July 2016

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The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

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VOLUME: 1 - ISSUE: 4 - JUly - 2016

Columns: Musings Of An Axolotl -C.S.Lakshmi P&P - Yonason Goldson Talespin - Era.Murukan Flash Fiction: Jeff Coleman Verse Novel - Book Excerpts: Chris Mooney-Singh Poetry:

Vyjayanthi Subramaniyan

Sadiqullah Khan

Debasis Mukhopadhyay

John Looker

Norbert Gora

Fiction:

Dave Ludford

Jayanthi Sankar Non-Fiction: Theatre

C.Raveendran Author Interview:

Kerry J Donovan / P.C.Zick

10 26 15 19 66 22 59 40 53 87 32 43 89 69

THE WAGON MAGAZINE KGE TEAM 4/4, FIRST FLOOR, R.R.FLATS, FIRST STREET, VEDHACHALA NAGAR, KODAMBAKKAM, CHENNAI - 600 024 Phone: +91-9382708030 e-mail: thewagonmagazine@gmail.com www.thewagonmagazine.com The deeper a well is dug, the more the water that springs; the more one learns, the more the wisdom it brings - Thirukkural -396 The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

PRASAD'S POST Life… is complicated.

One lives many lives among life.

I am a product of many lives.

I am synthetic; human and Complex.

I am just a product of the evolution through the ions: Then, who am I? *** When I am writing this, Nice was not NICE! Gone Turkey…. Noooo! It didn’t go cold! *** A press release by Human Security Report Project - (HSRP) School for international studies, places a couple of quotes, contradicting each other, before us to ponder: 1: In 2011, Harvard University’s Steven Pinker asserted that, “we may be living in the most peaceful era in our species’ existence” 2: In 2012, Martin Dempsey, Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff claimed that today’s world has become, “more dangerous than it has ever been” The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

4 They pin point clearly the vast chasm between these two extremes. On one side we have those who judge that the world has become less war-prone and on the other we see the ‘pessimists’ who argue that the global security environment has gone down and it is dangerous.

Let us take Steven Pinker: Steven Pinker, a professor of psychology at Harvard University, is the author of the best-selling books, “How the Mind Works,” and “The Blank Slate.” His latest work is an ambitious attempt to understand the origins, history-and perhaps the future-of human violence. The book is called ‘The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined,’ and it combines science with history to conclude that, by many measures, we live in the best of times, not the worst.

He answers in his interview to Gareth Cook, editor of ‘Mind Matters’, when questioned on the biggest misconception people have about violence?, ‘…That we are living in a violent age’! He continues by assuring us that the statistics suggest that this may be the most peaceable time in our species’ existence. See how he portrays the violent life among us; say before 500 to thousand years: “Statistics aside, accounts of daily life in medieval and early modern Europe reveal a society soaked in blood and gore. Medieval knights—whom today we would call warlords—fought their numerous private wars with a single strategy: kill as many of the opposing knight’s peasants as possible. Religious instruction included prurient descriptions of how the saints of The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

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both sexes were tortured and mutilated in ingenious ways. Corpses broken on the wheel, hanging from gibbets, or rotting in iron cages where the sinner had been left to die of exposure and starvation were a common part of the landscape.

For entertainment, one could nail a cat to a post and try to head-butt it to death, or watch a political prisoner get drawn and quartered, which is to say partly strangled, disembowelled, and castrated before being decapitated.

So many people had their noses cut off in private disputes that medical textbooks had procedures that were alleged to grow them back.”

We are aware of the word, today, ‘berserk’ which describes anyone in an irrational and agitated state of mind, and who has no power over his or her actions or reactions. The meaning of the word originates with the Viking berserkers, the fierce warriors who were known for battling in an uncontrollable, trance-like fury, and were alleged to be able to perform seemingly impossible super-human feats of strength. Adding to their ferocity, and in order to intimidate the enemy, they would wear bear and wolf pelts when they fought, giving them the name Berserker, meaning “bear coat” The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

6 in Old Norse. The Icelandic historian and poet Snorri Sturluson (1179–1241 AD) wrote the following description of berserkers in his Ynglinga saga: “His (Odin’s) men rushed forwards without armour, were as mad as dogs or wolves, bit their shields, and were strong as bears or wild oxen, and killed people at a blow, but neither fire nor iron told upon them.”

Self-induced hysteria before fighting, sorcery, the consumption of drugs or alcohol, or even mental illness, the ingestion of the plant known as bog myrtle and even possession of animal spirits of wolves or bears (animal totemism) are claimed as some of the causes of their behaviour by various research groups.

Mathew Arnold sums this up as , “Against this ideal are arrayed all the undisciplined forces of the age—prejudice, narrowness, the worship of liberty for liberty’s sake, faith in machinery whether governmental, economic, or religious—in short an unthinking individualism that leads to anarchy. English society may be divided into three classes—Barbarians, Philistines, and Populace. The Barbarians or aristocracy have a superficial sweetness and light but are too much concerned with the maintenance and enjoyment of their privileges to attain a true sense of beauty and a free mental activity. The Philistines or middle classes are devoted to money-making and a narrow form of religion and are indifferent or hostile to beauty. The Populace are violent in their prejudices and brutal in their pleasures.”

Getting back to Pinker, he, also, discusses in detail the ‘long peace,’ the period of calm in Europe after World War II and refers to people who want the nuclear bomb should be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, since it scared the major powers away from war by equating it with doomsday, though he himself is sceptical, quoting some valid reasons: “there are reasons to be sceptical. One is that World War II proved that conventional warfare in modern times was already plenty destructive. The fear of conventional World-War-II-style war would have been enough to scare the major powers away from a repeat performance. Another is that nuclear weapons have, fortunately, acquired such an apocalyptic aura that the threat is seen more The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

7 as a bluff than a deterrent, which is why non-nuclear powers have repeatedly defied the nuclear ones (Argentina vs. Britain in 1982, Egypt vs. Israel in 1973, Iraq vs. the US in 1991 and 2003, and so on). Better candidates include conventional deterrence, the spread of democracy, the expansion of international trade, the growth of international organizations, and the gradual eclipsing of the value of national and ethnic grandeur by the value of human rights—a hard-won lesson of the two world wars.”

Though wars between developed countries, in his opinion, might not take place any time soon,“…. violence against women, the criminalization of homosexuality, the use of capital punishment, the callous treatment of animals on farms, corporal punishment of children, and other violent social practices will continue to decline, based on the fact that worldwide moralistic shaming movements in the past (such as those against slavery, whaling, piracy, and punitive torture) have been effective over long stretches of time….. But civil wars, terrorist acts, government repression, and genocides in backward parts of the world are simply too capricious to allow predictions. With six billion people in the world, there’s no predicting what some cunning fanatic or narcissistic despot might do.”

Pinker concludes, in absolute confidence, that the present looks less sinister, the past less innocent. The mind always focuses on current threats, and takes for granted the violent events that don’t happen but could easily have happened a few decades ago. A sniper in Norway kills dozens of innocent people—and the population does not riot or lynch the perpetrator and his extended family, but holds candlelight vigils. The Egyptian government falls—but the new one does not vow to push the Israelis into the sea. North Korea sinks a South Korean ship, killing 45 sailors—but instead of escalating to war, the Koreans go back to life as usual. “Every day I notice the dogs that don’t bark.”

Let us move on to the ‘pessimists’: “The hundred years after 1900 were without question the bloodiest century in modern history, far more violent in relative as well as absolute terms than any previous era. . . . By any measure the Second The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

8 World War was the greatest man-made catastrophe of all time. . . .

There was not a single year before, between or after the world wars that did not see large-scale violence in one part of the world or another.” – This, Niall Ferguson writes in his introduction to his book, ‘The War of the World: Twentieth-Century Conflict and the Descent of the West.’

His analysis in this book fascinates while frightens too! He blames not on more modern efficient weaponry and fascist governments; he elucidates ethnic conflict, economic volatility and empires in decline as the true grounds.

“To appreciate Ferguson’s view, we only need to reflect on the history of the last 100 years. Waning empires in their death struggles, countries and ideologies vying for supremacy, major powers using surrogates as chess pieces, peoples and tribes seeking payback for earlier offences and each acting out their fractious nature and temper—person against person, neighbour against neighbour, poor against rich, uneducated against intelligentsia, ethnic and religious and social groups against each other—until an estimated 167 million to 188 million people of the ostensibly best and highest and latest culture the long history of mankind had to offer, were shovelled into early graves.

In ‘Gendercide—The war on baby girls,’ published on March 10, 2010, The Economist notes that during the same period 100 million females were purged from the human race because they were considered less worthy than males” – in http://www.vision.org Stephen Elliott quotes.

The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

9 He continues – “In discussing the ends of empires witnessed during the 20th century, Ferguson observes that the most violent period of any empire, country or ideology is during its death struggle. This is when rebellions are spawned, and are countered with what he calls ‘exemplary brutality’ by the established ruling class.

Ferguson also graphically illustrates that people take advantage of chaos to take what they want: attack other tribes or religions, and exact revenge for previous grievances whether real or imagined”.

True, as Ferguson says the World War I ‘was a senseless, bloody brawl’. Elliot analyses further to say, “But this was a war unique in the history of warfare and it laid a foundation for a new approach to war that has prevailed since. The emerging technology provided machine guns, tanks, poison gas, aircraft that were all deployed in the carnage.

The aftermath of this war and the Second World War was the end of empire as the Europeans had known it over the past centuries, and it came with tremendous bloodshed. However, large-scale warfare enabled by technology was not the only contributing factor to the high death toll of the 20th century. Adding to the record of violence was the wholesale murder of civilized societies by their own leaders.”

Though not accurate, it is estimated that, Stalin is thought to have been responsible for the deaths of 20 million and Lenin tens of millions in the Soviet Union; Mao’s rule resulted in the deaths of several tens of millions of Chinese; Pol Pot killed 20 percent of the population of Cambodia. This pattern was reflected elsewhere in Southeast Asia, Africa, Eastern Europe, the Balkans, Mexico, and Central and South America. They blanketed their objectives in the slogans of ‘liberty, freedom, and democracy’ while the real motives were ‘tribal, religious or cultural conflicts’; or ‘greed for supreme godlike power or wealth’.

Joseph Stalin is supposed to have said, “One death is a tragedy, a million deaths is only a statistic.”

Think of the common man while multitudes are driven to the wall!

The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

10 Stephen Hawking asked the question, “In a world that is in chaos politically, socially and environmentally, how can the human race sustain another 100 years? I don’t know the answer. That is why I asked the question.”

Religion also continues to play its part in promoting the difference between people in terms of eternal rewards and punishments. Sam Harris, author of ‘Letter to a Christian Nation’, observes, “Faith inspires violence in two ways. First, people often kill other human beings because they believe the creator of the universe wants them to do it…

Second, far greater numbers of people fall into conflict with one another because they define their moral community on the basis of their religious affiliation: Muslims side with Muslims, Protestants with Protestants, Catholics with Catholics.” From the fighting that has plagued Palestine for the past six decades (Jews vs. Muslims), to the dispute over Kashmir (Muslims vs.

Hindus). Also, there’s Nigeria (Muslims vs. Christians), Philippines (Muslims vs. Christians), Iraq (Sunni Muslims vs. Shiite), Sudan (Muslims vs. Christians), Sri Lanka (Sinhalese Buddhists vs. Tamil Hindus), and the Caucasus region (Orthodox Russians vs. Chechen Muslims). While most of them have basis in disputes over land and political supremacy, it’s actually the religious belief that forms the terms of the conflicts.

Charles Kimball’s book ‘When Religion Becomes Evil’ claims: “It is somewhat trite, but nevertheless sadly true, to say that more wars have been waged, more people killed, and these days more evil perpetrated in the name of religion than by any other institutional force in human history.”

Could you see the so-‘called’ secularism anywhere?

Does the wind blow everywhere? Then, are we living in the ‘wasteland’?

Krishna Prasad

a. k. a

11 MUSINGS OF AN AXOLOTL

C.S.LAKSHMI

WITH DANCE SHOES IN SIBERIAN SNOWS

Chithan

I am not a translator but occasionally I get tempted to translate a poem in English to Tamil or translate some poems in Hindi to Tamil. But one book I really wanted to translate at one point was Sandra Kalniete’s With Dance Shoes in Siberian Snows. Sandra Kalniete who grew up under Soviet propaganda, discovered at the age of 35 not only the real history of Latvia but her own family history. It was a shock to say the least. To find out that your personal memories of your country and your family have been distorted and flawed can be a shattering experience. But Sandra Kalniete rose to the occasion and decided to find out the truth about both her family and her nation.

The result is this book which delves into documents and memories hitherto unshared and rewrites and resurrects a buried and hidden history.

Sandra Kalniete’s need to delve into the history of her family which was so entwined with that of her nation began in 1987,

The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

12 when a small group of dissidents held the first public demonstrations protesting Soviet deportations of Latvians to Siberia.

The protesters gathered to place flowers at the Freedom Monument in Riga. Sandra Kalniete stood with the crowd of sympathizers crying as she watched people sinking to their knees praying to Mother Latvia. She did not dare to cross the road and join the protesters as they were surrounded

by Soviet militiamen and Chekists (Soviet Secret Police). There was so much inculcated fear in her inherited from her deported family although they told her nothing about their deportation days. But later she became one of the leaders in the Latvian struggle for independence.

Sandra’s mother Ligita Dreifelde was fourteen and a half years old in June 1941 when she was deported with her mother and father to Siberia not knowing they were being deported. They were told that they were only being shifted to Ogre, seventy kilometres away. They took many things with them including butter in a five-litre can thinking they would need basic utensils and food when they reach Ogre.

But they never reached Ogre. They were put in cattle-cars choking with people and after three days’ wait at a midway station, the names of deportees were called out and the train headed out. People tried to throw out small notes to let their relatives know about their fate.

The Dreifelds were too depressed to write, says the author. When the train crossed the border of Latvia at Zilupe, in a tear-choked voice her grandfather Janis, grandmother Emilija and the fourteen-and-ahalf-year-old Ligita, who would later be Sandra Kalniete’s mother, sang a folksong, “Fare thee well, my midland country, I will walk your paths no more…”. It was thus that her mother’s family together with more than fifteen thousand other unfortunates left Latvia. It was the first anniversary of the Soviet Occupation of Latvia. Many never returned. The women and children were separated from the men and women at a particular station and those who protested were calmed The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

13 down by the Chekists who explained that this was being done for humane considerations of the Soviet… as it was “immoral for women and men to be together for an extended period in such close quarters” as it “did not comply with Soviet rules of order.”

