Contemporary Literary Horizon

My rest from blogging has brought me luck. It was a good thing, so I’ll continue to rest time to time. But I want to let you know that out of my resting-from-blogging period, I clicked the place I probably never would have clicked. It was my near dead former blog site below.
http://keiko-booksandtalksfromlosangeles.blogspot.com/

A new message was left there for more than seven months. It was from Daniel Dragomirescu of Contemporary Literary Horizon. To make a story short, I’m excited to tell you that my poem and story will appear in the next CHMagazine. I don’t know how it will all work out because it is just happening now, but Daniel is talking about translating my work into Romanian and Spanish.

Wow! Is Daniel talking about not just publishing my pieces in his magazine, but in three languages?! I write stories in Japanese also, but I don’t even translate my own English work into Japanese. It takes much effort to translate even one small poem. How can I express my excitement?

I appreciate this place. I appreciate you very much for reading this.

A Man on the Roof

It was incredible. Last Saturday, my daughter and her boyfriend visited me, and we were about to walk to a local fair.

"Do you like fresh figs?" I happened to say. "It's ripe now."

"Yes," he said and looked out to the backyard.

"I didn't know you have a fig tree, Mom."

"Yes, I do. I didn't plant it though. Birds did."

Then, we stepped over to the backyard, and one thing led to another. He was on the roof like a fiddler. I said I wish all the branches are off the roof. In less than thirty minutes, all the tree branches disappeared from the roof.






Thank you, Jeff.

My Appreciation

To All,

I appreciate all the readers, but I especially appreciate the people who clicked under "Followers" and "Friends." To those of you, this is a time limited offer, but if you like, I'll send you one of my short story. It is a fairy tale based on a true remarkable story of a Chinese monk. I haven't finished editing yet. Rebb read it and she liked it! I'm thinking of reading it tonight at a local group. I hope to finish editing in a week. I provided my email address under contact, so if you send me your name and your wish for the story, I will send a copy.

Below is a hollyhock. I took the photo in May at the sidewalk near my place in Yokohama. I grew up looking at that hot pink hollyhock in a field near my house. I admire hollyhock. They grow very tall, but very strong. And the color is strong.


Below, I took these two photos in San Dimas last month. Again, the color is strong, and look at the strength of hollyhock! They bend, but not give in. How can we not admire it. I follow hollyhock although I won't grow taller anymore.



I didn't know hollyhock is from Central Asia. I just looked it up in my dictionary. I think of the history and hollyhock, and think of the appreciation spread throughout the world. How grand it is! I just happened to take the photos because I like them. But somehow, they always end up matching to the story I write. Strange, isn't it? It's a mystery like hollyhock.