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This February Janet Grace Riehl, author of Sightlines: A Poet's Diary, touched on an important point regarding love and Valentine’s Day. Janet suggested that if we would extend the concept of love beyond romance to encompass all the good feelings we have for people, then our Valentine’s Day will be more special. The philanthropic appeal at once touched my heart, taking my thoughts to our self-centeredness and its resulting self-confinement characterizing our emotional attachments.

True that romantic love is a defining human characteristic (and more). But often, it has a blinding effect on our human potential to stretch the benevolence of love to all or many around us. In romance, we tend to forget others, many a time even ourselves, as a single person takes the center stage of our emotional being. We think primarily in terms of that person, not realizing that confining our emotional flow to a single channel takes us away from those hundreds of more channels that need this emotional elixir. It is through connecting these many other channels that humanity becomes complete and happy.

For Valentine’s Day, let's open a window that lead us to open our hearts more fully beyond those closest to us. Speaking from a land where violence and terror haunt our peace each day, I see the love-to-all motto as the path to peace. So it is worth sharing to suggest sending love greetings and cards/gifts on Valentine to all and not our Romantic connections only. To make the day and life happier, let’s widen the concept of love.

Dempsey's "Blue Fairy" is dedicated to his beloved Aunt Farhana, who died at 35 in childbirth. His description of how this deeply affected him and radically changed his life forms the moving preface of the book. The book itself tells 25 stories that present us with a diverse cast of characters in a range of situations. All face the same fact of life: death.

--how one woman commemorates the death of someone who died for her.
--a surprising act of a woman about to die.
--a mourner who wishes he could stop time.
--parents who have to decide which child to save.

And...21 more. Dempsey is not sentimental, maudlin, nor too removed from his characters and their difficult situations. He presents us with a clear-eyed view of the many faces death shows us. For such a young man, this is a noteworthy achievement. My wish is that in another book Karim may write about Pakistan and the world he and his family live in there.

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"Love Each Day: Live each day so you would want to live it again" by Gail Bernice Holland (Modern History Press, an imprint of Loving Healing Press, Reflections of America Series) provides 40 true inspirational stories. Holland presents uplifting stories from a cross-section of society and ages. An astronaut and high energy physicist rub shoulders with community activists and students to provide portraits of a day they'd like to live over again. What would that day be for you?

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"Swift Winds," by Ron Sakolsky and artwork by Anais LaRue contains 13 pieces in the forms of poetry, rants, and essays. Naturally, I'm keen on the essays most of all. My favorites were: "Lost Utopias," "Harry Smith's American Dreamscapes," and "Rocks in My Pillow."

My writing pal Ernest Dempsey is also known fondly on Riehlife as "our man in Pakistan"---you can find many blogposts about his work on Riehlife under "Read On" and read his poems under the "Writing Matters" archive categories. I asked him to tell us the story behind the creation of his new book TWO CANDLES. I wondered how he found the connection to My Lucky Guitar Press.

Ernest says: "I have been publishing my short fiction in Skive quarterly magazine off and on. Mathew Ward, editor of Skive mag, started his own press 'My Lucky Guitar Press' and was open to book submissions. So I sent him Two Candles. He liked it and agreed to get it published. That's how Two Candles was born."

I love the writing tip that emerges from and links to the title of Ernest's new book. Just think...you can start a writing practice in any circumstance. Ernest wrote in turbulent times and found writing poetry a way to center his soul and find calm, strength, and peace. ---JGR
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Ernest Dempsey (looking quite ernest!)

THE STORY BEHIND "TWO CANDLES"
by Ernest Dempsey

The summer heat is building up here and it’s about 40 C in Peshawar, Pakistan. Still I feel so cool! Reason? Well, my second poetry book Two Candles is here and I am all joy! It is a collection of 74 poems, published by My Lucky Guitar Press (Australia).

LIGHTING TWO CANDLES

The title ‘Two Candles’ has quite a story behind its origin. Some months ago, in winter, I had a few candles in my room to light the place in case of a load-shading episode. One night, I just felt like writing a poem and doing so in candle light.

So I switched off the electric bulb and let my creative flow along with my pen on paper in the aura generated by candle light.

TIP FOR WRITING PRACTICE...ESTABLISH RITUAL AND ROUTINE

Thus started a writing habit that lasted for a couple of months. I got used to switching off the light, lighting two candles (instead of one) and write a poem or sometimes two poems daily at night in my hostel room.

SIGNIFICANCE OF TWO CANDLES?

Why two candles? Primarily because two candles gave more light and somehow they looked more beautiful and soothing than one. I suppose that by making this choice of lighting two candles instead of one was, unconsciously, finding my way of countering my solitude and loneliness.

However, it never occurred to me who this second candle potentially represents. I never consciously thought of it until last night. And it is of course no one else but my brother Shais who is my second self, my half being. And then I wrote to Matt this morning to include a dedication page in the book, dedicating this collection of poetry to Shais. That is the story behind Two Candles.

Click here or on any of the red text live links to read more about Two Candles.

When I sent this quotation to my friend Grace Madison (she is the mother of Curt Madison, one of my high school chums who know bases in Alaska), she wrote back that it brought to mind "a poem I wrote in 1960 as a memento for members of a conversational English class that I taught for awhile in Dacca, East Pakistan (now Bangledesh)".

ON LANGUAGES
by Grace Madison

The world has many languages
And to learn them is worthwhile,
But there's never a language barrier
In the friendship of a smile.

English, Urdu, Bengali
Conversation is an art.
But the universal language
Is the language of the heart.

Then, because she'd mentioned teaching in Pakistan, I sent Grace's poem on to my poet-pal Ernest Dempsey (aka Karim Khan, my man in Pakistan). He wrote: "That's really beautiful! Yes indeed, the true language is the language of the heart. Let me donate my own short stanza to this thread."