They were told that the families would be reunited at the final destination. And they believed them. Grandfather Janis gave them a light suitcase to carry thinking he would carry the heavy ones himself later. Hence Ligita and her mother were dressed lightly and Ligita only had her dance shoes with her to walk on the Siberian snows. They had been lovingly bought by her brother just the previous day, for her school dance, which she had remembered to pack. They never saw or heard of Grandfather Janis until April 1990 when Ligita received a notice from the State Security Committee of the Latvian SSR that he had died on December 31, 1941, six months after his deportation and six days before his sixty-third birthday. Emilija, Sandra Kalniete’s grandmother died in Togur in 1950 never to see Latvia again.

Sandra Kalniete’s father Aivars Kalnietis, was seventeen when he was deported along with his mother in 1949. His father Aleksndrs had continued to resist the Soviet occupiers and belonged to a group of partisans called “forest brethren”. Alexksandrs had been arrested in the fall of 1945 and underwent a protracted torture in the cellars of Cheka and was later deported to Siberia. He died in one of the prison camps in 1953 without knowing that he had become a grandfather.

Aivars and Ligita met in Siberia and married in 1951. Sandra Kalniete was born in Siberia in 1952. Her parents had to register twice every month at the commandant’s office. A month after her birth Sandra also had to be registered. Sandra Kalniete says her father and mother did not wish to give any more slaves to the Soviet regime. So she has no brothers and sisters. In May 1957 they returned to Latvia.

The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

14 Diaries and letters and official documents are used in the book to construct the memories of a family and a nation. It takes all of this for Sandra Kalniete to understand why after every meal her mother breaks a piece of bread into two and hands over a piece to her husband and why both of them then carefully begin to wipe their plates clean so that not a drop of sauce or crumbs of bread remain on the plates. Even after more than forty years of their return from Siberia, the starvation they experienced has scarred them for life. To this day her mother often wakes up with a dreadful dream. “Again it is night and someone is knocking at the door. Strange men enter and order her to get ready. The deportation nightmare begins…” and her mother in despair thinks: “The last time it was a dream. Now it is real.”

Sandra Kalniete ends the book with these lines about her mother after the nightmare. “On waking she gazes long into the empty night until she calms down and understands: she is home again. In Latvia.”

The cold official documents, the heartrending letters people exchange, the diary notes and the suppressed feelings even after returning to Latvia, brought back for me, memories of so many others who had to leave their homes similarly all over the world, in the recent past, never to return, holding on to a language, some faded photos and memories of unexpressed love, unwritten letters and unspoken words. These painful journeys forced by war, civil war, terrorism and political instability trample over so many lives, so many emotions. And the scars remain for life.

When I read the portion on Sandra Kalniete’s birth in December 1952 in Siberia, I thought of my own life then. I was eight years old and all set to go from Mumbai to Bengaluru, which was Bangalore then, to join a school there. I was going to be put in Class IV and my only worry then was that my English was so bad that I might not make it to the next class. While I often stood outside the class for poor marks in English, Sandra Kalniete’s parents would have stood outside the commandant’s office to register her. For those of us who grew up in the fifties nation and patriotism were words deeply connected with our lives but we took our nation so much for granted and never thought anyone could force us to leave it. It is later that The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

15 stories of Partition, concentration camps, occupations of countries and fights for liberation, came to us.

After reading Sandra Kalniete’s book I often wonder what I would carry with me if asked to pack and leave my land. Ligita, her mother, packs perfumes and creams and other knick knacks in a small blue suitcase thinking she is going only seventy miles away until her mother upturns the content on to the bed saying she cannot carry any of those. I also used to have a small blue suitcase. What would I put in it? Books, photos, certificates, the coral chain my mother gifted me or would I be sentimental enough to carry a handful of soil?

Many years ago I was in Colombo for a seminar and at the departure lounge in the airport I saw a lady clutching a jasmine plant with its roots in soil wrapped in plastic. I asked her where she was going.

She said she was going to join her daughter in Switzerland and that her daughter liked jasmine flowers a lot. Would jasmines grow in Switzerland? She had no idea but thought her daughter would somehow make it grow. When I think of this Colombo airport scene, I am reminded of my maternal grandparents’ house on Ponnurangam Veedhi, R S Puram, in Coimbatore. It had a fairly large front garden where among other flower plants, there were jasmine plants. I can still smell those jasmines I used to pluck along with my grandfather in the mornings. In the final count it is always fragrance of flowers, smell and taste of food, sound of songs and words and floating faces that you carry. And there are no suitcases that would hold them.

C S Lakshmi is a researcher and a writer who

writes in the pen name - Ambai. She is one of the founder trustees of SPARROW (Sound & Picture Archives for Research on Women) and currently its director.

The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

16

TALESPIN

www.toonpool.com

Era.Murukan

What the stars foretell and the sub-text…

I just glanced through the astrological forecast for the week of my star sign, that was published in an internet magazine. The 300 word weekly prediction written in a tech-savvy manner nudges me to stir out without losing further time and acquire a few high-duty electrical appliances like a state of the art cooking range for my kitchen, as this is best time for me to procure assets of this kind. It also hints at my front loading washing machine becoming non-functional any time this week and that by tying a green piece of cloth on my left wrist, I can turn my luck around to be positive.

Now, I am surprised beyond any reasonable limit as to how and why the stars and planet constellations that constitute the universe and are in perpetual motion, take all the trouble to make it favourable time for a tiny, insignificant speck of galactic sub-particle The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

17 dust like me, to procure a cooking range with the most recent design features that include a 6 mm thick glass ceramic cooking surface on a couple of independently controlled induction zones with a power of 3.5 kw per zone, all coming with a sleek illuminated console control?

And why would the same stars come up with a sinister plot to make my turbo wash machine to stop unannounced its lovely hum and go on to add to the entropy in the isolated system, which my house always is.

Not only that, I am aghast to find the cyber oracle rounds up his or her forecast with a strict warning: ‘Don’t have any interactions of whatsoever kind with thy neighbours, this week’.

I am aghast at the last byte of astro-advice as my ground-floor and up-one-floor neighbours are in perfect bonhomie and harmony with us for the past thirty years or so. We, all the good folks we are, have met around 20 times in these 30 years on the elevator and have had exchanged smiles as elevator communication every time we went up or down. I don’t think they will be envious if I go for a new cooking range or they would be a part of the faceless gang who would render my washing machine unusable.

It is lamentable that all the technological advancement in the form of broadband internet dished out as 3G and 4G net connectivity has to end up at the binary doors of digital morons, like the folks behind the internet magazine I read.

I have come across another form of net astrology with no free counselling to un-friend my neighbour. It normally goes on with suggestions of the sapphire and emerald kind. The pith astro column would as a matter of fact observe that by wearing my blue diamond ring on my left index finger (note, index finger) my promotion in office will be a cake-walk and by wearing pure gold in the form of a necklace, my luck will be in ascendance especially if I indulge in horse racing, lottery or betting wherever it is allowed. Taking fourweeks predictions together, a quick reckoning will yield the observation that I may require at least 10 different rings with embedded precious stones, a gold necklace, a pair of ear rings and diamond studded nose rings, the last three compulsory pieces of jewellery not The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

18 suitable for me, a forty plus greying at the temples, Indian male. And even if I am ready to wear these cranky ornaments, I may have to invest a million rupees an year to keep my ornamental inventory position up-to-date, in sync with what my stars foretell. I have a vague doubt that these predictions are published at the instance of a cartel of all jewellers, small or big breathing around now.

I remember going through an article at another astro-site with a tag labelling the column as ‘Chinese astrology’. The Chinese, I learnt by the time I read the article in full, do not go by star signs nor guided by the axiom, ‘diamonds are forever’. Rather, they base their sooth-saying and crystal glazing on the birth dates. And it is not a miserly weekly prediction but it covers the entire year we are talking about.

I with trepidation glided through the drop-down menus that obtain the information from me on my year, month and date of birth and the page opened up immediately with all and sundry predicting good for me in the forthcoming year. It is going to be a period in which financial income is going to rain in incessantly for me from all sources known and hitherto unknown to me. To make the cash-flow smooth and non-stop, all I have to do is to have a Mandarin goose in my bed room.

I rubbed my eyes in disbelief and read it again. Yes, I understood it correctly –I should have a Mandarin goose in my bed room.

Now, I don’t think with a live goose quacking in the bed room and wobbling around, it would be possible to have a peaceful sleep. Still worse, the goose may climb up the bed and since not house-trained, it may soil my blanket or my face or both.

As at cue, I went through the Chinese predictions for all my family members, my in-laws and, after a series of invented elevator meetings with my neighbours, for them too. I was keen to find out which animal or bird each of them should have in the bed room. Of course, in our master bed room, we cannot afford to have the junior entering with a squirrel, the sub junior with a rabbit, mother-in-law with a Cheshire cat and father-in-law with a guinea pig. It is after all a bed room and not a mini zoological park. And horror of horrors, The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

19 how can one anticipate one’s life partner entering the bed room with a monkey jumping and diving merrily?

Chinese are not that cruel, I found. Whatever be the date of birth, each of us had received a suggestion to go to bed with a Mandarin goose. It would certainly be not the night of the iguana but could be the night of geese for the whole residential apartment building tonight, tomorrow and thereafter.

Whatever grouse we harbour against astrology, it has to be agreed that, thirty years ago, astrological columns which were published in various newspapers, were much practical and in a sense ‘healthier’.

‘The planet Saturn is looking at your birth star and to ward off any difficulty you may face because of it, visit the village shrine every Sunday evening; light a lamp with sesame oil and go round the abode of Saturn in the shrine for a minimum 31 times; that is, clockwise laps. You will have all your days filled with happiness and will be successful’. Thus ran the predictions of those days.

Asking the reader to visit the temple where you worship and socialize; light a lamp within the precincts, making the pathways brighter and going round the abode of Saturn under the neem tree, 31 times, breathing fresh air and getting the much wanted exercise to your limbs, these predictions offered the best psychological and health counselling with the least financial outlay. The simple and plain astrologers of the past are to be venerated for their service to humanity, even if you do not believe in their trade.

Murugan Ramasami • Techno banker and project management professional heading large banking IT projects in UK, Thailand and USA • An author with 28 books to his credit, novelist, short story writer, poet, tech-travel-humor columnist (Tamil and English) • Playwright in Tamil • Movie script - dialogue writer • Translator from Malayalam, English to Tamil The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

20 FLASH FICTION

JEFF COLEMAN

His Domain

A gust of frigid night air blew past James as he wound through the park, making him shiver. Like a dream, only he knew he wasn’t asleep. The world was unnaturally quiet and still. There was only the wind, whistling and sighing like a mournful spirit.

Orange lamps lit the edges of an asphalt path, but the dim illumination only seemed to hint at all the things it refused to reveal.

So many dark corners and hidden shadows… Anything could be out there, watching, waiting, hunting.

What was most distressing was that he couldn’t remember why he was there. Memory was a vague thing, a thin mist that parted and evaporated whenever he reached for it.

James’s eyes flitted from one shadow to the next. He licked The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

21 his lips. They felt cold and dry. The wind was blowing harder now, trees swaying back and forth to a harsh rhythm. Leaves and branches played a haunting tune, a dry rasping sound.

James caught sudden movement to his right. He whirled, strained hearing to the point of breaking. But there was nothing.

More movement to his left... The merest flicker just at the edge of vision... Again he whirled and again there was nothing.

James ran. Lamps and trees streaked past in a blur until his sides ached and his breath started coming in ragged irregular puffs.

He had no idea where he was going, no idea what he was running from, only that he couldn’t stop, that stopping meant dying.

It seemed the trees and the asphalt went on forever. He could make out buildings on the horizon, a smattering of yellow-orange windows like distant stars, but running never seemed to bring him any closer.

James’s heart pounded faster, until it was a high frequency beat that made him feel lightheaded. Eventually he stopped, and when he couldn’t catch his breath he fell to his knees, gulping for air. He wanted to keep running, but when he tried to scramble to his feet he only succeeded in falling to his hands and knees once more.

“Why do you run from me?”

James froze. He tried to discern the voice’s source, but it moaned and whistled with the wind so that it seemed to come from everywhere at once.

“They all do, you know. They all believe they can escape. They think that if they only run fast enough, that if they only run long enough, they can get away, that they can cheat me out of what’s always been mine.”

The wind was now whipping at James’s hair and clothes in a violent gale.

A figure emerged from the shadows, not from a place of hiding amongst the shadows but from within the shadows themselves. It loomed over him, donning the blackness like a cloak.

James wanted to scream, to summon anyone who might be close enough to help. But whatever sound he’d wanted to make had The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

22 gotten caught in his throat. Finally, in a hoarse whisper, he croaked, “Who are you?”

“Yes,” the figure mused in that same elemental voice, “and they always ask me the same thing. Who am I? Why have I come?

And you know, they all know the answer before they even ask. Deep down, they’ve always known the answer.”

The figure knelt before him, and as he leaned in with a face that was shrouded in darkness, the air grew colder. “Have you figured out who I am?”

James had lost most of his body’s warmth. He shuddered, hugged himself with shaking arms. “Death.”

“Yes.” James’s vision blurred, around the edges.

“You’ve come to take me,” said James, Death undulating before him in the dark. “Because… I’m yours.”

“Yes, you are.”

The blackness enfolded him, blinded him.

A breeze grazed the surface of his left ear like a kiss. “Death is my domain.”

A flicker of consciousness, like a sputtering flame, and then James went to join Death in the dark.

Jeff Coleman is Modern Literary Fantasy Author who finds himself drawn to the dark and the mysterious, and to all the extraordinary things that regularly hide in the shadow of ordinary life. He writes modern literary fantasy for children and adults.

He is from California.He blogs @ http:// blog.jeffcolemanwrites.com./ The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

23

Dr.Vyjayanthi Subramanian - poems

CARE

Before you cut down the unwanted Flowers Before you prosecute the trespassers Before you smother the voice Look at the bleeding fence Hear the guitar weeping This wall did not play It cared for the flowers.

