Unusual charactersAbout this book
Before worldwide electronic media and large media corporations, people didn’t necessarily realize how odd they were.
These poems describe unusual characters. They might be called “usual” because interesting characteristics have been present in all civilizations; however, since each person is unique, each is unusual.
I am a poet, not a psychologist or cultural anthropologist, so please do not try to read this book as portraits of real people or cultures. Instead, read it as a means of expanding your own possibilities and understanding others.
At all times, and in all places and cultures, we should be kind to our fellow human beings, especially if they are different.
The cover is a photo by Den Trushtin from Unsplash.
The characters
- Aakash
- A boy from a poor family in the Black Town of Calcutta, around 1850.
- Adiharja
- A Javanese woman in Jakarta, around 1620.
- Agni
- A brick layer in Baghdad, eighth century.
- Aishe
- An Arabic woman in France, 1759.
- Akari
- A woman in Kyushi, Japan, about 790.
- Akilah
- A girl in Rijeka, Croatia, around 1500.
- Alex
- A schoolboy in Rieux, France, 1750.
- Alice
- A young woman in San Francisco, 1969.
- Alyia
- A Moabite woman in a nomadic tribe near Madaba, Jordon, about 800 BCE.
- Amed
- A son of a wealthy man in Ramadi, fourteenth century.
- Anahita
- A girl in Arbela, now Erbil, Iraq, eighth century BCE.
- Anita
- An unmarried woman in Szeged, Hungary, about 1650.
- Anzolo
- A young man in Venice, tenth century.
- Araoluwa
- An Yoruba woman near Lagos, sixth century BCE
- Asenka
- A young woman in Hawai‘i, around 1910.
- Asher
- A poor Philistine near Ekron, Philistine, thirteenth century BCE.
- Ayat
- A girl in Rabat, Morocco, 1756.
- Aysel
- A beautiful woman in Carthage, Tunisia, third century BCE.
- Bassel
- An juggler in Thebes, Egypt, 725 BCE.
- Bata
- A boy in Antalya, 1230.
- Biagio
- A young man in Milan, around 1400.
- Bibek
- A feedstore clerk in Oyam, Nepal, nineteenth century.
- Binasa
- A woman in Adelaide, Australia, 1970.
- Binoba
- A Bengali office worker, Bombay, around 1955.
- Boubacar
- A builder in Kano, Nigeria, around 1870.
- Chang
- A Chinese craftsman south of Shanghai, 1540.
- Chodrak
- A young man in Kathmandu, Nepal, around 1870.
- Damir
- A baker in Ayagoz, Kazakhstan, around 1810.
- Darryl
- A motorcyclist near Fresno, California, 1980.
- Debjit
- A poor Hindi man in Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, India, tenth century.
- Devkumar
- A Punjabi man in Lahore, 1570.
- Donkor
- A hod carrier at Luxor, Egypt, 2300 BCE.
- Dria
- An Etruscan girl near Spica, 600 BCE.
- Eikkir
- A boy in Meroe, Sudan, about 700 BCE.
- Ejaz
- A young Muslim man in Algiers around 1560.
- Eliza
- A trader’s daughter, London, 1850-1911.
- Epa
- She was in contact with her ancestors
- Γεⲛⲛεοⲥ
- A Palestine woman in Megiddo, 3002 BCE.
- Gilraen
- A Gypsy girl near Granada, Spain, about 1450.
- Guilabert
- A worried boy near near Cessenon-sur-Orb, Languedoc-Roussillon, France, 1949.
- Guillaume
- A soap maker in Glanyrafonm, near Aberystwyth, Wales, about 1250.
- Hilda
- A married woman in Hirta, on St Kilda, Scotland, around 1740.
- Ichtaka
- An Aztec man in Texcoco, about 1250.
- Ifedayo
- A healer in the Ijoko, Nigeria, 1910.
- Itai
- A Shona boy in Masvingo, near Great Zimbabwe, twelfth century.
- Javed
- A Hindu boy in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, about 1900.
- Jian
- A boy in Nanning, China, around 1350.
- Jimena
- A married woman in Seville, about 750.
- Jonatas
- A blind French interpreter in Lisbon, Portugal, eighteenth century.
- Layla
- A woman in Sfax, Tunisia, fifteenth century.
- Leroy
- A farmboy, near Le Havre, around 1610.
- Lukman
- A man in Cairo, 975.
- Lyle
- An import clerk in Barcelona, fourteeth century.
