Tuesday…the 2nd day of a new year...

May find us back at work, or school, or the daily routine that we let go for the holiday season.  We may have a list of resolutions that have already been broken and tossed to the “I will get to it tomorrow” heap.  We are probably still putting away gifts, taking down ornaments and trying to decide whether or not to re-cycle the tree or put it out for garbage pick-up. 

We easily fall back into past year activities and then wonder why the new year is not better than the one we just left behind.  Maybe, just maybe, we can make 2018 a tad better than 2017…if each one of us does something positive, something different to make our life, the life of another better, or where we create a single improvement in our community, region, or nation.  And it is okay if only you know what you did.  Most heroes exist in anonymity. And remember, “Each one, teaches one.” 

Michael Lee Johnson (photo provided)

Michael Lee Johnson is a Pushcart Prize nominee, editor, publisher, poet and all around Renaissance person.  He is a former aaduna contributor and his work continues to excite us.  Here is an excerpt from a poem that will be in the forthcoming issue:

“Lilly, Lonely Trailer Prostitute”  

Paint your face with cosmetic smiles.

Toss your breast around with synthetic plastic.

Don’t leak single secrets to strangers-

locked in your trailer 8 foot wide by 50 foot long

with twisted carrots, cucumbers, weak batteries,

and colorful dildos-you’ve even given them names:

Want more of Johnson? 

You will just have to wait for aaduna's winter issue launch!

Denise Lewis Patrick (photo provided)

But wait; hold on; don’t stop reading...there is Denise Lewis Patrick, a fiction writer hailing from Montclair, New Jersey who knows how to tease, stroke, and compile us to want to read her entire story.  Her are the opening paragraphs to her eloquent and resonating story, “Things Between People.”

“If he asks me, I’m gonna say ‘yes,’” Lizzie said, propping her elbows up on the kitchen table.  She stared into her dark cup of coffee instead of looking at her mother across the room. Ella, her mother, said nothing in response, but Lizzie heard her sigh as she opened the oven. The scent of nutmeg and butter wafted out. Lizzie slid a hand onto her lap and spread her fingers wide, imagining a gold band on one of her long brown fingers.

Randolph was late. Even the men who might be the best aren’t perfect, Lizzie thought. She got up abruptly and walked through their shotgun house to the front room, feeling the swish of her starched cotton slip against her legs. Though it was late Sunday afternoon, she was still wearing her church dress, and she didn’t want it wrinkled. But the truth was Lizzie didn’t really want her mother’s opinion about the man she had determined to marry. She was eighteen, and she did know she wanted to get out of this house.

Getting out…a goal, a determination…maybe in 2018, if we need to, we can get out of those things that trap, enclose, bound, hamper or tear down our spirit since we know what is best for us as individuals and as members of a larger community that depends on us. 

Be safe and creative in 2018. 

We can change the world. Our region. Our community. 

It is not a hope. 

It is an action. 

Each of us…one at a time…the movement will evolve.

Persevere and trust.

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aaduna - an online adventure with words and images - a globally read, multi-cultural, and diverse online literary and visual arts journal established in 2010.  Visit us at www.aaduna.org where we put measurable actions to our words.

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