Submit your work, meet writers and drop the ads. Become a member
LN Sep 2014
I.

The heart is clumsy,

our thoughts provoking disaster

when pulling on the wrong strings

before the storm, and after.

II.

You

and I,

encompass the sky

that hovers above us

holding clouds that serve purpose

to embellish or destroy

waiting for the wind

to mould us into strange shapes

tugging at others’ curiosity

not knowing what we are

or where we’re going.

III.

Muffled speech,

blinding weather in his eyes,

today we are not raining together

drop by drop

He falls and changes,

beauty into anger,

I await on a lonely ground

to catch him.

IV.

We exist in all shades,

unpredictable,

beautiful,

converging into one another

calming the anxious souls

that we transport to the heavens above.

V.

I watch the sun and moon alternate,

natural occurrences, I notice

just like the thoughts

that feel like clouds in my head

when my heart reminds me

of him

at an ungodly time of night

striking me like lightening,

thunder echoing between these ears

that long for the voice of an angel instead.
jane taylor May 2016
a cerebral grasping of existence’s resplendence
is insufficient

tenuously treading bereavement’s tide
i cradle life

twinkling moments spent on this planet
are hallowed time

i walk in quiet reverence as tears flow
at innocuous occurrences

god’s face aglow in each instance
perspective revived

a bumblebee drifting gently settles
evoking awe

i stand pensive aforetime unaware
in cathedrals we stand

eyes newly uncovered awakened discover
celestial dimensions

people replete with infinite spirit
are all that surround

my senses abruptly adjusting their focus
‘tis an earthly angelic realm

©2016janetaylor
Carlos Molina Mar 2013
Can't sleep, it's always the same.
I get to my room, exhausted, lie in my bed,
Close my eyes and the Sleepless Fairy
decides to take the reins of the situation.

Maybe if I go to my computer and surf for a while
I could doze off. Maybe I'll go out and have a cigarette
to calm the Fairy. No, this insomnia is different. I can't fix it
with simple solutions.

This wakefulness is not due to the anxiety of an exam,
or the diffidence I have for that one girl I can't get out
of my head. This insomnia is that small sparkle of
uncertainty that has abounded my mind for a long time.
That feeling of vagueness, of yearning. Yearning of what?
I don't know.

It is simply that feeling that I'm missing something,
whatever it is. I go around the whole day in my mind,
what am I missing? What am I forgetting?

During the day I'm acquiescent, lucid, happy.
But come night... time to go to bed.
Time to perform the daily check for recent events.
Catalog the occurrences with different feelings,
accommodated to their respective memories.

But there's something missing.

I curse the Fairy and its 1001 tricks that keep me
awake and conscious about that which is in the
subconscious.

Will the day come when the Fairy shows up no more?

As long as that feeling is housed in me, like a parasite
clogged on its new victim, the Fairy will keep visiting.
Raven Nov 2016
The drug
The high
The confusion
The craving
The withdrawal

The brain feels overwhelmed
The noise creates chaos in my mind
The silence I seek
The alone time I need

The anxiety kicks in
Struggling to breathe...
Overthinking creates an addiction, to the things that cause mind suppression.

My mind is noisy, with thoughts of occurrences that have happened, and some not.
I try not to depress myself, but mistakenly think too far in the future, then get disappointed because expectations have not been reached.
Busy, distracted, chaotic, and unfocused.

I reach no end to where my mind goes...
A path of little thoughts that creates an explosion and downfall.

I crave the drugs to give my mind a rest.
To give it a sense of peacefulness...
I have failed lifes tests.

Tense, tight, my mind implodes.
Burn my thoughts and bury them in ashed coal.

Cannot sleep
Cannot close my eyes
Always in a state of overthinking...
Like my brain is constantly blinking
Lin Cava Jun 2013
Renewal

Mother walked into the Sea this morning.
Harkened to the song of Neptune;
the wail of the sirens.
She was called to beauty.

Mother walked into the Sea this morning,
but she did not walk out.
Embraced by the precious,
the irreplaceable, the untouched
she is surrounded now in a balance of beauty.

She travelled long and far
leaving land behind
as a lost memory
a forgotten effort

Relieved forever of the weight
of the fight, of the blight
She has left us to our own devices.
I cannot even cry, "Why?"
For I am aware.

