Here are two poems written in honor of my father.  Let them speak for me, for now:

Fathers

by Robert Schubert

We hear of them,
these boulders:
Soothing sentinels
softening the strife,
holding back the hillside of harm, hurt and hell,
marking the shores of seas and streams and
patrolling the paths that wander
through the mazes
that mark our minds and hearts.

Full weight presses earthward,
their shoulders support us as we sit and stand
listen and laugh,
love and lose.

Their polished soft sides soothe us,
while the rough undersides rile us with reminders of reality.

And while death took the flesh and blood of your father,
the boulder remains:
A giant, gentle sentinel
standing sturdy, ready
should your spirit call.

 

The Loss

by Mike Clark

The loss
of a parent
who knew how
to hold his wife’s hand
tenderly
teaches the lesson
that all of us
are searching a hand
to hold.
In parting,
we reach out
to the other
close to us
in this life
to comprehend
the precious instant
in what matters.

As a six year old boy, Marek witnesses his mother’s death. He learns that the people who killed his mother were the Russians. Later on, throughout his adult life, he searches for ways to revenge what happened to him and his family. Finally he finds the way: He joins the mujahideen in the Soviet war in Afghanistan. He feels that by joining the mujahideen he will find justice.  Will he?

Veni, vidi, vici!

for my students, Fall 2011

by Danuta Hinc

When my students were in the preliminary stages, meaning, “familiarizing themselves” with Assignment #5 (writing instructions for experts and non-experts), one of my students from the A. James Clark School of Engineering, questioned the requirements of that assignment.

“Professor Hinc,” he asked in his baritone voice, “the assignment calls for 400 to 750 words.”

“Yes, it does indeed” I said, knowing that what will follow will be another, already familiar to me, tirade of precise explanations in which graphs, charts, drawings, and a mind-boggling calculus equations will be used as supporting points.

“Well, I think that we don’t really need that many words to write instructions,” he said to the perfect silence of the other twenty-one students in the class, whose faces were now turned towards him.

“Really?” I said, waiting for the calculus equations and seeing all the faces in the room turn to look at me.

At this point everyone in the room understood that my engineering student and I were engaged in a match and that the outcome was of the great interest to all in the room.

“Yes.  I can pretty much explain anything under 400 words.”  All the faces turned towards the baritone voice.

“Are you sure?” I said not knowing what to say.

“I am pretty sure,” he said.

“Well, in this case, we need to conduct an experiment.” All the faces turned towards me.

“Experiment?” The baritone voice clearly liked that word.  “What experiment?” he asked.

“You will see,” I said, trying to be as mysterious as I could.  I think even my eyebrows moved up slightly.  “We will conduct an experiment in the beginning of the next class, on Wednesday.”

“Okay …” The baritone voice was cheerful and confused at the same time.

***

“An experiment?  Why did I say that?  Now I have to come up with an experiment,” I was thinking coming up the stairs to my office.  “I can’t believe the things I say sometimes! Why do I have to make it difficult on myself?” I remember that “regret” was the first word that followed the questions.  The second word was “Jesus!” This is the one that comes to my mind habitually.

On the evening of that day I paced my house—admiring the autumn colors of the woods I see through the enormous windows in my living room, visiting the refrigerator in hope of finding something that needed to be purchased immediately, checking the dryer wishing to find clothes that needed to be folded—and nothing came to my mind.

To my disappointment, I realized that I was on an impossible quest to surprise my students, to engage them in something fabulously interesting, to challenge them, to make them happy, and—most importantly—to prove the baritone voice from the engineering school wrong.

I struggled way past my bed time and finally gave up.  I turned the lights off. A voice in my head said: “It’s okay.  It’s good to know when to give up.”  I took a deep breath and said to that voice: “I am not giving up, I am just going to sleep, you idiot!”

I was feeling myself dissolving into the warmth of my bed, drifting away into the place where my body, my thoughts, the air, and even the walls and the ceiling of the bedroom become one.  On the precipice of a dream a saw the walls of my room disconnect and float as geometrical shapes—a small square with an opening for a window, a gigantic rectangle for the ceiling, two trapeziums that supporting the cathedral ceiling, and a rhombus from nowhere that decided to join the other shapes.  They floated above my head in different patterns as if revealing all the different combinations of connections that exist within those shapes.