Sometimes for the bloody Hands of the trespasser

The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

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MRS HAVISHAM

25

USING WORDS

Estella met a new Mrs. Havisham Long after Dickens died She was married With children But the warning remained the same...

Turn them down Never love Stop the clock at 11am No one is happy ever after Do not listen to Beatles Ah...Don’t look at all those Lonely people....

Loneliest are married...

The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

You waited till I finished my speech Ladies first?

I thought it to be chivalry You were sharpening your nails Building your muscles To hit me hard at my innards I only used words You used everything else.

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27 PROVERBS & PROVIDENCE

It was perhaps destined that I fall in love with a man Who loved himself more than I ever could In that arduous process He taught me to love myself....

Each turn that offended him, I felt the insult that had not offended me...

Whenever he did fling my womanliness to render me weak, I felt the vulnerability of his desire His misinterpretations of me Showed that he was used to Submissions Manipulations of his vanity....

He had surrendered to sensations I did not reflect him...

He saw only his reflections....

I heard ‘ Echo’ the woman Had chosen to love narcissus retaining her voice....

ECHO The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

YONASON GOLDSON

Near Death Experience

You’re ten years old and a sound sleeper, so it’s already unusual that something has woken you up in the middle of the night. You go out into the hall to investigate. There are strangers in the house and flashing lights out the window. Your father tells you to go back to bed.

When you wake up the next morning, your mother has disappeared from your life.

It’s 1970, before school counselors or lettered conditions like PTSD. Your father means well, but he’s not the communicative type, not one for expressing his feelings to others or eliciting others to share their feelings with him. He’s from the Depression Era, and he barely saw his own father growing up during those desperate years.

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28

He’s a veteran of the Second World War; difficulties are part of life.

He’s also dealing with his own trauma, as his wife lingers between life and death.

You get shipped off to stay with friends, or with your grandmother. Very little is explained to you, and you understand even less.

Years later, there won’t be much that you remember, aside from the indelible images of that first night.

You won’t remember waking up the next morning to find your grandmother home with you instead of you parents. You won’t remember when they took you to visit your mother one last time because no one thought she had much time left. You won’t remember shouting at her for having abandoned you. You won’t remember the outgoing, cheerful little boy you were before that cold, winter’s night.

You only remember how hard it was for you to talk to people from that moment forward. You remember how easily you cried during the years that followed, and how much you hated yourself for crying so easily without understanding what made you that way.

You remember how you considered taking your own life, but always managed to convince yourself that you could do it tomorrow.

A decade passes before you really recover. In some ways, you never recover at all. ✽ My mother had gone in for her annual checkup when a routine chest x-ray revealed a tumor the size of a pea on one of her ribs.

It turned out to be benign, and the surgeon removed the tumor without incident. The doctors sent her home early from the hospital.

A few days later my mother returned to have the stitches removed. She remembers a distracted intern taking her into a supply closet to remove her stitches without first washing his hands. She thought nothing of it at the time.

The next morning she could barely get out of bed, and barely made it back to bed once she was up. Her temperature spiked and she couldn’t unclench her hands. The ambulance took her to the The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

29 hospital about midnight.

It was 4 AM before she was taken off the gurney. Her temperature was over 105 and her blood pressure was 0. They wrapped her in an ice blanket and put her on an IV. She didn’t eat or drink again for two months.

The doctors diagnosed her with consumptive coagulopathy, now better known as disseminated intravascular coagulation (DIC).

It’s sort of the opposite of hemophilia, where the body’s clotting mechanism accelerates until the victim’s blood turns into molasses and refuses to circulate. My mother was the sixth case at UCLA medical center. The first five had died before any course treatment could be determined.

One doctor told my grandmother her daughter’s life wasn’t worth a plugged nickel. Another told my father there was no hope.

For the next six weeks, he steeled himself every time the phone rang, expecting to hear the worst.

But one doctor didn’t give up. Larry Johnson, head of infectious diseases, told his colleagues that he wasn’t going to let a 42-yearold woman die without a fight. They replied that he was wasting his time. He ignored them and put my mother on a new drug called Vacumiacin, then began administering massive blood transfusions.

It was 1971, two year before the first AIDS contaminated blood appeared at UCLA. From the shock of the disease, my mother’s kidneys shut down so that she needed three five-hour dialysis treatments each week.

Fluids built up in her body until doctors restricted her to two teaspoons of ice per day. She developed thrush, like a baby, and her veins collapsed like an octogenarian. Her hair broke off like straw.

She couldn’t talk and began hallucinating.

My father almost never left her side. The nurses told her later they had never seen such devotion.

At the six week mark, my mother turned a corner. Body functions started to return. New fingernails started to grow under the old, cracked ones. She couldn’t stop drinking fluids. They brought her cottage cheese and Jell-O, which tasted better than anything she The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

30 could imagine.

Her muscles had atrophied, so she had to learn to walk all over again. The drugs had scorched the cilia in her ear, and she never fully recovered her balance. From the blood transfusions, she contracted hepatitis and spent the next six months in bed. At five-feet, seven-inches tall, she weighed 107 pounds when she came home.

The doctors never did determine how she became infected.

The head of hematology dropped by to wish her well and say how happy he was that she would be going home. He said he never believed she had a chance. It was the first time she knew how close to death she had been. ✽ Larry Johnson, who saved my mother’s life, died of a heart attack a few years later. He was barely 50 years old.

My mother, she should be well, turns 88 next month and is sharper than ever. She has lived to see her 50th wedding anniversary, to enjoy her four grandchildren, and to attend the wedding of her oldest granddaughter. She spends most of her time playing mahjongg and bridge, and cursing the incompetence of Washington politicians.

She says that when her ordeal was over, she resolved to take more pleasure in life, to enjoy all the good and not let little things upset her. She says that her resolution wore off almost instantaneously.

There’s a lesson in that for all of us.

As for me, my entire personality changed… or so I’m told. It would be easy to mourn for the person I might have been, for the life I might have lived had I retained my youthful self-confidence, escaped the curse of hyper-self-consciousness, and remained emotionally unscarred. But that little boy turned off onto a different fork in the road and disappeared from the world many years ago.

Who knows what might have been? My mother once told me that everyone has to pay dues, and that if we pay them early we may not have to pay them later on. Fate and fortune reveal themselves The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

31 over time, not in the moment. That’s why at least half of lottery winners eventually say that riches ruined their lives -- which doesn’t stop the rest of us from buying tickets.

When there are no cattle, says King Solomon, the manger remains clean; but much harvesting lies in the strength of an ox.

Navy SEALS only become Navy SEALS by going through pain. The pain of childbirth is what brings us all into the world.

People who overcome obstacles often recognize that early challenges prepared them for later success. And we all know how pointless it is to cry over spilled milk.

But that knowledge rarely guides our reactions. When we miss a red light, instead of cursing our luck shouldn’t we be grateful for the traffic system that keeps us safe? When an amber alert interrupts the movie we’re watching, instead of cursing the network shouldn’t we offer up a prayer for the missing child? When our favorite mug slips from our fingers and spews coffee and ceramic shards across the kitchen floor, instead of cursing our own clumsiness shouldn’t we be thankful that we didn’t stain the carpet, and that we have another mug in the cupboard?

Isn’t it mortifying to contemplate how many trivial inconveniences we equate with the end of the world, which are so often symptoms of our prosperity?

But what if it’s something bigger, like a tree crashing through the roof or a truck broadsiding our car? Still, shouldn’t we praise the guiding hand of Fate that allowed us to escape with only a few scrapes and bruises? Isn’t it proper to acknowledge that a cut finger isn’t a broken finger, that a broken finger isn’t a broken back, that a broken back isn’t the end of a life, that the end of life is something we will all have to face sooner or later?

Indeed, even if we feel that the past has dealt with us unfairly, if we’re happy with who we are now, would we dare risk changing a single detail of the history that brought us here? One tiny change or one minor revision could so easily transform the flapping of a butterfly’s wings into a tempest that whisks us away to an alternative existence much different from our own, and perhaps much worse.

The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

32 And what if we’re not happy with who and where we are? It doesn’t matter, since we still cannot change the past. But that doesn’t mean we can’t change the future by taking charge of the present. After all, one heroic doctor wouldn’t accept the conventional wisdom of his peers, rejected the consensus of the experts, refused to stand by and let a woman die. Instead, he saved a life and changed the world.

To whom could I feel gratitude if I could change the past so that none of it had ever happened?

As unimaginable as it might once have seemed, looking back, I wouldn’t change a thing. And looking forward, who knows what changes the future may bring.

33

Fiction

Dave ludford

U-r-s-u-l-a Literary magazines can continue to perform a useful role only if they continue to forge new connections. Please get connected.

Contribute your literary creations.

Subscribe so that the magazine could serve better.

Recommend the magazine to your literary circle.

Contact: thewagonmagazine@gmail.com The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

Four months of intensely hot, dry weather had baked the earth hard and cracks split the ground like the deep lines that etched the faces of the old men in the village, lines that had grown deeper with worry as crops and cattle perished. Everyone prayed for rain; for relief from the merciless heat that sapped away one’s strength and determination to continue with the daily struggle for survival. A heavy air of tension hung over the village like an invisible cloud that only broke on the day of the storm, and that was the day that Ursula vanished.

Ursula was the fourteen year-old daughter of Tamara, the widowed village midwife, and had not spoken since birth. She had The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

34 keenly intelligent eyes and a friendly, outgoing manner and was as strong as any boy her age in the village. She would help the men in the fields at harvest time, and often ran errands for villagers to make a bit of extra money, all of which she gave to her mother. She would often spend hours on end walking through the rolling hills and forests round about, being a loner by nature and given to prolonged periods of deep introspective thought. Her mother often wished that Ursula could communicate these thoughts, but was content that they did not cause bouts of melancholia in the child. As Ursula was too young to remember her father (having been only a few months old when he’d succumbed to fever and passed away after a week of fitful struggle) Tamara knew that his passing couldn’t be a source of mourning and grieving to her daughter. She often wondered however if Ursula gave any thought to what he’d been like.

The day of the storm began like every other had in the past four months; just a couple of hours after dawn the heat was already unbearable and the vultures, those ever-present speculative opportunists, gathered in numbers in the fields surrounding the village, waiting for the chance to pick at the flesh and bones of fallen cattle.

Tamara was not perturbed at finding that her daughter was not in her room, and had not joined her for breakfast. Ursula would often take herself off in the early morning to go walking. She noticed that Ursula’s bed had been slept in and that there were a couple of apples missing from the bowl on the kitchen table, so all seemed reasonably normal.

Mid-morning brought thunder that rolled through the valley sounding like the heavy boom of cannon fire, and forked lightning that lit up the firmament even against the backdrop of gathering clouds that were bruise-black. A few heavy drops of rain fell tentatively on the parched earth that sent steam hissing into the air; after a few minutes it became sotorrential that a steamy mist drifted towards the village. Within a short time the ground became a mud bath, the flash-flooding creating rivers of fast-flowing water. The men in the fields scattered, quickly abandoning what few crops remained and driving cattle ahead of them that seemed frustratingly stubborn and The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

35

unwilling to move even given the sudden change to violent, angry weather that seemed to be ripping apart both heaven and earth.

The vultures rose heavily, screaming and flapping furiously as they wheeled away to escape the fierce onslaught.

Tamara watched the men as they returned from the shelter of her cottage doorway as the driving rain turned the once dusty, heat-seared road into a snarling river. She experienced what at first was a mild tinge of unease in the pit of her stomach as she strained her eyes and noticed that her daughter wasn’t amongst them; so she hadn’t gone to help them in the fields this morning, therefore she must have gone walking in the hills or the forest, she concluded. The sodden, miserable-looking men drove the cattle into their barns then quickly dispersed to their own homes. As the rain continued to hammer down relentlessly she tried to reassure herself that her sensible and resourceful daughter had somewhere found adequate shelter. She turned and walked back into the cottage, closing the door firmly behind her.

A fresh and prolonged bout of thunder and lightning did little to calm Tamara’s increasingly fractious nerves and she began to pace up and down the small room while the rain battered against the windows. She was praying silently that the weather would lift and her daughter would become sufficiently encouraged to make the return journey home; she walked towards the window and peered into the gloom but could see virtually nothing. Maybe, she thought, if she were to run to her uncle’s cottage in the next street and explained the situation then perhaps he might organize a search party, despite the adverse conditions. She sat down and gave this idea serious consideration. They were a tight-knit community and surely there would be no shortage of volunteers willing to help. She realized that she needed to act fast if such a search party were to have any chance of success in what remained of the light, otherwise they would have to wait until morning and the thought of her daughter being out in the open all night, exposed, alone and frightened, filled her with horror.

She grabbed her shawl and rushed out of the cottage.

The rain had abated somewhat as she hurriedly trudged The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

36

through mud to reach the cottage of her uncle Saul, one of the village elders and a man of significant wealth and position within the village. Upon reaching his front door, she banged the heavy wood with her fist several times then stood back, shouting: “Uncle Saul! Please come to the door. It is I, Tamara! Please, I fear that Ursula has disappeared.”

The door was opened a few moments later by Saul’s second wife Jennifer; a small woman who radiated love and warmth and who loved her adopted family deeply.

“Tamara, what is this you are saying about our beloved Ursula?

She has disappeared? Please, come in quickly or you will catch your death from a chill.”

“Thank you, Jennifer,” Tamara replied, and advanced swiftly past her into the cottage.

“Now then, child, sit down and calm yourself and explain what has happened. Saul is feeding the chickens at the back but I will go and fetch him immediately.”

She bustled through the door from the living room and thence through the kitchen to the rear of the house and called her husband; they both returned within minutes and seated themselves opposite where Tamara sat, shivering and wringing her hands.

“Tamara, my beloved niece, what can have happened?” Saul said calmly. “Has Ursula gone on one of her long walks? She certainly wasn’t with us in the fields today. I’m sure she is safe and all is well.

You know how she loves to just wander off.”

His words did little to reassure Tamara, and she could see the impossible-to-hide look of grave concern on his face.

“But we must go and find her instantly,” Saul continued, sensing that Tamara was far from convinced.

“I’ll go now and round up some men and we’ll set out before it gets too dark.”

“Thank you, uncle,” Tamara replied, rising. “I’ll come with you, if I may.”