Mother walked into the Sea this morning.
She moved past vast deserts in the Oceans,
fled beyond sea lanes and gulf streams
shedding tears to match the salt of the sea
she cried for the lost coral reefs

She cried for the loss of life
She cried until there were no more tears
...and still she swam to where now she rests.
There is no more she will do.
There is no more she can fix.

She floats past green fronds,
free floating in the brine
feels the mermaids purses hiding there
so few, and less will survive.

Along the way, through dead seas
she sees the remains
of man's most vile waste
drums upon drums, rusted through
once filled with half-life,
spent fission elements
left to decay, left to destroy
left to be forgotten
but Mother, cannot forgive
the damage is done.

She lingers in a place of beauty
beyond words, no language can portray
as she hides among the coral, watches
the colorful fish, tropical life
and cries once more for the death
the destruction, mankind's blight
wreaked upon these special places...

Her heart is breaking
for if the Seas die
the Earth dies.
Better to let the Blight of Man
be left to destroy himself.

She shall gather the gifts of the Earth
Secret them far away from harm
to become the seeds of a new beginning.

It has happened before
Millions of years ago
But an instant to Mother
And after, the Earth came back
full in its beauty
perfect in its balance

Let her sister, Nature, take Her toll upon
the blight of man,
the pestilence of saturation.
There are too many, much too many
for Mother to support.  

She must rest now.  Save what little can be saved.
For the time when she must rise again.
A time when the wind will carry her breath
to  breathe life into what remains.
And she shall rise again.

Renewal.  Mother will rise once more.
And for a while, there will be no callousness
no blight of forgotten crimes
against the lifeblood that sustains her;
Mother Earth.  Only she shall remember
that once, there was greatness in Mankind...

Mother walked into the Sea this morning.
Harkened to the song of Neptune;
the wail of the sirens.
She was called to beauty.

Mother walked into the Sea this morning,
but she did not walk out.

Lin Cava
20-June-2013

As of June 19, 2013 the world's human population is estimated to be 7.093 billion by the United States Census Bureau, and over 7 billion by the United Nations.  Most contemporary estimates for the carrying capacity of the Earth under existing conditions (which is the ability of earth to sustain the population of man) are between 4 billion and 16 billion. World Population Organization has stated that the growth of human populations now exceeds the ability of the earth to sustain them.

*****************­*
Depending on which estimate is used, human overpopulation may or may not have already occurred.  Nevertheless, the rapid recent increase in human population is causing some concern. The population is expected to reach between 8 and 10.5 billion between the year 2040 and 2050. In May 2011, the United Nations increased the medium variant projections to 9.3 billion for 2050 and 10.1 billion for 2100.

Something has to give.  There will be disease, and increased loss of life by natural occurrences because of sheer volume of population alone.  There will be genocide, and hidden agenda's carried out by the powerful and wealthy which will remain secret.  We are so capable of saving many, but just as capable of biological destruction.  Culling of the herds.  It will not be fiction, just as "1984" is no longer fiction...
Karijinbba Aug 2018
John Lennon's songs
"Yesterday" and "Imagine."
Lennon was asking us
to imagine a place where things that divide people religion, possessions, did not exist.

Would Earth be a much better place to live?
This song is a strong political message that is sugarcoated in a
beautiful melody Lennon knew that a gentler approach would bring one poetic song to a wider audience who would grasp
his creed, and he like Jesus tried
to change the world and like a thorn bird both paid a price

Change while innebitable encounters an abyss of resistance
but just one immutable voice
one tini stone into a sand pool creates the meaningful ripples needed to speed up the initial spinning force.

Imagine how hard it is to "imagine no possesions" when one's personal worth is in the vicinity of half a billion bucks.
IMAGINE was the best song in Lennon's entire career

As the collective imagination of our species produces actual occurrences and manifests our own destiny.
Science has proven that our upper levels of consciousness are linked and the more people that become aware of truth and reality force the rest of the species to evolve.

Fact: We have receivers and transmitters attached to your neurons that vibrate energy "Imagine" by John Lennon
his lyrics on this album
on "Oh My Love."
tells you where he is
"I see the wind I see the trees, everything is clear in my world"

He was feeling being alive he as a poet was expressing to us the intimacy of life.

Imagine was a wish an aspiration.
No war no possessions!

