Excerpts from Jaggery Literary Magazine, Issue 4

Fall 2014

The Journey Home by Nabill Idrisi

Somewhere on the N4 Intercity Highway, between Dhaka and the Brahmaputra River

15 August 2012, 01:12

I had to shut my eyes. Our car was racing against huge diesel trucks, vying for space on the narrow, bumpy road that didn’t even seem to fit the width of two sedans. The prospect of hitting another vehicle in the night’s darkness filled me with fear. Even though I was with my Khalamoni and my Nani, Ammu’s cautionary words from Florida rang in my head: Abbu, don’t go. Are you sure you want to go? You don’t know what the roads are like. It’s not like here.

I hadn’t been worried. I had come to Bangladesh this year after a long gap of seven years, determined to spend time with my ailing grandmother, and I wasn’t going to miss this chance…

Sly Smile by Gethsemane Herron

Part I

Let us talk about the willing blindness.
There are children
Eating where pigs shit,
Shitting so pigs may eat/

“The gaze fixed straight is for their privacy!”
You! Black girl
W/ (Blue Passport, Gold Eagle.)

Do not forget that your people too
dark; fringe worthy.
That you got aunties steeping
in lightness cream,
like a vegan milk to a dense chai…

Malavika Rajnarayan 

Why It Often Rains in the Movies by Anil Menon

Dear Chitra-ji, I’m married to a kind and loving man. We are the parents of a two-year-old girl. Last year, just after Dussehra, my husband’s body was taken over by the soul of some other man. Everything’s the same, but I know he isn’t my husband. I’m afraid to tell anyone because they’ll take my daughter from me and lock me up. You’re the only person I can trust. Please advise.

“Medical?” asked Chitra.

“Hard to say.” I leaned forward to return the letter. “Could be a case of Capgras delusion. It’s rare. But she’s looking for confirmation, not a diagnosis.”

“Yes, I know.” Chitra sighed, fingers poised over the keyboard…

Fragments of Riversong by Farah Ghuznavi

Reviewed by Susmita Bhattacharya’

Indeed, Farah Ghuznavi’s collection of short stories is an opportunity to journey to Bangladesh, to live alongside the characters and share their dreams, aspirations and fears.

Ghuznavi’s job as a development worker in areas such as political participation, microcredit loans for the poor, adult education for women and human rights for organisations that included British NGO Christian Aid, Grameen Bank in Bangladesh, and the United Nations, has inspired her to write about the themes dealt with in her stories…

For Submission Guidelines visit http://jaggerylit.com/about/submission-guidelines/