“You’ll do no such thing, my girl,” Jennifer interjected. “This is no sort of weather for you to be out rooting around God knows The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

37

where out there. Let the men search. Stay here with me; I’ll make us both a hot, soothing drink.” Tamara smiled and retook her seat.

Saul took his jacket which was hanging from a hook near the door and went out into the night, without uttering a further word.

He called upon his immediate neighbours Joshua, George, Jason, Ben, Matthew and Peter who in turn enlisted the aid of several of their sons until the search party reached eighteen in number. And thus they moved forward into the miserable night, with torches held high scanning the landscape and with a mixture of fear, hope and determination in their hearts. * “Are you hungry, child?”

Ursula, seated on a large boulder, nodded her head vigorously.

“I thought so. Perhaps a serving of my broth would serve to make you feel better.”

The old woman busied herself spooning soup from a large tureen into a small, clay bowl, which she then handed to the young girl along with a chunk of bread.

While Ursula ate, the old woman regarded her keenly, smiling.

“It’s lucky that Malkin found you when he did.” she said.

Ursula looked up briefly from her bowl, then dropped her head and continued eating.

“There are many evil trolls in this forest,” the old woman continued. “It’s no place for a child to be wandering alone, especially in stormy weather. The lightning invigorates their spirits. Recharges their energy, gives them new life. Seeing a human child in trouble and distress would make them feel very hungry, too; would give them a ravenous appetite. They love nothing better than the taste of young flesh.”

Ursula looked up from her eating once more and stared at the old woman, an open-mouthed expression of horror on her face.

“Sorry, child, I didn’t mean to frighten you,” the old woman said. “But it’s best that you are aware of the potential dangers you face out here. As I say, you were lucky;those evil ones were no match for Malkin.”

The old woman bent down and indulgently scratched behind The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

38 the ears of the large, leopard-like cat that was sprawled on the sandy floor of the cave. The cat rolled over, closing its eyes and purring heavily. Outside, the persistent hiss of rain could be heard, although the worst of the storm had passed over a few hours previously.

Ursula had slept for several hours after the exhaustion of her ordeal. The large cat, patrolling its territory in the forest, had encountered the half dozen or so evil spirits that had been taunting the little girl, who had backed herself against the trunk of an ancient, gnarled oak tree, looking frantically all around her for a place of safety to run to; but having had no experience of spirits, she was unsure where safe harbour or refuge could be found. She had begun crying when Malkin had sidled up to the clearing where this drama had been unfolding. Quickly assessing what was occurring, Malkin had emitted a roar, which had been virtually soundless to Ursula. She merely saw the huge beast open its ferocious jaws widely, exposing a mass of razor-sharp teeth, and emit a noise akin to that of the soft mewling of a domestic cat. The effect on the trolls however had been dramatic and devastating; they had clasped their ears with both hands as if to banish an excruciating, unbearably loud noise and had dissolved into nothingness after only a few seconds. Clearly the sound of the beast’s roar had been transmitted on a wavelength largely imperceptible to humans.

The huge cat had then casually walked towards Ursula, who had shown no fear; after all, it had dispensed with her evil tormentors. The beast had crouched down low, and Ursula, sensing what she must do, had climbed onto its back. She had thus been transported to this cave, the home of the old woman. Although it had still been raining heavily the cat seemed to radiate an invisible shield which surrounded Ursula, keeping her dry. The old woman had dried Ursula’s clothes by an open fire while the young girl slept.

“You do not speak,” the old woman said now, as Ursula finished eating and laid her bowl down on the ground. “Can you write down your name?”

Ursula searched around at her feet and quickly found what she was looking for; a small twig, which she picked up and used to The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

39 inscribe letters in the dust: U-R-S-U-L-A “A lovely name,” the old woman said. “I am called Celia. Once I was young and beautiful like you. And then, when I was not much older than you are now, I was driven from my village, many, many miles from here.”

Ursula tilted her head, a quizzical expression on her face, inviting elaboration. The old woman gave a small laugh before continuing: “I’m a white witch, Ursula, like my mother and my grandmother before me. I did good things, such as healing sick people and animals with my special herbal medicines. But one day a plague of locusts descended on our fields and destroyed our crops; it was utter devastation. My mother and I were blamed for summoning those hideous creatures from hell. My mother was murdered, but I managed to flee to safety, unharmed. I’ve lived in the vast forests and caves here ever since.”

Ursula shook her head, looking extremely sad upon hearing the old woman’s story.

“Do not be upset,” Celia said. “It was all so very long ago. Now hand me your bowl, girl. I’m sure you would enjoy some more soup.”

Ursula nodded and picked up her bowl. Just as she was handing it to Celia, there came the unmistakeable shouts of voices from outside, calling Ursula’s name. The young girl stood up quickly, pointing towards the cave’s entrance.

“Your people?” Celia said. “They have been searching for you.

I thought they would be coming for you eventually. Hurry, you must go to them. Ride upon Malkin, it will be quicker.”

The huge cat, understanding the old woman’s words, pricked up his ears and, rising, walked towards Ursula, who climbed onto his back once more.

“Goodbye, Ursula,” the old woman said. “It was such a pleasure meeting you. You must come and visit me again, soon! Promise?”

Ursula nodded several times, smiling. Then Malkin began to pad towards the cave entrance, thence out into the thick black night, The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

40

towards the pinprick lights of the villagers’ torches.

The search party, to a man, looked in stunned disbelief at the approaching sight; their missing, beloved girl Ursula, riding on the back of a huge, ferocious-looking cat. Ursula gave the men a wave and a wide smile as Malkin sauntered past, oblivious to their presence, plodding steadily towards the village. The men fell quickly into step behind them and followed, all the while looking completely bewildered. * Tamara, who had been sitting quietly next to Jennifer for what seemed like eternity, looked up from where she had been staring into her lap, seeming to sense that her daughter was safe and was now coming home; it was like a sixth sense that only mothers possess. She sprang up from the sofa and rushed out of the cottage, standing in the middle of the street and peering hard into the darkness. At first she saw the torches of the search party some way in the distance, and her spirits fell at the thought that perhaps after all they had not been successful in their search and her instinct had been wrong. Then she made out the figure of a huge cat, carrying her daughter on its broad back, walking towards her. She shrieked in horror and ran swiftly forward.

Upon seeing her mother illuminated in the few dim outside lights of several of the cottages, Ursula excitedly jumped down from the cat’s back, and patted its head. She waited until Tamara was only a few feet away, then opened her arms out wide.

“Mummy, Mummy! I’ve had such a really big adventure!” the child shouted, jumping up and down. She then shook her head in shock and disbelief at the sound of her own, newly found voice.

Dave Ludford is a poet and short story writer from Nuneaton, England. He is the author of over 40 published works of poetry and narrative fiction. He is currently at work on his first novella.

His stories have been published in Schlock! magazine in the UK (www.schlock.co.uk), Fever Dreams magazine (www.feverdreams.co.uk) and poems at www. poetrysuperhighway.com The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

41

Debasis Mukhopadhyay - poems

sea-bound stroll now retsina softening old stitches and summer jaunts fomenting the sepia waves of lassitude the fresh catch grilled at sundown dabbled memories nea paralia nea paralia and an opalescent sea rustling across a bloated brochure called gateway or maybe sea-bound stroll with azure galore beguiling the eyes like those hydrangeas flaunting a clear blue within easy reach from the deck flowing to a time

The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

42 when salty pebbles keep rolling in on the wounds and the spume swathes a heart in the sand vowing like a touch of warm cotton swabs now-here now-here now-here said once love you and walked by the sea

between root & wings your black eyes underneath the lap of soft soil escaped all flowers gouged out of sky like wings I had never soul but life so full of sky

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43

wrappings of misnomer the little bloodroot is not a metaphor this time end of day to find out how does it feel to be a flower to be bleak in this far-close emptiness to become a bleach in my paintbox looking for silence my bottle of bourbon is filled with cubes of souffle emerald plague lighthouse and salt clouds silhouette of viper and desperation imagined with violin end of day to find out what is to be a simplification devoid of any slit what are the eyelashes of how to think an anemone awed again and again at every breeze

Debasis Mukhopadhyay holds a PhD in literary

studies & lives & writes in Montreal, Canada. His poems have appeared or are forthcoming in The Curly Mind, After the Pause, Posit, Mannequin Haus, Yellow Chair Review, Thirteen Myna Birds, Of/With, I am not a silent poet, New Verse News, Scarlet Leaf Review, With Painted Words, Silver Birch Press,Quatrain.Fish, Whale Road Review, and elsewhere.

Follow him at https://debasismukhopadhyay.wordpress.com/ or @dbasis_m on Twitter.

The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

44

FICTION JAYANTHI SANKAR

Peacock feather fan

When the Deputy Editor called his line, “Could you please

come to my cabin for a moment?” Roger left a sentence half way, logged off, threw his hands upwards to stretch his thin and gaunt physique before walking towards her cabin.

He knocked and entered. “Take your seat. Editor had called me to check if the story on the animal lover has shaped. She says it has to be published within the next few days.”

“Ya, in fact I’ve already started ideating the story. David has taken brilliant shots of Lisa with her pets,” Roger said benignly.

The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

45 Hair that looked interestingly bristly with a recent close crop, she looked younger and more immaculate, in her formal navy blue dress, he thought.

“Since it’s our own feature, Editor said that we might think of a blurb in the ‘Island time’ and also to inform Wendy that you will have your first byline in this,” the Deputy said looking straight into his eyes.

He controlled his jubilance and just smiled as he proceeded to debrief on the assignment.

As an animal lover, Lisa gave her opinion on the missing cats of Khatib. Facing the camera Lisa had melted, “The animals are not like humans, they can’t possibly ask for their rights, you see?” very carefully feigning to touch her mascara laid eyes. She has two cats, a dog and a couple of hamsters. “When I heard about the serial cat killer I cried and cried, you know. I hope the police can find the guy soon. Can or not?”

Almost in tears Lisa said, “It’s already a sin you know when people abandon their cats and dogs. I can’t imagine someone is killing them one by one. Poor things, I can’t taahan anymore lah.” She tried to speak on the positive side when she said, “I like what ‘acres’ is doing. They help in so many different ways to treat and shelter the estranged and confiscated animals of all kinds.”

“I have three young children who always love to watch national geographic. I leave them in the neighbor’s house because I can’t watch animals killing each other,” she showed her hand towards the living room window. “She was so happy to get featured to show her gratitude she had made chicken rice for us. And she had originally planned mutton curry and fish ball soup to treat us, she said.”

The wrinkles formed on her forehead as she frowned.

“All the best for your story,” the Deputy said indicating that he was to leave. “Better not get personally involved with contacts.” He nodded as he exited. * Roger went near Wendy’s and smiled, “How is your Sunday feature shaping?”

The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

46 “Not bad.”

“An old woman called me for the third time in a fortnight to plead ‘Can you look for my cat?’”

“Oh dear!”

“First time when she called I told her am just a reporter cum editor, not a policeman. But I was astonished when she told me to buy fish porridge on my way to her house.”

“Really? May be she has no one to seek help.”

“But I wondered since when have our cops become errand boys?”

“How did she get your number?”

“That puzzles me as well. But I guess this number previously belonged to a police guy because this is not the first time that I have been called with an assumption that I’m a cop.”

“You could have guided her to call the actual police,” she looked deeply into his eyes.

“She didn’t let me talk at all, you know. She went on saying she lived in Yishun and that her name is Aziza, and that she is eighty three years old but would keep repeating in between - please look for my cat.”

Wendy’s line rang. Picking the call, she gestured towards the Deputy’s cabin. “Catch up later,” waved and glided off. * The Deputy looked at her as if she was seeing her for the first time. She moved an A3 print out of the page in progress towards Wendy. “It’s like a slap on my face, you know.”

Bewildered and confounded, Wendy stood open mouthed for a second before saying, “I don’t understand what you mean.”

“When I am here, telling you to use the text I had sent you, you are suppose to use it. Why did you do your own editing?”

She said, “Sorry, I still don’t understand.”

“I spent time editing that advertorial, you know.”

“Oh, okay. But I didn’t know.”

“But you seem to have used the original text to edit yourself.”

“I received two forwarded internal mails. I still don’t underThe Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

47 stand how this happened. Let me think.”

Suddenly, Wendy realised that she was actually looking not at her but at her sandstone necklace.

“I don’t want to hear your stories.”

“But you will slap me with words?” she muttered to herself.

“Beg your pardon?” the Deputy looked at her sternly.

“I said I deserve an opportunity to explain, at the least.”

“But I have a lot to finish,” she spread her palm and showed her files on the table before she folded her hands leaning on the table, placing her elbows with a deliberate gait.

“I just remembered that I got a forwarded attachment of the same from Mr.Tan.” “But why take from that attachment when I have sent you?”

“Well, I thought since they are the same,...” Wendy tried to explain.

“No, my point is that I spent time editing and it defeats the purpose.”

“Precisely, in fact, I would prefer to use the text you edited to save my time and efforts.”

“Then why didn’t you?”

Feeling implacably, Wendy zipped her mouth.

“And why didn’t you edit the other text on the community event?”

“I thought you had vetted Mr.Tan’s.”

“You must edit where ever necessary.”

“Ok,” she said almost inaudibly, “And perhaps get ‘kicked’ by him for a change, instead of being ‘slapped’.”

“What did you say?”

“Nothing,” she foozled.

“You said something.”

“Well, I said, from now I shall clarify with you daily as to which ones I should be editing and which ones I should not be editing.”

“But you are the editor of the page, aren’t you?”

“I think so. Or am I?” “When I send, use them as they are. Any other texts you reThe Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

48 ceive, please edit to suit.”

Wendy came out fuming. They just exchanged an eye contact and Roger knew from her flashed face not to ask her anything for some time. * Roger watched her hurriedly checking her mobile.

He waited for her to finish serious phonic conversation that lasted for few minutes. Then he went near to ask, “Anything wrong?”

“My younger doll had fever in morning. But she is fine playing, it seems, I just checked with my domestic helper.”

“Aziza had called again,” he said thinking that she looked more verdure than usual.

“Roger, why don’t you take it as a mission to look for her cat?

Poor Aziza,” she laughed mildly.

“Come on, am I Murakami’s Nakata?”

“How is your grandma’s roaches problem now?”

