In the Second Anniversary issue, aaduna will kick-off publishing spoken word artists whose poetry is at its best when performed. We will publish two of Giovanni's pieces in print and provide a video of him performing those pieces as well as two others that we will not print. In this way, our readership can see the dynamism of seeing and hearing spoken word versus reading, the same work in a printed format.     (Tim Ogene, our recently appointed contributing editor for poetry, will offer his insights and advice on this burgeoning style of poetic expression in the non-fiction section of the journal.) To continue our celebration of National Poetry Month, we are sharing the unedited version of "Enough" in print.   You are encouraged to check out Giovanni’s performance of this piece in the forthcoming issue.   You can then judge your reaction to seeing and hearing the vibrancy of spoken word poetry. Enough I awoke When "they" told us we had to start...

Changming Yuan provides a “short take” reflection from his portfolio of work.  Read how he orchestrates the interaction between words and imagery. We look forward to the poetry that he is bringing to aaduna’s Second Anniversary issue in a few weeks. Amidst Morning Mists Unable to endure constant burning The suffering souls finally find their ways Out of the topsoil, trying To rise together With the summer sun Yet they are all shot With its very first needles Into the darkest moment of last night Where the ghosts of the newly dead, the invisible Linger on, staring at one another No one knows how many of them Were still holding their authentic Human shapes, how many of them Became deformed, agonizing Between pools of stinking blood And piles of rotten flesh   Read more of Changming's work…soon…you just have to wait…patience is really a virtue !

Kimberlynne Darby-Newton has found her home with aaduna .   Here is an excerpt, or as we like to say, a “short take” from one of her poems that will grace the Second Anniversary issue: The Lesson Won't use his name But he changed me. Montgomery , Alabama Not exactly an incubator Of tolerance They were just "sissies" To us. Undeserving of any scorn, Noticeably different But just there With us. Everything Would have probably stayed same If not for him Most handsome man met Liquid eyes, spilling Sweet, funny, tender We bonded over Snark and humor and smart I Crushed harder Than unknown elements Until, I said the "word" One day Tossed blithely, proving cool Saw liquid eyes dulled, by friends’ betrayal Considerate enough To spare my feelings For hurting HIS feelings He let the night end genially But I was savvy enough to know What I'd thrown away! There is more to “The Lesson”…you will just have to wait…the Second...

Natalie will have her work in the Second Anniversary issue.  Here is one of her poems: Climbing the Coaster I walk up dwarf-steps, mud-specked Nikes curling over the edges of the platform above these trees. Cruel spikes cling to the soles, in case of danger: plummeting into the Red Queen’s garden below. Human touch foreign, chips of cobalt blue from the metal railing chafe my hand. Onto a ramp, feet shake   me towards the steel caterpillar. Captives fidget and stare on the track   in double rows like school children. Sun reflects off the sleeping caterpillar, gas waves distort summer. Rider’s hair steams from sweaty glances.   Over the railing is the wonderland, green and metal. Sugar orbs   of baby pink and blue cotton candy float beside tiny heads. Vicious growls pass the platform,   metal below my feet rattles and hesitates. A cat...

April is National Poetry Month.  The best way for aaduna  to celebrate this recognition is to kick off the promotion of our Second Anniversary 2013 Issue with 'short takes' from the poets that will be featured in that issue scheduled for launch at the end of this month.  Here's a poem from Shana Bulhan Haydock:   here and there the day we eat pitiful sambhar & idli in downtown Northampton i decide i must learn to romance dim yellow.   “i miss you even more much”   even now these clothes thwart-- at some point the novelty wears off and i am foreign, foreign again. i will try to write smaller & smaller & stay here for the odd clothes, the books, the fabric, the shoes, the knick-knacks, the kitsch, the expensive coffee shops, the delicious desserts i can't afford which the doctor tells me not to eat (but never as good as gulab jamuns) & the better hearing aid care. That. there is perhaps resignation "i co...

Is it possible to shrink the world...capture each country and hold on to it solely with the power of words, images, creativity and imagination? We think so. aaduna is trying.... If you have friends around the globe, ask them to visit us at www.aaduna.org and/or www.aadunanotes.blogspot.com We just added: Turkey Barbados Japan to our growing worldwide readership (now read in almost 30 countries.)  Imagine that...and then some more! FYI - "Short Takes" of the work that will be in the Second Anniversary issue will start this weekend.     You've been advised. Get ready!  

aaduna visual arts editor, Lisa Brennan won the Grand Prize in the 2013 Cat Photo Contest sponsored by the Auburn Public Theater (APT) in Auburn, NY.  With 120 entries, Lisa captured the elegance, simplicity and grandeur of Cleopatra enjoying nature at home.  Cleo is one of two Sphynx cats (her brother, Cairo is the other one) who resides in the Brennan/Berry household.      Lisa Brennan, aaduna Visual Arts Editor As Grand Prize winner, Lisa received two tickets to see "CATS,"Andrew Lloyd Webber's long-running Broadway masterpiece, based on T.S. Eliot's "Old Possum Book of Practical Cats," which will play at the Merry-Go-Round Playhouse between August 21- September 11.  She also received cat toys, catnip, notecards that show the winning entries, and cat stickers.  The Notecards and a calendar featuring winning photos are available for sale since APT is raising ...