- Kastriot
- A cleanup man in Belgrade, 1680.
- Kordt
- A German man in Hanover, about 1650.
- Massika
- A slave girl in Canopus, Egypt, around 1100.
- Micah
- A shepherd near Yeruham, Israel, ninth century BCE.
- Milo
- An unmarried clerk in Augsburg, Germany, sixteenth century.
- Mio
- A woman in Kyoto, around 1650.
- Mohammed
- A clerk in a fabric shop in Haifa, Israel, 1754.
- Mustafa
- A Turkish laborer near Kırıkkale, seventeeth century.
- Nealon
- A fisherman in Oulu, Finland, 1722.
- Nihir
- A street sweeper in Lagash, Summer, around 5000 BCE.
- Oktai
- A Mongolian man in Uliastai, Outer Mongolia, 1915.
- Omar
- An Arbic man in Lebanon, around 200 AD.
- Penny
- A former prostitute in Seattle, 1930.
- Poppy
- A farm girl in Northumberland, near Morpeth, 1822.
- Rana
- A Jewish makeup artist in Alexandria, 310 BCE.
- Saniya
- A woman in Constantinople, 1735.
- Sarthak
- A man in Indore, India, 210 BCE.
- Seth
- A Hebrew seller of scrap metals in Ashdon, Israel, tenth century BCE.
- Shu
- A young woman in Beijing, about 1410.
- Mr. Smith
- Retired, London, 1848.
- Sonya
- A woman in Bologna, 1953.
- Susu Wei
- A woman in Hong Kong, around 1850.
- Timo
- A boy in Tallinn, Estonia, thirteenth century.
- Ursa
- An assistant to an architect, Uruk, Sumer, around 3000 BCE.
- Yasmeen
- A young Persian woman in Shiraz, Iran, the daughter of a tile salesman, during the Zand dynasty, 1760.
- Yolanda
- A woman in Ghent, Flanders, fourteenth century.
- Yong
- A boy in Shanghai, around 1150.
Any resemblance to any person living or dead is incidental.
Links and shortcuts
In any page, you can click on or touch links to jump around in this book.
- Each entry in the contents links to the poem.
- The title for a poem links back to the contents, highlighting the entry for the poem.
- Words in the headers and footers link to the index, the contents, a listing of books by the author, to this page, and to the previous and next poems in the book.
You may find the following keyboard equivalents to be convenient. Here I use the symbol ⌥ for the option key on Mac/OS or the alt key on Windows, ⇧ for the shift key, and ⏎ for the return (enter) key. Arrow keys are ◄ (left), ► (right), ▲ (up), and ▼ (down).
| Context | Keys | Jump to / Behavior |
|---|---|---|
| cover | ⌥ ◄ | Books by Tom Sharp |
| ⌥ ▲ | About Tom Sharp | |
| ⌥ ► | about this book (this page) | |
| ⌥ ▼ | contents | |
| ⇧ ⌥ ▼ | contents | |
| contents | ⇧ ⌥ ▲ | cover |
| ⇧ ⌥ ► | about this book (this page) | |
| ⌥ ▼ | select the next item in the contents | |
| ⌥ ▲ | select the previous item in the contents | |
| ⌥ ► | open the selected page | |
| ⌥ ⏎ | open the selected page | |
| poem | ⇧ ⌥ ▲ | contents |
| ⌥ ◄ | contents | |
| ⌥ ▲ | open the previous page | |
| ⌥ ▼ | open the next page |
The poet
Tom Sharp is a Native American of Aleut heritage, a member of Seldovia Village Tribe. He is the author of numerous books, including Spectacles: A Sampler of Poems and Prose, Taurean Horn Press (ISBN 0-931552-10-9), a novel, Hans and the Clock (ISBN 979-8580172484), The book of science, SciFi (ISBN 979-8694935210), Things People Do (ISBN 979-8687425568), The book of beliefs (ISBN 979-8683553593), The I Ching (ISBN 979-8573510620), Images (ISBN 979-8577560515), Aleut Artifacts (ISBN 979-8575608998), Aleut Words (ISBN 979-8582103394), and First Nations (ISBN 979-8682924769).
You may email tom/AT/liztomsharp/DOT/-c-o-m-/ to share comments on this work.
Acknowledgements
“He could be only a clown,” “He dreamed he was at sea,” and “She lived in a fantasy world,” are in The Antonym, 12 November 2021.