“Oh she said cockroaches anyway return after some time.

That’s the price we pay for low level flats. It seems recently the cockroaches were lesser. She is allergic to sprays and so we had to shift her to our house before spraying her house a few months back. And she has recently spotted a few lizards and she is terrified of them now.”

“They must have been eating the roaches,” Wendy beamed broadly. * The Deputy peeped out of her cabin to call Roger. Not expecting to be called again, he hurried to her cabin. He noticed that Mr.Tan, in his beige polo and brown denim pants, was already seated there. With an awkward care avoiding glancing at him, he sat looking at the Deputy. He felt the air heavy. They seemed to have had a long argument or some serious discussion.

“HDB is investing 45 dollars in its new project,” lampooned the Deputy throwing on the table before him the page folded to show the two column news. Nonplussed that he was he kept quiet.

“The very first sentence has the ‘million’ missing.” Roger was shell shocked.

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49 “Why don’t you say something?” her propensity as usual put him into a silence.

“Sorry,” he mumbled with despair in his eyes and voice.

“It’s been almost a year since you joined, I think.”

“One year next month,” he said feebly.

Deputy’s smile looked hideous to him when she said, “And you could do such a factual error. I need to talk to your mentor, Wendy, on your nescience.”

“Sorry, but Mr.Tan was on duty. Not just that, he was the final proof reader of the page as well,” in remorse he searched for suitable words.

“Stop pointing fingers at others. Be happy that you are not thrown out. Carelessness as yours can be perilous. Do you know what it can be to answer the officials?” she asked with a controlled but ferocious hiss.

“I was doing my page with severe migraine. I needed help and I got none. He stopped helping totally except searching for the images. Subsequently everyone started to follow him.”

Both looked aghast.

A warning letter was given. With a pale face, he walked out of the room languidly. * Roger went straight to Wendy and showed. With repugnance he lamented, “They had typed, signed and kept it ready.”

“Hush, and easy.”

“I thought Mr.Tan was a Senior Sub Editor. Since when has he become the Accuracy Editor? Did we ever before have such a post in our office?”

“But we have it now, don’t we? A new incarnation,” she smiled broadly but he didn’t.

“Come on, Roger baby.”

“Will this affect my annual appraisal? Having worked here for more than ten years, you should know.”

“Why worry now?”

“But all the blame is thrown on my shoulders,” he sulked.

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50 “It’s a team work just in name. As soon as an issue arises, each will put self before others. That’s the basic rule everyone follows.”

“He interacts warmly and I thought he treats me like his own son. And to think he didn’t even utter a single word to her.”

“I know how you feel. Don’t fall for the urbane manners. Everyone has been an underling in the past and applies his or her experiences exactly the same way when they get their opportunity.”

“It’s not as if I have never seen people in my life. I am not from an alien planet. But these open, intricate, direct, indirect shades of politics overwhelm me. If it is a mistake committed or carelessness then shouldn’t the magnitude remain the same irrespective of whose it is?”

“Been there and seen that.”

“But,..”

“In the power race, the fittest survives. The upper hands would do anything to save their asses. Creating a completely new abstract position is absolutely nothing, though this is entirely new to me as well. Face the fact, but cheer up. Don’t be a milquetoast,” she said.

“Today, I voiced my stand, Wendy.”

“Oh good, I think you will be fine after you sleep it off tonight,” she said patting on his shoulder. “Time for our meeting,” they scurried along with the others. * During the Editorial, Roger was not his usual self. Ahmed bent down to ask in his ears, “Are you unwell?” He just shook his head to say no.

In the local section, the serial cat killer getting 18 months supervision took the centre stage discussion. “It seems he was mentally ill. Noisy cat had made the 41 years old get angry, they say. He came out of his house, lifted the cat that was trying to go up the stairs in the second level. Holding the cat, calmly he went up the elevator to the thirteenth floor and threw it on the ground from there,” Ahmed elaborated.

Mr. Tan tried to contribute, “There has been a string of feline deaths. Since October, 7 cats were dead in 12 days.”

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51 “Check if the images are embargo and remember to add the byline. I think the image credit goes to the police. You may show me a print out at the earliest for me to have a look at your layout,” he said.

“If there is any breaking news it can go in. We will decide that later. As of now this is the first page lead of the section. And it goes into the top attraction of tomorrow’s issue, don’t forget.”

When Mr. Tan said to Roger, “If don’t have an assignment today, please help with the story,” he simply nodded in affirmation. He didn’t look at him more than those three seconds.

“Wendy, please spare me a few minutes after the meeting,” Mr. Tan said as he got up to exit. Once the local team along with the reporters came out, the room was filled with the Asia section team.

When Samy started raking, “PTI says a tigress was killed in the Soopkhar range of the famous Kanha Tiger Reserve in a suspected territorial fight with another feline, a forest official said today,” everyone’s attention focused on him.

“Was it a man eater?”

“I don’t think so. Earlier in South India, a tiger was shot for having killed three women over two weeks,” Samy added. Looking deeply into his face the Deputy gave a hostile nod without the slightest croak.

“And last week, Menaka Gandhi criticized the minister for the ‘go ahead’ to shoot the nilgais. As per India’s Wildlife protection act 1972, she argues that vermin like rats, crows and termites can be exterminated but not the endangered species.”

“Samy, could you just stick on the current? Why connect all that come to your mind and slant the story?”

Unyielding as always he said, “We could add some back ground. And I thought this story could develop further and there could be some possible follow ups this week.”

Her frown said she didn’t relish it. “Remember to check with other sources as well.”

“Shall we have an exclusive page for cats?” Samy tried to ease the atmosphere. Laughter filled the room. “Enough of rhetoric,” Deputy barged in to stop the amusement. The hubbub subsided inThe Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

52 stantaneously.

The Asia team spilled out with all the hustle and bustle. * Wendy went to Mr. Tan’s desk. He was sulking to someone over the phone, “Oh she holds a post so decorative that even the editorials are to be written always only by me. I think it could help having a framed photo of hers on the wall here as we’re almost forgetting her face these days,” The moment he spotted Wendy he wrapped up abruptly saying he would be busy the whole afternoon.

“I just wanted to tell you please don’t edit the community even text I attached to you because they want an extensive coverage. The organisers had called me in the morning.”

“Did you discuss with her?” she showed the Deputy Editor’s cabin.

“No, I haven’t and I don’t intend to.”

“Then I will go with a print out and check with her first,” Wendy said smilingly trying to sound normal as she left.

He just gave her a villainous look behind her back. * Around five when Wendy came to his desk and said, “Shall we go for a coffee?” Roger was checking his mails.

“Aziza’s is one of the few dozen cats missing and I don’t know how to explain it to her?” Roger said. She didn’t respond but gave a ‘poor thing’ expression.

Roger kvelled when she said, “Your layout stood out, I’d say. I will read through soon,” and wished that at least this time his story doesn’t get killed with some inevitable coverage of some breaking local news.

“I had left my mobile charger at Lisa’s house. I had been there yesterday. She was away to the vet with her pets but she had left it with her neighbour. Lisa’s children, all below seven, were there.”

Wendy listened with occasional nods.

“Leaving the children to play on the floor in the common corridor in the afternoons, Lisa stays inside the house with her pets. The father who works in Batam comes once in a fortnight. Seeing the The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

53 children having ant bites all over their bodies, he would reprimand her and they both end up fighting. She would scream at the top of her voice and wouldn’t let him touch her pets. The irony is we are going to feature her as an animal lover.”

“We are not here to change the society. Media matters. But always remember we can only report. Be happy that you have another contrast angle to cover when the appropriate time comes.”

“But I don’t wish to. I wouldn’t be allowed to anyway.”

Both of them turned to look when Samy joining a group announced happily with a boisterous laughter, “And now all the cow, goat, chick eaters head towards the canteen.”

Walking behind them, Wendy turned with a smile, “My cousin says that you can ward off lizards using peacock feathers. You can buy a fan from one of the little India shops, it seems. It would be a good wall ornamental item for your granny’s living room. No harm trying.”

“But, will the roaches return?”

She halted to look blankly at the floor for a few seconds and wide eyed she shrugged her shoulders as she continued to walk with an easy smile at him.

Jayanthi Sankar writes short stories, novels, translations and essays. Her English short story ‘Read Singapore’, published in the quarterly magazine Ceriph – ISSUE TWO – 2010, has been included in the anthology ‘The Epigram Books Collection of Best New Singaporean Short Stories: Volume One’. The same short story has been translated and included in the Russian anthology: To Go to S’pore, contemporary writing from Singapore, edited by Kirill Cherbitski. A collection of her English stories are expected to be published as collection next year.

Her short story collections have been short listed thrice for Singapore Literature Prize. She can be reached at: http:// jeyanthisankar.com/ The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

54

55

JOHN LOOKER - POEMS

The year 2016 is the 400th anniversary of the death of William Shakespeare and in commemoration around the world there are many performances of his plays, new books and tv programmes, and articles in magazines and newspapers. John Looker, a poet living in southern England, has offered his own tribute in a short series of poems, each of which is a reflection on one of Shakespeare’s best loved plays or sonnets. It is a risky project, to write in verse in response to the Bard, but poetry has always had a place for tributes to great writers. John Looker felt that his own responses at least had the merit of offering a different, perhaps unexpected, viewpoint.

1. Malvolio Looks Back

Then how I failed myself: that yellow hose (cross-gartered!); the fancy that my lady loved me; the smiles; the conceit to suppose that she would thrust some greatness upon me!

The hours would pass so sluggishly these days, but for the new tobacco … sonnets … plays …

Malvolio was the pompous steward in a great house in Shakespeare’s play Twelfth Night. He was tricked into thinking that the Lady was in love with him and especially fancied him in yellow stockings with cross garters. He fell for it and made a complete ass of himself in front of her. And that was only the start of his troubles.

In the photograph, Stephen Fry as Malvolio in Twelfth Night at the Apollo theatre. photo credit : Simon-Annand

How did it go so wrong? I started well, securing employment in a great house.

I worked diligently, learning to quell my spirits, my own views, finding the nous to flatter without detection, to be discreet, dependable, in every task.

I rose. How I rose! until it was me (or do I mean I?) who bore the steward’s staff.

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56

II . And To A Winter’s Day Also …

(William Shakespeare, sonnet 18)

… for isn’t there beauty in a winter’s day?

Not just the frail sunlight sparkling on ice, the clear skies, the dark holly with those dear berries; nor even the breathtaking lace of trees in the cold air. Give these their due but there is more – for all is stillness; peace.

Walking, you take my arm, and I am yours.

III. From Shakespeare’s Notebook: first thoughts towards his sonnet 73 Coming out of the theatre I find you here, as promised, in a doublet I have not seen before

57 (could it be your love is like the crowd that gives its heart to the players with greater joy knowing the play is fleeting?)

We walk on together towards the bridge, you talking at length about your day and I lost in the music of your voice (do you sense, with me by your side, how the scenes of your own half-written play must pass?) … you are morning still; springtime. You are a brightly lit fire from which I take such warmth as I had thought would never shine on me.

(Most of Shakespeare’s sonnets are now presumed to be addressed to his Young Man)

… I am evening now; autumn.

I am embers.

All this you perceive with your clear bright eyes (your love must be more strong than I had dared to hope, seeing me so pallid, in this out-moded cape) You raise your smile to me, greeting me with a shared jest, and I feel at once how fast my pulse is racing The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

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58

IV. Julius Caesar In The 21st Century (thoughts prompted by Shakespeare’s play) Julius Caesar, performed at the Globe Theatre Photo: Alastair Muir

In the Forum, we stand among the crowd and lend our ears to whosoever’s rhetoric is balm.

Those men in togas! All so ambitious: one’s greedy to bestride the little Earth like a Colossus;

59

V. Bottom Remembers Love All them years ago – but still each day she’s flitting in and out of my dreams … her eyes like pools at night full of the moon and stars, her smile pure sunlight waking in the east.

She smelt of summer meadows, and when she spoke her voice, soft and fierce, flew like an owl hunting. I tell you I froze, while the hairs on my head stood up, and they (you know what I mean?) weren’t all.

You’re right of course, they laughed and called me an ass.

Me and her, we come from different lives, like trees that were stood on opposite banks of a river leaning, weaving our branches, blossom, leaves.

What could we be to each other? She were the rain falling on wheat … and me warm air lifting the lark.

Here in the UK there are currently several theatres staging A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Bottom was one of the comic characters who, under enchantment, was given an ass’s head; Titania, Queen of the Fairies and herself under a spell, fell in love with him until released from the enchantment.

another has a lean and hungry look – he thinks too much and this we do not like.

John Looker lives in southern England.

He has written poetry all his life and now, in retirement, draws on the experience of a long career in the British civil service, on family life and on international travel.In his book The Human Hive, John Looker explores our common humanity, down the ages and round the globe, by looking through the lens of work and human activity.

The Human Hive by John Looker, published by Bennison Books in 2015, available through Amazon.

How hot it is! But some Mark Antony, who always had our hearts, borrows our minds and moulds them easily.

We run headlong through the streets shouting, the dust rising beneath our feet.

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60

An Epic Poem by Dr. Sadiqullah Khan

61 Sappho:

...continued from JUNE Issue,2016

Aristotle and Sappho

What is action?

Aristotle:

The construction of Plot Act v Scene: School of Athens Aristotle: Once and the most important Thing in Tragedy Tragedy is imitation of an action, That is complete, whole Of some magnitude.

Sappho:

Sappho:

A revelation though Is not life itself made of Multiple dramas enacted.

Is a whole, a magnitude?

Aristotle:

Plot in the drama is an equivalent Of an Action is real life.

Action, is not an external act But an inward process, Which works outwards Or the expression of A man’s rational personality.

The characters in a drama Are not described but they Enact their own story And so reveal themselves.

Aristotle:

A whole may be of no magnitude.

Sappho: What is a whole?

Aristotle: A whole is that, Which has a beginning, a middle And an end.

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We know them not O! Muse the tenth From what we are told of them.

We know them by their performance Before us.

Without action in this sense A poem would not be bad drama, But no drama at all.

Not a collection of incidents An action is whole The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

62

63 Must be of some length, But a length to be taken by memory.

The length thus depends On spectators, a hundred stories To be timed by ‘water clock’ The limit is, The longer the story Consistently with its being comprehensible, As a whole, The finer it is by reason of Magnitude.