And that was the very moment when I realized that the dance of the geometrical shapes was the experiment I needed.  For a moment I was surprised how unimpressed I was to finally have it and then I realized the reason: I knew I had to get up and write it down because otherwise I won’t remember anything when I wake up in the morning.  “Jesus!” came to my mind.

***

The next morning I opened a Power Point, went straight into Shapes and chose Basic Shapes.  I arranged different shapes into a picture you can find here: http://tinyurl.com/6sbtye7

I would like to say that on Wednesday all my students were eager and excited in anticipation of the experiment, but the truth is that I was the only person exited because I was the only person who remembered about the experiment.  My students’ seemed slightly bewildered when they heard the word “experiment,” but when the baritone voice said, “Oh, yes, the experiment,” everyone seemed to remember our Monday’s match.

Here is the experiment:

I asked my students to pair up.  I asked them to sit back to back.  Half of the room faced the wall on the right and half of the room faced the wall on the left.  I gave the students facing the right wall a sheet of paper with the picture I prepared for the experiment.  The students facing the wall on the left were given a blank piece of paper (of the same size).  Then I asked the students with the picture to give instructions to the students with the blank paper to draw the picture they were holding.  The students with the blank paper were not allowed to see the picture; they had to draw it only on the basis of the instructions given by the students holding the picture.

After about 10 or 15 minutes everyone was done.  The results varied.  Some of the drawings were very close to the original, some of them were not, but all of them revealed one simple truth: giving instructions is not easy!  Or is it?

“How many words do you think you needed to instruct your partner?” I asked the baritone voice (he was the one giving instructions in his pair).

He smiled the smile of integrity. “Way more than 750,” he said, still smiling.

I didn’t need to say anything. I felt victorious!

“Professor Hinc,” called the baritone voice. “I would like to show you our drawing.”

“Yes,” I said walking towards his desk.

He put the drawing made by his partner on the original to reveal that the drawing was very precise.  The two pictures aligned perfectly.

“How did you do it?” I asked.  “It’s almost impossible!”

I turned to the class and showed them the drawing aligned with the original.  I asked if anyone else had such perfect results.  No one did.

“How did you do it?” I turned to the baritone.

“I gave him all the instructions in inches,” he said and smiled the victorious smile.

This story was originally published in “The Professional,” a newsletter of the Professional Writing Program at the University of Maryland, College Park.

~Bertrand Russell

by Khaled Tantawi, student, Ain Shams University, Cairo, Egypt

“Go home, we will run the country for you,” has been the tone of the Supreme Council of Armed Forces, the ruling military junta in Egypt. They are doing what they want as opposed to what the people, and specifically the revolutionaries, really want.

We wanted them to restore the security in Egypt–legislate a ban of all those who cooperated with the Mubarak regime from participating in the Egyptian political scene, liberate the Media, and let us reap the fruits of the Revolution. However, thousands of civilians were brought to military trials, while Mubarak is staying in his luxurious hospital.  Actually, we are not even sure if he is there at all.  We are also not sure if he is on a civil trial.

This is what the Supreme Council of Armed Forces accomplished so far:

(1) Arrested women and forced them to have humiliating virginity tests.

(2) Censored media imposing lack of transparency.

(3) Insisted on having parliamentary elections first as opposed to having a new constitution first.

(4) Announced they will be staying for 6 months and now it has been over 9 months.

We have been under a military rule since the 1952 coup d’etat and we are dying to have a civil country.

The truth is: The members of the Supreme Council of Armed Forces are loyalists to the previous regime and ousted president.  Even though the truth is wildly known, many had faith again all odds, because it’s scary to fight the Armed Forces.

But now, those who oppose the Supreme Council are growing in numbers.  People have been staying in Tahrir Square for almost a week, calling for the Supreme Council to step down. People demand to have a transitional civil government and a free country. The Armed Forces tried to force people to leave the Tahrir Square and many people were killed and thousands were injured. The Armed Forces used tear gas and the same brutality that has been used by the previous regime.

