Synkroniciti is pleased to welcome back west coast poet and writer Peter Cashorali with two fascinating prose poems. “Afterlife” turns the paradigm of death upside down, presenting a reality in which the dead go on and we, the living, drop away. “They wonder if they’ll see us again but the more realistic among them doubt it, know we’re gone because it wouldn’t hurt so much otherwise.” Death is so final and transformational that we cannot be sure what happens to consciousness afterwards, but it seems reasonable that whatever parts of us continue will have new things to learn and be and do that are nothing like what we have experienced as flesh-bound humans. Peter puts this into words beautifully in way that creates connection between the living and the dead, who mirror each other, each reducing “to a few scenes that fit into” each other’s “pockets.” Marvelous imagery. “The Underworld” is a depiction of the archetype often known as Hell, but this isn’t a place where sinners go after death. It’s an interior place where the parts of us who are most unloved and distressed reside in constant torture. “With good reason you’ve fled it all your life. By working overtime or always keeping your word, by drinking or sex or trouble, or making sure everyone likes you.” We can’t escape ourselves, but we can ease our torment by listening and caring for ourselves. Peter speaks in Jungian metaphors, approaching that place where the individual and collective humanity meet.
Read “Afterlife” and “The Underworld” in Synkroniciti’s “Haunting” issue, available for purchase here: https://synkroniciti.com/the-magazine/purchase-individual-issues/.
Peter Cashorali is a queer psychotherapist, previously working in community mental health and HIV/AIDS, now in private practice in Portland and Los Angeles. Recent work appears or will appear in Dog Throat Journal, Synkroniciti, Katabatic Circus, Ekphrastic Review, 1870 Journal, Gas and Red Fern Review. Older work includes Gay Fairy Tales (Harper SanFranciso, 1995) and Gay Folk and Fairy Tales (Faber and Faber, 1997).