A rough general formula is ‘A length which allows a hero pass through a series of probable or necessary stages from misfortune to happiness, or from happiness to misfortune.’

This may suffice For the magnitude of the story.

An end is that Which has nothing after it Which is naturally after Something itself.

Either as some thing is necessary Or because it is consequent.

A beginning has that Which has naturally something after it.

Plot, therefore cannot begin or end At certain random point.

Sappho: What makes it beautiful?

Aristotle:

To be beautiful, A living creature O r any other whole made of parts Must not Only present some order In arrangements of parts, But also be of certain definite Magnitude.

Beauty is a matter of size and order.

It is impossible without that The unity and wholeness of it Is lost to the beholder, otherwise.

Sappho: I am empty this day, Your critique, the empiricist My muse though busy In deconstruction I lost the construction In parts, the whole.

(Now strolling to and fro)

Aristotle:

Unity of a Plot Does not consist As some suppose In having one man As its subject.

Sappho: How long the Plot should be?

Aristotle: Sappho:

So a story or Plot The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

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65

One man as its subject?

O master of reason, a catastrophe, Life is so replete with?

Where to place the mirror To its ugly face.

Aristotle: An infinity of things befall That one man, some of which it is impossible To reduce tot unity.

And in like manner There are many actions of one man, Which cannot be made to form one action.

Aristotle: The middle must follow Naturally from the beginning.

And naturally lead to the end Or the catastrophe.

The end is casually related to something That went before it But has nothing coming after it.

Sappho: Aristotle:

Where from is the beginning?

Sappho: The beginning does not come after, Something else as a consequence.

It is casually related to what comes After it. This does not mean That the Tragedy should begin From the beginning.

It would be more effective If the tragic action comes Later in the career of the hero.

The beginning should therefore Be self explanatory.

It should not need the knowledge Of any earlier circumstance.

Neither should it be To make us ask, why and how.

Tell the ‘golden mean’.

Aristotle:

The Plot should have a magnitude Beauty depends on magnitude and order.

The ‘golden mean’ is that it should be neither Too long, or too small That one forgets the begging or appreciate the beauty.

Unless of suitable length One cannot appreciate the orderly arrangements Of the part of the whole.

Sappho: What length master?

Aristotle:

Sappho: Where comes the ‘catastrophie’ The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

‘It must be long enough to allow a sequence of events The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

66 within the limits of probability and necessity which can bring about the change of fortune.’

Sappho: Do you mean organic unity of Plato?

Aristotle: This is significant The ‘organic unity’ propounded by Plato.

A symmetrical and proportionate relationship Between the parts and the whole.

A plot should consist of incidents or episodes Which show a proper relationship to the whole.

Like a creature neither too small nor too big Beauty is a matter of size and order.

End of Act V

END

67

Book Excerpts - VERSE NOVEL EXCLUSIVE EXCERPT FROM THE VERSE NOVEL

BY CHRIS MOONEY-SINGH

Foreign Madam and the White Yogi

The Characters: Newly married Yogi and Margot, devout members of the Himalayan Yoga Centre in Australia are on a journey to India, along with Margot’s two little girls – Pauline and Adele from a previous marriage. During their stopover in Singapore Yogi is feeling challenged with step-parenting issues during his first experience landing up in an Asian culture.

Chapter 6.

Singapore Stopover

Dr. Sadiqullah Khan Wazir belongs to Wana, South Waziristan Pakistan.

A Physician by qualification the author serves in the Customs Service of Pakistan. He lives in Islamabad. The Voices, Chaos of Being, The Songs of Other Times, A Forgotten Song, Chasing Shadows and Orchard of Raining Petals are his works of Poetry. The author manages two groups of poetry, The Voices and generation 21 and a page The Voices. The author can be reached at https://www.facebook.com/sadiqullah.khan.92 The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

Leaving Adelaide on SIAl Margot sat with each young belle on the window aisle marked HJK, she in the middle of Paul and Adele.

Poor Yogi sat in quarantine.

Booking late, centre aisles had gone.

The seating plan, a poker machine had dealt three queens and one lone lemon The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

68 who was souring there in 40G. Had stepfather fate waved a hard wand against him joining the family?

Away from Papa, the girls might bond, or so he’d hoped as the plane took off.

Now, strait-jacketed in a seat, he swallowed and suppressed a cough, climbing to thirty thousand feet.

* The Singapore Girl stepped in long attire with tongs and steaming towels wound tight as egg rolls, shuffling to and fro in a blue kebaya², haute couture by Pierre Balmain.

While Yogi drank tomato juice with a slice of lemon, she did the food-tray sleight of hand, a pro who served his meal with practiced Asian meekness.

Margot’s eyebrow rose peripherally, critical of the women’s French-twist bun: a Chinese sweet-thing with her learned deportment like the other lipsticked hairdos on this flight – identical toenails, red in batik slippers, rosebud lips, shaped eyebrows, blue eye shadow, the Asian face that launched a thousand jets: Singapore Girl, you’re a great way to fly.

Then Margot played a hand from the bag of tricks packed in for her daughters, wide-awake.

They laughed at her, now stuck with the final card, yelling “Old Maid.” Yes, she had lost the game. * A chase of taxis around a tough metropolis, twenty five thousand, twenty four hours, week after week they zip down expressway paradise, flecked with purple orchids The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

69 and flame trees fronting apartments to the CBD³ through incense lanes detouring, tight by Rochor Road, Kollywood-Bollywood blaring through rainbow shop fronts peddling elephant brass chunks of the Sub-continent.

Yogi is budgeting a bite of Little India, training his spice girls for Bigger India coming.

King of the melodrama, three queens there in the back, leaning into a corner he apprehends blue neon flashing ‘Madras Hotel’ in the black tar lane.

“This is the one?” he asked.

“Corr-ect,” said the driver. * Later on, they went to walk and eat in Little India’s crowded rice-plate lanes, no Golden Arches close to take the strain with a happy meal of planetary junk.

“Oh, do we have to?” they mosquito-whined.

“You just can’t hide out in the hotel room,” she said. “Will you come out and see the place?”

Overbearing Yogi so ripe for failure, intemperate in the tropics naively led them to dollops of rice and dhal and chilli pickle slapped messily upon banana leaves.

Pure ignorance of the over-righteous hoped novelty would wolf down spicy rice.

Forgetting his own childhood, he was dumb and mute before the god of simple tucker that kids adore – their likes and dislikes kept The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

70 apart as mainland mash potato from offshore carrots to the archipelago of peas. Poor Margot had no appetite to see cold war between her lovely three. * “Why don’t you look around? I’ll take them back,” she said. So he walked off, disheartened that their trip had stalled. He meandered on, and breathing in the durian-scented air he saw ahead to the parrot fortune-teller.

Could he divine his luck with child-care? * The Tamil in his dhoti at a table told famous Mani, the rose-ringed parakeet⁴ to come out through his trapdoor. The green bird stepped jauntily back and forth until the divination moment fell with sixty Bhagavad Gita cards. The bird was troubled, indecisive as Arjuna who once sat in a pacifist funk between two warring clans.

This lime-green Hamlet with no heart for action stepped back and forth, back and forth, but then cantilevered a card with beak and tongue, bringing it to the Tamil seated sideways to divine more. He flipped the thing. It showed two warriors with golden gaddas, ready to club each other into the Otherworld.

Below, there was a verse in Devanagari from the Bhagavad Gita spoken by Sri Krishna: A man’s own self can be his own best friend and man’s own thinking is his own worst foe.

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71 And so, the cartomancy bird had chosen.

Your destiny is lodged inside your skull, Yogi self-chided. Ridiculous to let two little girls unseat you from the chariot.

His head a room of dirty sounds now echoed along Serangoon⁵ asphalt; spicy sour, the lock-up, roll-a-door midnight rattled still inside his skull. So he skipped ahead, escaping inside the next emporium looking for some talisman, a way to make things better. Did the Indian gods come from happy households? There were stacks of brass-cast deities shipped from Chennai, the racks of incense, Tamil music tapes, cheap print editions – astrology and vastu⁶ .

And then he saw those divination cards, each with a guidebook Gita, vacuum-sealed.

Ascending, tier by tier, a Hindu temple, the On Sale mountain teetered on its table.

As if he’d heard the call of Krishna’s conch he bought the cards and went back to the hotel, then tossed and turned throughout the tropic night there upon on his one-man creaking cot.

So far this honeymoon was a sexless lockout. * Today and one more night in Singapore.

It was time to do ‘kid stuff ’, or risk a riot.

He read some options ¬from the hotel brochure.

Pauline pushed the decision to her sister so she could crush it with an easy “No!” “Well?” said Margot, mind reader in the middle knowing her belle, full well, a sibling’s fears.

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72 “Oh come on, Dele! We haven’t got all day.”

Finally pressed, she just said, “I don’t know.”

* They took the Grand Tour of Singapore: three girls up front with Yogi trailing after to each chic metropole on a transit card: Raffles, Ngee-Ann City, Great World City, Citylink and Suntec City Mall for underground and high-rise freebie miles, ice-creaming through the catacombs of slick, ogling girly hair-thing bargain bins.

Here Vuitton, Escada, Gucci, F.C.U.K had each glad rag, and suit, chic bag and shoe as in Australia, yet more arcades of shopping paradise – perfumeries Dior, trench coats Burberry; all things material.

She let them have their fling with delicious bling, impressionables mesmerised by glass.

Then, Old MacDonald takes a Duck Tour e-i-e-i-o amphibian war craft after makeover e-i-e-i-o Splashing into Singapore River, a concrete Venice for tourist chappy, their motor duck is slow to deliver.

At least the girls are tail-up happy.

Emerging from the Kallang Basin they motor back to Suntec City.

One hour later – time to hasten.

They feed the girls at KFC. The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

73 Then ferry to Sentosa Island where pink dolphins bless the lagoon, by pearly beach and party club land where disco balls outshine the moon.

Time for a cab. The girls are tired.

Dozing now, they are sitting pretty, passing ten disco rickshaws hired

by Japanese tourists from Kobe City.

When they reach the Madras Hotel the dead-weight girls are now compliant.

He lugs floppy doll Adele and earns dad-thrill as the jolly giant.

They had a plan for after dark, to find some shadows in a park, a festival of puppetry the hotel brochure said was free.

Asian troupes, three days and nights: Myanmar butterflies, Thai sword fights, Malaysian tales of dove and monkey, a swordfish speared into a palm tree.

Cambodia, they buffalo-rode, Laos with monk and Buddha’s code.

The girls sat down to giggle-clap as Hopeless Heron got in a flap.

Flying Fish flew into the moon while Whale sang his signature tune.

They wandered free from booth to booth and saw small staging of big truth.

Margot smiled and Yogi sighed enjoying the girls gawk, open-eyed.

She felt relieved. He’s here to stay co-starring in her shadow play.

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74 * Bali’s shadow puppets came up next, a wayang kulit show, the main event⁷.

Audiences massed now for a mini epic on grass mats. Then, the announcer spoke.

“Please, look backstage. Feel free to come and go.”

“Let’s see, Mummy,” restless Pauline said.

Margot stayed and sent them off with Yogi.

After intoning mantras to call the spirits and coaxing them to sit upon his tongue, the dalang⁸ got things ready for the story with his puppet sticks chosen for tonight; he pronged them into the horizontal length of banana tree-stem, wet and yellow-green placed there underneath.

“Why is he waving his fan?” she shouted out.

“It’s not a fan,” he whispered with backstage etiquette.

“It’s a tree inside a leaf of sorts!” he said.

“But what’s it for?” asked dying-to-know Adele.

“I think it starts the show,” said Yogi, digging, recalling invocation kickstarts epics.

Tonight it was Pandavas and Kauravas about to steal the epic micro stage, with gamelan⁹ and the dalang’s toe-rattle.

“They’ve got noses long as witches,” Pauline said.

“And skinny necks,” Adele now followed up.

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75 Little Aussie eyes would not accept.

Why were they acting like this? Yogi, wondered.

Yes, they had flipped – sweet angels into devils.

Reading the situation the announcer tried a rescue.

“It takes a lot of work cutting the leather, painting a nose so long to put on sticks boiled up from buffalo horn.”

“Yuck! That’s gross,” Dele said. Eyes turned again.

“Fiddle-sticks!” said Pauline, aping Mum. “Sticks and stones,” said Dele, the copycat.

“Bones and phones and witchety crones,” Paul chorused.

They’d veered off topic into silliness.

Finally, they settled down to watch.

The Tree was twirled to Heaven and away.

The tale of black leapt onto the sheet of white and the audience was in the dalang’s palm.

The noble king of character and dharma, Yudhisthira, speaks in the Kawi tongue1⁰, while knockabout buffoons: two epic mimics translate high life to low in Bali English.

“Wow! Look at that, Son!”

“What’s that, Dad?”

“God Shiva!”

And so the deity standing with his trident now passes to the eldest Pandava, a gift sought after, that can end all rebirths – The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

a flask of immortality, the great reward for the selfless act of saving a pregnant fish offering to the heron his own flesh.

One drop can heal and even raise the dead.

He passes it to Bhīma for safe-keeping sloshing in its flask, who passes it to his half-demon son, called Gatotkatcha, the super-wrestling giant and big baby11.

Flying high above the Himalayas Gatotkatcha drops the lotus bottle carelessly as any reckless youth sprinkling heads of demons in the mountain waking them all to live another lifespan long after being put to bed for eons.

76

Soon, the land of snow is boiling over threatening to melt the glaciers.

The ways of trolls is introduced in turn by demon servants, another two pot bellies – a mirror pair to the other courtly servants These tell new jokes and dance.

“Our demon brothers, asleep a thousand years are free at last!”

They do a silly item with the gamelan, and, in conclusion, clonk their devil heads knocking each other out. Recovering they roar with belly laughter, one of them known to the audience by the name of Lam. Reaching eleven, he slow-leaks a fart.

Paul and Adele thought this hilarious and squealed with pleasure. “Shush, you two!” said Yogi.

“Sorry. For my perfume, everybody.”

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77 It broke the fourth wall, worthy of Artaud and Brecht who’d filched the epic Orient.

Of course, a good tale must turn bad some time.

Yudhisthira and the Pandavas arrive to quickly sort the hothead bad lads out.