No one knows what’s going on in Egypt. I blame the ruling military junta for this. We are so over with their slogan, “Go home, we will run this country for you.” They lost our trust.

And now that the anniversary of the January 25th Revolution is approaching, it’s really sad to see what the truth is.  The Supreme Council of Armed Forces tricked and betrayed the people of Egypt. They have actually convinced them that they were pro-revolution, and they said they supported it.  They kept reminding people how they never shot people during the protests like the Libyan and Syrian Armies did.

Bottom-line: We had a peaceful revolution, but it seems like peaceful revolutions don’t work nowadays.  Today in Egypt, many people are ready to die to have this country as they want it to be.

To Kill the Other
Danuta Hinc
Tate Publishing
127 E. Trade Center Terrace, Mustang, OK 73064
9781617390197, $18.99, www.tatepublishing.com

No one is born a murderer of thousands. “To Kill the Other” takes a spin on how a terrorist is formed. Telling the story of Taher, a man who is transformed from a simple kid into a ruthless individual joining in on his group’s plans of mass murder. A fascinating and well written story, “To Kill the Other” is a highly recommended pick, not to be missed.

 John 14:1-4 “Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. And you know the way to where I am going.”

I started talking about the weather and the colors of the forest around our house. Everything is turning red and yellow, I said. It rained last night, I said. The tomatoes are still coming but most of them break open, too much water, I said. The dog is so happy now. It’s his kind of weather, you know. Not too hot. Sort of chilly today, I said.

I don’t ask questions anymore. They all became exhausted; all of them talk about life after all. I can’t say, how are you feeling? I can’t say, how did you sleep? I can’t ask about his appetite.

Today I talked in hope to hear his voice again, but he said only, yes? I don’t know if he heard what I was saying. When I stopped talking, I didn’t know what to say, I could hear his breath. Strange, raspy, not-my-father’s breath of someone I don’t know.

There was a long silence before I asked the question I regret, are you still there? Are you still there? I don’t even know what it means anymore. Still there?

I want to talk to someone who can help me understand the “there,” the “silence,” the “stranger in my dying dad.”

I find escape in books — in reading and writing.

Here is a poem I have been reading for a couple of weeks now, rediscovering its meaning in the unfolding days of my present life.

by Elizabeth Arnold

Whither I go, thou canst not follow me …

Walking toward the ginkgo trees,

their yellow, fan-shaped leaves

around their trunks in rings,

my feet sink where the moles dug,

pushed through darkness near the top,

the earth buckling behind

as if it had been hoed from underneath.

 

I wonder how the dead go,

blind at first to what is near,

until the force incomparable

will turn on how they know,

displacing ten-ton beams

of their attention, thundering them

from one world to the next.

from: The Reef by Elizabeth Arnold

• My fragmented father, my fragmented me
• Life beyond words (1)

• Praying for my dad, praying for myself …

How can I possibly talk about the years of working on this novel?  What is the most important message I can convey to my audience? 

I think of Taher, the main character of my novel and the complexities of human condition come back to my mind. Thiry-three years of his life lead to an end he regretted in a moment when nothing could have been changed.

I come to the same unsatisfying conclusion: how little do we know about each other, and how little do we know about ourselves. 

Is it a role of a writer to have all the answers?  I believe that my role, instead, to post all the right questions.

This short meditation brings me to a quote send to me by a friend a couple of weeks ago.  The quote made me feel honored and undeserving at the same time.  Here it is:

The books that help you most are those which make you think that most. The hardest way of learning is that of easy reading; but a great book that comes from a great thinker is a ship of thought, deep freighted with truth and beauty.

~ Pablo Neruda

Baltimore Book Festival

September 23-25, 20011

I will be on a panel discussion:

“Read on the Wild Side: Thrillers and Their Authors

Please, join me on Sunday, September 25 at 5:00pm

Address:

City Lit Stage

Mt. Vernon Place 

centered on 600

North Charles St.

Baltimore, MD 21210