The song coined from Yoko Imagine from her book Grapefruit espoused a world without war weapons and mad men running the world.

He knew we needed liberated women to make the world a better place to effemanise soften male aggression.

It is not about atheism but it is about RELIGION using it as a means to hate not LOVE.

He, like us wondered what created everything that mattered in all our lives a special song by a special human in a special place at a very special time, the song holds a very special place for me
If we all imagine, but finding the secrets of our conduct.

How we resolve ourselves.
Can we win when we lose?

Imagine,  Yesterday, What a Wonderful World, Blowing in the Wind, Amazing Grace and a handful of other songs still give me chills each beautiful song.
And all well-intentioned.

Too bad it is about communism and is misguided.
Man's evil didn't start with nations, possessions or religion.

We were stealing from each other and slaughtering each other well before any of those things existed since pradise fell
We started to CHANGE that.

Our goal isn't to have NO nation. Our goal is to have ONE nation.
for peace on earth
to reign under God.
~~

( In memory of my true love
jPC/Rc who Sang to me his song
"Yesterday" in Veracruz!) He too tried to change earth but I didn't understand him so I feared him and lost the chance to join him reciprocating timely, our love was key. True love was in me for him too but free will faltered. Love cannot be made perfect in fear.
Two hearts that beat as one. Two minds and one single thought throwing one single stone creates a riple effect that can change the world may we cast our rock and may a poem become the moving action ripple effect yo change from within one person at at time?
~l Rights reserved.~
Joseph Schneider Nov 2014
Distant learning courses in the heart
Irrelevant actions have left us all apart

Acquisitions decaying those stray minded people
It's no longer a commonplace to feel peaceful

Simultaneous occurrences have our mind in disarray
Through our pasts they begin to replay

All these calamitous activities brought through maleficent eyes
Disintegrate what's left sending us in a fools paradise

We reap to elope from these rigorous bearings we call home
Only to find ourselves cast away into the unknown

We strive to survive in a world full of abhorrence
Being seen transparent just as worthless corpses

Those few who prevail are not left without detriment
They are forever severed a mental delinquent

Nevertheless our story lives on
In this godforsaken marathon


-Joseph B Schneider
© Joseph B Schneider. All rights reserved

Life always finds a way to repeat itself, if not through your eyes then through another's.
Coop Lee Mar 2014
mean beam bottom ***** without reluctance.
\ air above \
since forever baby boy: since forever liquid sparkler.

he has sense
& peanut butter jelly geography to his page.
his romance is of the west.
his eyes are of dandelions kicked & to the wind.
he moves like ancient turtle migration.
reaches feet to sidewalk \ sand to depths \ ride \

night:
velcro-tightened mind withstanding.
party lights, ***** willows, retro punch, he
is orpheus descending: with all the elements positioned just so.
\ jellyfish electric \  
he says he likes the loneliness.
he says it’s the water.

& so he moves \ wills himself into the next measure.
liquid resolute bits.
so move \ orca \
curl of eye \ so ride \ black rollo wave \
basilica \ & \
coral reaches below \\\

he likes to tell it, with warmed exaggeration.
slow-motion buffalo stampede. ride the railroads free & easy.
orange glowing bars of elsewhere. oscillating seal calls.
oily portland hipsters howling on the beach. those
juno cheeked rosy-red lips.
somewhere, sister getting married.
spring, summer, fall, winter, spring.
africa ******* a branch of a tree of a forest, overlooking elephant burial grounds.
color & white material:
plantations, gas stations, diners, & sharks.

this is the morning lunar \
sweet blue beach of the old & awakening.
he crawls out & into her breaks.
her deep heights & bombora reef. the serotonin
functions twice, exposed between thin tissues of warm-blooded neurochemistry.
human, shown.
he is as a raw page, blank, yet
dipped \
\ so ride \ bulbous waves of air mother agua \
ride \ &
\ ride \ &
brew by light these occurrences forever.
previously published in the Susquehanna Review
http://media.wix.com/ugd/387c1e_b3d8de732bd84e88923496bcea98bdb1.pdf
Ellen Dawson Apr 2014
Your touch closes my eyes
I let your words traumatise my mind
Your breath dampens my skin,
Provoking apocalyptic thoughts from within

The trickle of your touch
Is eating at my mind,
I keep your desires fed,
Thirst and hatred intertwined

Disrupting my insides
My lips escape discordant harmonies,
As in you I confide,
That the truth's foreign to my eyes

You remain my fixation
A sinister hallucination
Occurrences of formination
Are my self-rehabilitation
Gunnyr Johnson Jan 2015
Why do we hurt.
Over such obvious human occurrences.
He and she.
Them and it.
Society tells us beauty lies within.
Yet we are unable to see true beauty.
Death come quick.
To the one who waits and hopes.
Death is beauty.
Thy velvety pink lining has revolted against thy most honorable wishes.