Arjuna, too, is itching for a fight.

Lam is primed to translate on the spot.

“See them shooting the fire missiles, good!

Arrows ping! ping! ping! at the Pandavas.”

Next, the bad boss shoots a flaming arrow that Yudhisthira stops with his jets of water.

Arjuna says: “Now fight me to the death,” sending a missive through the bad boy’s heart.

With each thrust the mountain ranges shift, with earth’s crust the three worlds shake adrift, with dying lust the demons’ end is swift, splintering from their boss like foundry sparks.

Yudhisthira shoots, until each limp rakshasa is heaped upon the field of war. Then silence.

“Wow!” says the young potbelly to his pop, returning back on stage, the court buffoons, “Like pancakes stacked dey make a mountain, Dad!” “Cor-rect. Our world is save for sure now, Son.” “Yes, Dad. Yes, I think our story stop here.”

Margot came to find the snoozing girls.

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78

79 lifting of lumpage complaining older compliant younger stepdad’s burden, some small elation moving walkway rush to Boarding loudspeaker paging flight 303 the nick of time sigh of relief Singapore Girl

would unleash their Papa’s puppetry again.

This hard-won blink of family time was done.

The girls were fragile, Handle with Care inscribed on their red faces. Hoisting one up became a stepdad test. Adept he passed it well with Dele the angel. As Margot took on Paul sound sleep became their ally in this battle. * Two long days in paradise were over.

They ferried back each darling sleepyhead.

Two lovers travelling under cover lay quietly together in one bed.

Yes, they’d missed each other. He stroked her hair.

Wriggling marionette-like, she could flex her legs to dove-tail with him, bare as they performed the art of silent sex.

missed alarm early morning push of panic rush to pack lost toothbrush rainbow toe-sock bill to settle cab to call rushing for Changi along the freeway brisk arrival no need to tip baggage x-ray last call line up luggage checked passports chopped The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

“Good morning, Sir, Good morning, Madam, Good morning, girls.

How are you today?”

Chris Mooney-Singh’s

last two collections-‘The Laughing Buddha Cab Company’ (2007) and ‘The Bearded Chameleon’ (2011)appeared in Singapore and Australia. His verse novel ‘Foreign Madam and the White Yogi’ written in a wide variety of fixed and free forms, alongside concrete and shape poetry was received a commendation in the 2015 Victorian Literature Awards (unpublished fiction ms category). In addition, he has completed a doctorate in creative writing from Monash University in 2015.

Mooney-Singh resides in Singapore where he is the Director of the Writers Centre, Singapore and works full time facilitating literary arts activities. Australian-born he adopted Sikhism in 1989. http://www.chrismooneysingh.com

1. Singapore International Airlines. 2. Kebaya: traditional Malay long dress adapted for SIA hostesses. 3. CBD: Central Business District. 4. A fortune-telling tradition common in South India found throughout South-East Asia wherever South Indian diasporic communities are found. 5. The main street of Singapore’s Little India. 6. Indian Feng Shui, geomancy. 7. Javanese and Balinese stick puppet storytelling centres on The Mahabharata and Ramanyana. 8. Part-shaman and multiple voice-over artist, the dalang trains from childhood to entertain audiences solo for several hours at a time. 9. Gamelan instruments are known as metallophones. They are hit with mallets while other percussionists play hand-drums. These are called kendhang which keep the beat. 10. The earliest known texts in Kawi (Sanskrit: ‘poet’) date from the Singhasari kingdom in eastern Java. More recent scripts were extant in the Majapahit kingdom, also in eastern Java, Bali, Lombok, Borneo and Sumatra. 11. Half-demon with super-strength and magical powers who plays a part in the Kurukshetra War later in the epic. Born from the jungle union with Hidimbi, the she-demon. A perennial teenager.

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80

AUTHOR’S INTERVIEW BY KERRY J DONOVAN

P. C. ZICK Bestselling author, P.C. Zick describes herself as a storyteller no matter what she writes. And she writes in a variety of genres, including romance, contemporary fiction, and nonfiction. She’s won various awards for her essays, columns, editorials, articles, and fiction.

Many of her novels contain stories of Florida and its people and environment, which she credits as giving her a rich base for her storytelling.

“Florida’s quirky and abundant wildlife – both human and animal—supply my fiction with tales almost too weird to be believable.”

Her Behind the Love trilogy—contemporary romance—is also set in Florida, but she’s now working on a series set in the Smoky Mountains.

Home Town: I’ve lived in Michigan, Florida, Pennsylvania, and North Carolina in the United States.

Hi guys, Okay, I know it’s not Friday, sorry I’m a day late, but I hope everyone’s having a wonderful 2016 so far. It’s been busy for me with a new book—On Lucky Shores—published and another Casebook nearly finished.

Talking about On Lucky Shores, I’d like to introduce you to my American editor, PC Zick who is an author, editor, all around star. As usual, I’ve put all her contact details so you can concentrate on the chat for now and ask questions later.

KJD: Hi, Pat, how you doing?

P.C.ZICK: Very well, Kerry. Great to meet you in person at last. Love these French cakes, what are they called?

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81 KD: Er, cakes, I guess. Despite my claims, I don’t really speak the lingo here. Don’t tell anyone, will you?

PCZ: Pass me another of those delicious lemon ones, and my lips are sealed.

KD: Deal, help yourself. Only one though, the other five are for me. Now, before we get down to the authorly stuff, what’s the most exciting thing you’ve ever done?

PCZ: In 2004, I travelled to Morocco. I had a friend working in Casablanca, but I travelled in trains around the country-blond and alone. Quite an experience.

KJD: 2004? You must have been a teenager! But Morocco?

Blimey. How intrepid of you. I’ve seen Midnight Express. I’ve never been further south than Bordeaux. I’m really impressed. There are probably loads of stories to tell— PCZ: Wouldn’t you like to know, but as the saying goes, “What happens in Morocco …”

KD: Ah, but Casablanca. “Of all the gin joints …” Sorry, point taken. Good job neither of us is named Sam. Now, I’d like to learn more about the real you. Let’s delve into your likes and dislikes. Imagine you’re planning a dinner party and have a choice of five guests, (you can chose from anyone in history living or dead). Who do you chose and why?

PCZ: John Lennon – because of his genius for writing lyrics that stay in my head and his rebel stance throughout his career. Tina Fey – because she cracks me up and because of her ability to write satire. I find satire the most difficult of genres to do effectively. Pat Conroy – because of his writing, of course, but also because of his damaged psyche that he parlayed into writing beautiful prose. Jeff Daniels – I admire his career, but also he’s my age, and we grew up fifteen miles from one another. I know we must have been at a grasser or two together, and it would be great fun to share memories. He also rented my mother-in-law’s house twenty years ago to film the movie “Sleep.” And finally, to round out the table for interesting juxtaposition, Mother Teresa. How did she find her inner peace that allowed her to shine love on the world?

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82 KJD: Jeff Daniels rocks. Interesting stuff. Mother Teresa was beatified recently and is well on her way to being made a saint. A great guest for any dinner party, I guess. Great choice.I mentioned in the intro that you are an editor. Can you give us a little background to your life as an editor?

PCZ: I began editing as a newspaper reporter on a small weekly. I had to wear many hats in that job. Then I started my own paper and became the editor-in-chief, which involves much more than actual editing. Then I took a job as editor-in-chief for two regional magazines in Florida. From there, I began editing fiction. There are different skill sets and styles when going from non-fiction to fiction, but I’ve always been a self-starter. Also, I believe editing teaches me things about my own writing.

KJD: Fascinating. And let me take the opportunity to thank you for doing such a great job editing my latest novel,On Lucky Shores.

[That’s three mentions of your new book. Enough already, Ed.] Sorry, boss.....

Without naming names, can you give me some examples of bad writing you have to deal with? And no, you’re not allowed to mention my new novel or my writing in any way, shape, or form.

[Thin ice there, buddy! Ed.] PCZ: At the magazines, I hired many freelancers who knew nothing about writing but just wanted to write. I spent lots of time pulling out my hair. As the editor of fiction, there was one client several years back that I had to turn down after attempting to read nearly 100 pages of his manuscript. He wasn’t ready for an editor, and he needed to study the craft of his chosen genre. It’s tough sometimes to deliver my truth to someone, but I would have done this gentleman a disservice by taking his money on something that was nowhere near ready for publication.

KJD: I told you not to mention my manuscript!

Kidding, but I think I might have read his book, too. Teehee.

What are the two or three most common writing mistakes you’ve found when editing a manuscript?

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83 PCZ: I will attempt to keep this simple. If someone is serious about becoming an author, these are basics to learn. I see the same mistakes repeated often.

One, learn Point of View (POV). It will mark an author as an amateur if this is not done correctly. Read books that offer basic instruction on it and don’t submit to an editor until your POV is correct. Read other bestselling authors and study their use of POV. Sure, you can experiment, but you’d better know the technique before you do that.

Two, dialogue is another area that will label your fiction as amateurish. Learn the basics of writing it properly. Don’t try to emulate real speech exactly. Capture the essence. And stay away from dialect unless you’re an expert with a doctoral degree. I could go on but those are the ones I see most often, not only as an editor, but also as a reader.

KJD: What’s the best editorial advice you can offer to an author?

PCZ: Learn the craft of writing fiction—don’t leave that to your editor. If I receive a manuscript so full of troubled areas, it is very difficult to be an effective editor. I was teaching a workshop last year on writing—just a basic introductory course. When I talked about getting the craft and mechanics right before submitting to anyone, one of the students (an adult), said, “I thought that was the job of an editor.” Everyone else agreed that’s what they thought. So I say it loudly and succinctly: Learn the craft. If you don’t, no one, including your editor, will want to read what you’ve written.

KJD: Never a truer word. I’ve been writing novels, off and on, since 1985 and still consider myself a novice.

And now let’s move on to your writing. What is the first thing you do when starting a new novel? Do you research and write a detailed plot outline?

PCZ: I’m generally a pantser (fly by the seat of my pants). I write a few things down, but if I get the first line of a novel, then I’m off. I write the entire first draft, which I see as my outline. Then I go back and revise before letting anyone see it. Now as I get into the area The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

84 of climax and resolution, I might start outlining a bit on a legal pad with a sharpened #2 pencil.

KJD: I’m pretty much like that myself—apart from the pencil part. I rarely resort to paper and pen. The word processor is both my friend and my enemy (if you see what I mean).

What excites you about writing and the writing process?

PCZ: That’s easy. I love telling stories. Ask anyone who’s ever sat on my porch drinking wine with me. I turn a trip to the grocery store into a story. I love it when the characters become real to me and their story pushes its way onto the page. I love researching. I guess I love just about everything. I even love editing my own work.

KJD: Tell me a little about your latest novel.

PCZ: I wrote Misty Mountain during National Novel Writing Month in November. I actually wrote a 40,000-word romance in one month. I’d never done that before, and I was quite pleased with the results. I didn’t have time to think about it. I just wrote the story and set a word count deadline for every day. I publishedMisty Mountain on January 19 of this year. Here’s the opening chapter: LACY SCHUMACHER LIFTED A TRAY filled with hot chicken wings from the kitchen window countertop. When she turned to head to a booth in her section, “Your Cheating Heart” blasted from the stage at the front of the bar. Suddenly, her feet went out from under her when she slipped on a puddle of beer spilled by one of the customers. Chicken wings flew in the air, and the small cup of blue cheese dressing landed on top of her head and rode with her on her descent to the floor. A celery stick landed on her chest.

She heard the laughter all around her, making the humiliation complete. Then a hand appeared to help her to her feet. She felt the growing wetness on the back of her jeans from the beer as she stood and faced George. She pulled the container from her head.

Blue cheese dripped down her long brown curls. He grabbed some napkins from a nearby table and started dabbing at her hair. That’s all she needed. They’d only been dating a few months, but now any doubt he had about her abilities to do anything gracefully were probably dashed.

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85 “It’s all right,” she said, as she took the napkins from his hand. “I’ll be right back.”

She headed for the bathroom, hoping she could clean up well enough to continue her shift at Misty Mountain, the bar where she’d worked for several years.

Misty Mountain hopped on a cold Thursday night in January, and Lacy longed to go home and soak her aching feet in a hot bath as she used a wet paper towel to dab at her hair. Too bad her house didn’t have a hot tub like so many of the rental cabins in the Smoky Mountains.

The economics of the town depended on the tourists whose visits to the mountains were as unpredictable as the weather during the winter months. Locals accounted for a fraction of the crowd most of the time, and the part-timers were scarce from Christmas to Easter. But tonight, the restaurant was enjoying the first busy night of January.

“It’s the winter festival in Blue Ridge,” Julie Cole had told Lacy when she’d come in for her shift a few hours earlier. “We could have a big crowd tonight.”

Julie and Lacy had started working at Misty Mountain about the same time several years earlier. Julie, more outgoing than Lacy, gravitated to bartending. She loved teasing and laughing with the customers. Lacy enjoyed her job most of the time, but she was quieter.

“The band from Nashville will draw a crowd, too,” Lacy had responded. “I can use the tips, and I bet you and Johnny could use the business.”

“That’s for sure. It’s been a slow month so far.” Julie had stopped washing glasses and put her elbows on the bar. “So have you two talked yet?”

Lacy tied a black apron around her waist. She knew Julie meant well, but she didn’t want to talk about George. Julie, and her husband Johnny, owned Misty Mountain, and George was Johnny’s brother.

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86 Even though she and Julie were good friends, she felt uncomfortable discussing George with her. Small towns bred familiarity—she knew that all too well.

Lacy shook her head. “It hasn’t come up.”

“It will. Especially if Becca ever finds out the two of you are dating.”

Becca, George’s ex-wife, lived in Nashville, where the two of them had moved twelve years earlier. She knew Julie was right. Maybe it was time to just end it with George before it went any further.

It was inevitable that Lacy would be left heartbroken when Becca found out, and George inevitably succumbed to her demands. Even though they were divorced, they had a child together, and Lacy felt certain Becca would use that to manipulate George.

“George is buying into the bar,” Julie had said as she poured the pitcher of beer. “Did he mention it to you?”

Lacy shook her head. George had moved back to Murphy after his divorce, but his son still lived with Becca in Nashville, four hours away. Last time they’d talked about it, he said he wasn’t sure what he was going to do. He’d been handling the music end of the bar for a month, bringing bands in from all over the south for live music on the weekends. Maybe he’d decided to stay, even though it made seeing his son more difficult. He certainly didn’t need to tell Lacy about all his decisions.