ON LANGUAGE, (continued)
by Ernest Dempsey

While language spoken to others may convey
Some meaning or impression not intended
The language of the heart does not betray
Whatever truth is meant for one’s own sake

His latest is inclusion in Howard Wu's anthology "Random Thoughts," one of the eight authors "compiled in a blend of concrete and abstract perspectives." Here's an interesting twist. The anthology, completed in two months, was initiated through Craigslist, exchanging free advertising and exposure for contributions. "Political protests, love, introspection, travel, miscellaneous rants, and post nuclear war fiction all make their way into this unique combination of works, that likely would not have otherwise found their way alongside each other in the same volume." Dempsey's work is widely read online and is a favorite recurring contributor to Riehlife. Check the Read On! and Write Pen! sections for his past work here.

Ernest Dempsey, Our Man in Pakistan

Staying Safe: Signs of Attitude Change in My Townsfolk
copyright 2008 by Ernest Dempsey

A couple of weeks ago, I went to my hometown Hangu on account of election holidays. It wasn’t that I had any interest in casting a vote (I haven’t done that magnanimous act in my entire life) but simply because the ‘cooking authorities’ of my alma mater (my workplace), the University of Peshawar, informed me beforehand that they were going to close down immediately after the lunch. ‘Hmm!’ I thought. ‘How about my dear mom’s home-cooked food instead of walking two kilometers daily for every single meal that tastes like some wild roots of the prehistoric age?’ The next thing I did was heading toward my home.

I got home in the evening and realized, next day, that my townsfolk had moved on a lot from their historic ignorance. I am speaking about the voters not the political candidates, who, as always, were well known, crooked figures with long histories of corruption and what not. Since votes here are polled for a particular candidate for such ‘grand’ reasons as kinship, receiving money, and simply nescience of the whole sly game, I expected that the most cunning candidate would grab a seat in the parliament and then sell his fidelity to a grander division who could spend hundreds of thousands for buying a vote to the ‘ruling chair’.

As I enjoyed watching my favorite TV show’s DVDs at home and reading Ronnie Lee’s philosophical poetry on Existentialism, everything proceeded as it used to be in the past. People were ‘bought’ and ‘sold’; fidelities were shifting sides; deals were made; ignorant voters were coaxed into polling their only ‘respected’ opinion by ‘smart’ agents working for the candidates; and media was glad to find fodder for their glutinous ‘electronic stomach’.

Wait a minute? Am I contradicting myself here in describing everything as going on in full swing while still claiming that the people of my town have made a leap of progress? Not really! What makes my latter claim true is the fact that only a small number of them bothered to go out and cast their votes. The official figures, as I came to know from a friend, revealed that the total turn out was less than 30%. In my hometown, it appeared that even fewer people had stepped out for polling votes. What a wonderful change! Finally, I am witnessing a time when people have reacted to the hoax of elections in a country where dictatorship puts on sundry persona. They have attested their distrust in empty claims of democracy and trite vows of service. A sigh of relief!

And yet, I feel that something vital has been compromised in attaining this healthy indifference to the putative democratic process. Many people feared the possibility of terrorist attacks, suicide bombings in particular, that are becoming matter-of-course things in our country, being made in crowded polling stations. The apprehensive expression ‘it appears all too dangerous this time’ was the main check on people’s inkling to show up among the throngs where many funny and interesting things happen, making the ‘extraordinary’ in an otherwise alienating routine of daily life chores. The empty roads and dismal quiet of my town on this once-exciting day spoke more for people’s fears of being victimized than for a maturity of mind. And it aches my heart to see the lost freedom of these people to go out for a silly exploit in all the innocence of their ignorance. Maybe it is time for a change. I hope my people will create new, safer ways of getting happy about things that don’t promise utopias but still count a lot. Mom’s home-cooked food is one example; something that works for me.

Ernest Dempsey, author and poet

This morning I received the news of little Ethan having cancer. Ethan's mom, Esther Lombardi is a friend of mine, living in New Mexico. A graduate in English Literature, Esther is an editor of classic literature at www.about.com. She is the person who wrote an introduction to my poetry book Islands of Illusion.

I had regular correspondence with her until a few months back when she suddenly vanished from the online world. Thinking she might be busy or traveling abroad somewhere, I didn't think much about her absence. But then it occurred to me if everything is all right with her. I sent her a couple of e-mails that were not answered. I tried to call her at her number I got from her resume and the phone message told me the number was no longer in use.

I again tried to connect with her via e-mail and this morning I received her short reply: 'Ethan has cancer. We have been moving in and out of hospitals.' I was shocked and could not help feeling heavy-hearted throughout the day. At night, when the power failed out for some time in our hostel, I wrote a peom in my room in candlelight. As I wrote this poem at night in my hostel room, I felt like crying for the child. I don't know how he is doing and whether or not he has hope for life but I strongly wish that he comes out safe and sound. Please join me in wishing him well!

Towards the Light

Power failure in this lonely night
I grope for my cell phone in the dark
Reaching for the candle in its dim battery light
The noise in the side room continues
Guys, afraid of living alone, chat together
I light the candle
My heart still reaching out to young Ethan
A child of under two, fighting cancer
Struggling for his so very tender life
He has his mother to stay by his side
The woman he belongs to
There may be many friends of their family
Each offering some degree of support
Least helpful, though most honest, are my wishes
Silently connecting me to Ethan
From inside of my room with a dying candle
A candle that is all my hope this moment

copyright 2007 Ernest Dempsey

To read an interview on Book Pleasures with Ernest about his writing, his work, World Audience, publishing, and being an author, click here.