Try as he may, the Ugly Amerikan can´t kill off all the mockingbirds, and Plastic Betrand can´t avoid his pact with Mephisto, to name but a couple of the gang who like playing with matches. Looks like some are even trying to dance the Mugabe. Even Mugabe, it seems, wants in again. And while we´re at it, have white South Africans become Australia´s Amerikan Norwegians according to the potato gospel of Tony Abbott?
We now have the Fakedoms of China, Russia, Cambodia, Turkey – we are approaching a list of UN members, so obviously the disease is contagious, with the UN itself not being spared.
So is there hope?
It would seem so as members of civil society are taking to the streets and showing that they have a better understanding of democracy and the responsibilities of elected officials than those elected to run countries do.
So where does it all go wrong? Has ballot box cheating now become a fine art feeding into the complacency of well-fed masses? We must hang on to our health and our wealth, keep our heads down, some say. A brown nose is just collateral damage any good Maybelline lady can fix. Or can we think global and go local?
Can we think?
I´ve had a few hits and misses lately with a longlisting (in the top 26/111) for my Novella in Flash. The title story just missed the longlist at Reflex Fiction and bombed elsewhere, so you never know. I have since sent out some more pieces in the knowledge that touching just one reader is an end in itself.
So I was thrilled and proud that Julya Rabinowich chose to read two of my contributions to her online workshop at the Vienna Poetry School held just before last year´s elections. One of the contributions was a riddle based on the bio of the 1932 Federal Chancellor of Austria; the bio was surprisingly similar to that of a latter-day turquoise garbed saint of the same country.
And isn´t it just the way. Just after I sent of a short story/flash fiction collection submission, I saw an error in the ToC, but it was too late. Yet it is never too late to touch one person and share the things one cares about.
On Friday, I hope to hear Friedrike Mayröcker read from her latest book; Günther Kaip will also be reading new poetry as will Judith Nika Pfeifer, Susanne Toth, Augusta Laar, and others.
So until next, onwards!