“He sure has been bringing in some good music.” Lacy had said. “I guess he’s decided to stay in Murphy for a while.”

She’d been burned too many times in the past by men she fell for who hadn’t fallen for her in return, so she tried not to think about George’s sandy brown hair that fell softly over his collar or his brown eyes that sparkled whenever he talked about music and his passion for finding just the right sound. She didn’t think about his broad shoulders or the way he looked in his solid-colored flannel shirts rolled up halfway on his forearm. She most certainly didn’t think about those things or about the way he kissed her good night when he walked her to the door of her house. So far that was as far as the relationship had gone, and that was fine with her. She liked George The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

87 and enjoyed spending time with him, but that was it. She didn’t need another relationship to turn out like the last one—with her boyfriend engaged to another woman.

KJD: Wow, so much information packed into such a short passage. I guess that’s down to your journalism background. Nice.

Thanks for the sample. My readers will love it.

What’s next in your life?

PCZ: My husband and I are transitioning into a new era in our lives. He retired in December, and we moved to a cabin in the Smoky Mountains. We also have a home in Florida where we’ll live in the winter, starting next year. I probably will never retire. Right now, I’m between writing projects and finishing up some big editing jobs.

However, I have books to write this year, and I plan on expanding my editing business by actually promoting rather than depending on word of mouth. You’ve not seen the last of me!

KJD: So glad to hear that. Pat, it’s been a gas. Thanks millions for visiting and thanks again for the wonderful work on my novel.

Darn, what was it called again?

PCZ: Do you mean On Lucky Shores?

KJD: You got it. J

[That’s it. This interview is over! Ed.]

Kerry J Donovan

was born in Dublin in the

late 1950s, before the time of mobile phones and twenty-four-hour television. He spent most of his life in the UK, and now lives in Brittany with his family. Kerry’s psychological thriller, ‘The Transition of Johnny Swift’ became a number one bestseller only a few months after release and his ‘DCI Jones Casebook’ series are also bestsellers. He can be reached at http://kerryjdonovan.com/ publications-by-kerry-j-donovan/ The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

88

POEM

Norbert Gora

89 walls that changed colour as emotions appearing on people’s faces remembered every creak of the floor. they do not exist anymore deviated from the present times only the gravel road cries of longing quiet wind hums the tune of compassion nothing will drown out the suffering its foundations were destroyed by the clock of fleeting life

A house that disappeared there was a house saturated with lives of tenants the words composed of joy and sorrow bounced off the walls in its heart their treasures were gathered stuffing memories in dark corners.

there was a house touched by a finger of development it vanished in the fog of oblivion no loss for tomorrow yesterday died of grief

Norbert Gora is a 26-years old poet and writer from Poland. He lives in a little town of Góra, Poland. Many of his horror, SF and romance short stories have been published in his home country. He is also the author of many poems in English-language poetry anthologies around the world”.

its eyes saw first smiles tears, passionate kisses and the storm of feelings woven with love.

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90

NON-FICTION

C. Raveendran

TRENDS AND MOVEMENTS IN INDIAN THEATRE

“Alkazi saab, the ferociously dedicated ‘padrone’ of the theatre, liked to personally set an example, asking no less of himself than he asked of anyone.”-

Naseeruddin Shah- ‘And Then One Day’

91 modern Tamil plays in them. There were also random attempts to visualize these plays through play reading or enactment in an improvised way in a literary gathering. With a sense of urge to participate in some way in theatre activities in Tamil Nadu, I selected the field of stage lighting, after reading Richard Pilbrow’s ‘Stage Lighting’ at the American literary, New Delhi. In 1980 I had also participated in a 40 days Back Stage Workshop conducted by V.Ramamorthy, one of the leading lighting designer of India from Sri Ram Centre for Arts and Culture, New Delhi. In 1981, I had gone to Chennai in the month of June and I met my friend E.R.Gopala Krishnan who took me to Madras Museum Theatre where Na.Muthuswamy was rehearsing his play “Unthichuzhi” with bare minimum lights. I saw that the auditorium was equipped with lots of lights and rotator dimmers.

Out of curiosity, I asked Muthusamy the reason for using minimum lights. Immediately he questioned me back to know the purpose of my enquiry. Hesitantly, I introduced that I know something on lights. Instantly, he placed me as his lighting designer. As a challenge, I took the responsibility. I designed lights for Na.Muthusamy’s play Untichuzhi on 11th June 1981 preformed at Museum theatre

At the outset, I must confess that I was neither a playwright nor a theatre man initially. But, as a spectator and reader of drama, I was interested in theatre till I joined as a lecture in Dayal Singh College, University of Delhi in the month of October, 1971. In 1972, particularly in the month of March, I had a chance to see Eugene Ionesco’s ‘The Lesson’ directed by Ebrahim Alkazi, a National School of Drama production, at the studio theatre of Rabindra Bhavan.

I was so excited to see that play. During those days, I have been closely associated with little magazines and writers like Na. Muthusamy and Indira Parthasarathy who had keen interest in writing The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

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92 at Chennai. The play was directed by K.C.Manvendranath and set designed by P.Krishnamurthy, the painter and well known Art Director for all the experimental films, in Kannada, directed by G.V. Iyer.

Untichuzhi is a visual fantasy of a story of a woman who lays egg instead of delivering a baby. After some years, the husband returns with their grown-up daughter. The girl tries to seduce the boy but the father reveals that he is her brother. Not believing that story, the girl takes her father, instead of her brother to a room. In the bolted room, the girl stands nude in front of her father and teases him to have sex with her. Not able to yield to sexual desire, the father kills himself by hanging. The whole incident is narrated by the girl after coming out of the locked room. And then the girl moves towards the boy telling him that he is not her real brother as he is born out of an egg. Unable to believe and tolerate the narration, the boy commits suicide by the ropes of a cradle. In the tussle, mother pleads sorry to her daughter for not telling the truth. Daughter concludes that she was just like Draupadi to her. The play ends here.

A review was published in The Hindu daily under the caption of ‘All the Kings Men’ praising the Director, the Set Designer and the Lighting Designer by allotting each one of us an exclusive paragraph.

That is how I started designing lights for theatre.

With this background, I can confidently talk about the Trends and Movements in Indian Theatre. It is my opinion that the study on trends and movements occupies an important place in the field of historiography in terms of understanding the growth of literature or any branch of art and literature just like the performing arts through ages. It is imperative to undertake any kind of study on the history of drama and theatre should go well with the multitudes of trends and movements which provide space for discourse on drama and theatre. It is also a common belief that the history of drama begins with the history of theatre. Unlike other literary genres like novel, short story, the study of drama initially remains as a literary text and then as a performing text. So the evaluation of drama as a literary product lies in understanding drama in its ‘performance’ mode. Raymond The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

93 William’s ‘Drama in Performance’ is an elaboration in this regard. Taking cue from Raymond Williams, an attempt is made to show the crux of the identity politics of Indian theatre as one of the multiple streams of performing tradition of India.

Due to the advent of English education and the arrival of printing press in various parts of India during the colonial rule, there was an urge to bring out the seminal texts in the form of printed versions and to create new literary genre as done in the case of novel, short story and so on in the Indian languages.

Prose as a mode of communication took the main stage replacing the verse. Many dailies and weekly/monthly journals in Indian Languages feverishly sprouted. Along with fiction and non-fiction, in Indian languages, one can witness the emergence of a new class of people popularly known as ‘readers’. To cater to the need of the reading public, numerous experiments took place in the creative field. The genre of drama was an outcome of such experiments.

After the advent of Parsi Theatre and their lavish productions like Inder Sabha, countless people from Marathi and Guajarati entered the theatrical arena by creating their own theatre companies, modeled on Parsi theatre, to satisfy the spectators through theatrical skills of music and dance. The theatre establishments in the major cities of India and their popularity among the urban educated middle class audiences, made the rural native people also to take interest. They created ‘touring theatre’ companies all over India. They produced plays based on traditional/folk theatre forms. By staging these plays not only in urban centers but also in small towns and rural villages of India, they entertained both urban and rural audience.

Pammal Sambandha Mudaliyar, the doyen of Tamil Theatre started his Suguna Vilasa Sabha at Chennai, after seeing the production companies of theatre from Andhra Pradesh.

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94 He wrote more than 90 plays and also published the autobiography under the title of ‘Forty years Life Under the Footlights.’ His play

‘Chandrahari’ is a parody of the play Harichandra, performed all over India in different theatrical forms. Instead of standing for the truth always, the protagonist Chandrahari lies always, at any cost.

Recently Pammal Sambanda Mudaliyar’s Chandrahari was directed

by N. Muthusamy under the banner Koothu-p-Pattarai and it was well received by one and all for its u-turn theme reflecting the reality of the contemporary politics. Stalwarts like Bala Gandharva of Kirloskar Natak Mandali, Bombay and K.G. Kittappa were icons of those days for their mellifluous voice and doing versatile roles.

Though the publication of Dinabandhu Mitra’s ‘Nil Dharban’, the Blue Mirror of Indigo Planters in 1860, the play was staged in Lucknow only in 1875 which created a furor among the audience, particularly the white. It had a scene depicting the molestation of an Indian woman by a white planter. A frenzied mob of white people got frustrated over that scene and forced the company to stop the performance. The enactment of the proposed the Dramatic Act of 1879 was the result. The power of performing art induced the fear in the minds of white people and it also opened new vistas among the playwrights of Indian languages by creating plays as a protesting voice against the social injustice in the Indian society.

Farley P.Richmond, in his concluding essay on ‘Characteristics The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

95 of the Modern Theatre’ in a book on Indian Theatre (1993), has classified Indian Theatre into four groups i.e., Commercial, Amateur, School and College and Experimental Theatre.

There is no problem in this classification. But the term ‘Amateur’ leads to identify a group of people ‘who participated with least expectation of earning a living out of theatre’. As the theatre groups like Sabha, Natak Mandali and so on in India, the activities of the Amateur theatre groups are also started to be considered as ‘Modern Theatre movement’.

Only two movements are there in theatre in India, as far as I am concerned; namely, commercial and art / avant-garde theatre. Experimental theatre also comes under the classification of ‘art’. These are the basic classifications of theatre but through the history of theatre, we can also observe that the director creates his own theatre movement and christens his theatre such as Artaurd’s The theatre of Cruelty, Grotowski’s the Poor Theatre, Schechner’s Environmental theatre etc. In short, the traditional or folk theatre will be always Actor’s Theatre while modern theatre is Director’s Theatre.

It is better to name the publications of initial plays in all Indian language under the label of ‘Modern Indian Drama’ from 1860 to 1956, the year in which linguistic reorganization of the states of India occurred, as the first phase of Indian drama and theatre.

At that time, Sangeet Natak Akademy also moved the proposal to establish ‘National School of Drama’. Among the playwrights to emerge in the first phase, Rabindranath Tagore stands tall and, no doubt, he is, till date, almost the prophet of Indian Theatre. His plays like Dak Ghar (The Post Office), Mukta Dhara (The Water Fall), Rakta Karavi (Red Oleanders) and Raja (The King of the Dark Chamber ) are, sure to say, landmarks in the annals of Indian drama. Among these plays I have only seen Dak Ghar and Raktakaravi staged by the directors, Aanamika Kakhsar and Vibas The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

96 Vishnu Choudhury of Bangaladesh, respectively. The production of Anamika Kakhsar’s Dak Ghar, the Post-office, which is still green in my memory, has also paved the way for creating children plays, leading to Children Theatre. More than this, ‘Post-office’ symbolizes the encroaching colonial British. The entire play is the journey of a bedridden boy trying to understand his inner-self in relation to the society.

Similarly, Mukta Dhara is a predictive text as an agenda to environmentalists and Tribal activists to negotiate with the administrations of the centre and state Governments towards constructing dams and blocking the sources of river water. Unfortunately, Mukta-Dhara still remains untouched by the entire Indian theatre activists.

Rakta Karavi, Red Oleander, is now available in English, translated

by Rabindranath Tagore himself. It narrates the creation of the land of Yakshapurri, the land of prosperous celestial beings. On the other hand, the land we live now becomes the land of refuges. I am proud to say that Vibas Vishnu Choudury of Bangaladesh took it as a challenge to stage Rakta Karavi, as a student production, abridged for thirty minutes, in the Department of Performing Arts, Pondicherry University in 2010. The entire cast and the credit, including director Vibas, were all my students of M.A. in Theatre Arts of Pondicherry University. They created wonders on stage by proving the maximum in the theatre as a combined art form. I do have hopes that Vibash will definitely stage Rakta Karavi in its entirety, some day in Bangladesh.

The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016

97 As a lighting designer, I have been always interested in reading plays which are really a tough challenge to perform on stage, including Stage Lighting, in modern format. To me text is always pretext of a context. I am really baffled by the simplicity of Tagore’s ‘concept of light’. The play ‘Raja’ is so simple but it is marked as a allegorical play as well a ‘mystic one.

It echoes the very rhythm of unearthly and personal rousing of an individual in their eternal quest for truth and beauty. The story is loosely borrowed from the Buddhist story of King Kush from Mahāvastu. In the palace chamber, Sudharsana, the queen, is in an eternal search of the Raja and she longs to indulge in conversations with him. In spite of all her frenzied search she could not see him in person but only hear his voice. The queen’s maid is aware of the presence of the king in the dark chamber. Thematically, Rabindranath Tagore’s play Raja is a problematic text for feminist critics since it does not provide any chance to start their fight or and for theatre activists to have a discourse. Subramania Bharathi, the national poet, places the concept of the play, Raja, in a simple dictum; to him, darkness is ‘minimum light’.

In short, it is imperative on my part, that Rabindranath’s plays, especially the above mentioned four, are implanted with the current politics of the world, as we are living in an age where ‘everything’ is politics. Theatre is also politics by inculcating the micro narration of uplifting the miserable of the earth or upraise of the man towards his individual, social and political freedom and independence. to be continued in the next issue . . . .

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Published by Vel.Kathiravan, K G E TEAM, Chennai, India - 600024 Printed by Print Process, Chennai- 600014 / Phone: +949176991885 The Wagon Magazine - July- 2016