'tis now an angry, burning red!

Much like the doomy pits of hell!

And hell is how one should describe thee.

But why? Why doth thy choose such a path?

could one have followed an alternate?

will thy destiny have changed?



Explosions as mighty as all the worlds volcanoes

oozing pain, thy knees tremble like an earthquake

One can no longer enjoy the purity of ones skin

One can no longer live carefree

If kept a secret, thy shall be no different than a murderer!



A soothing touch.

Although, the rain hath left no moisture.

The grounds crack and ache for a new rain to fall.

Thou shalt not ponder such occurrences...for will it come?

One has high hopes.

As high as the heavens.
My take on ****** Transmitted Diseases during the Shakespeare Era (1600's)
“Keep on the Watch”​—The Hour of Judgment Has Arrived!

The information in this study article is based on the brochure Keep on the Watch! released at the district conventions that were held around the world during 2004/05.

“Keep on the watch . . . because you do not know on what day your Lord is coming.”​—MATTHEW 24:42.

1, 2. To what did Jesus fittingly liken his coming?

WHAT would you do if you knew that a thief was on the prowl, burglarizing homes in your neighborhood? To protect your loved ones and your valuables, you would keep alert, watchful. After all, a thief does not send a letter announcing when he is coming. On the contrary, he comes stealthily and unexpectedly.

2 On more than one occasion, Jesus used the ways of a thief as an illustration. (Luke 10:30; John 10:10) Regarding events that would occur during the time of the end and that would lead up to his coming to execute judgment, Jesus gave this warning: “Keep on the watch, therefore, because you do not know on what day your Lord is coming. But know one thing, that if the householder had known in what watch the thief was coming, he would have kept awake and not allowed his house to be broken into.” (Matthew 24:42, 43) So Jesus likened his coming to the arrival of a thief​—unexpected.

3, 4. (a) What is involved in heeding Jesus’ warning about his coming? (b) What questions arise?

3 The illustration was fitting, for the precise date of Jesus’ coming would not be known. Earlier, in the same prophecy, Jesus said: “Concerning that day and hour nobody knows, neither the angels of the heavens nor the Son, but only the Father.” (Matthew 24:36) Jesus, therefore, urged his listeners: “Prove yourselves ready.” (Matthew 24:44) Those heeding Jesus’ warning would be ready, conducting themselves properly, whenever he would come as Jehovah’s Executional Agent.

4 Some important questions arise: Is Jesus’ warning only for people of the world, or do true Christians also need to “keep on the watch”? Why is it urgent to “keep on the watch,” and what does this involve?

A Warning for Whom?

5. How do we know that the warning to “keep on the watch” applies to true Christians?

5 It is certainly true that the Lord’s coming will be thieflike to people of the world, who shut their ears to the warning of impending calamity. (2 Peter 3:3-7) However, what about true Christians? The apostle Paul wrote to fellow believers: “You yourselves know quite well that Jehovah’s day is coming exactly as a thief in the night.” (1 Thessalonians 5:2) There is no doubt in our minds that “Jehovah’s day is coming.” But does that minimize the need for us to keep on the watch? Notice that it was to his disciples that Jesus said: “At an hour that you do not think to be it, the Son of man is coming.” (Matthew 24:44) Earlier, when urging his disciples to seek continually the Kingdom, Jesus cautioned: “Keep ready, because at an hour that you do not think likely the Son of man is coming.” (Luke 12:31, 40) Is it not clear that Jesus had his followers in mind when he warned: “Keep on the watch”?

6. Why do we need to “keep on the watch”?

6 Why do we need to “keep on the watch” and “keep ready”? Jesus explained: “Two men will be in the field: one will be taken along and the other be abandoned; two women will be grinding at the hand mill: one will be taken along and the other be abandoned.” (Matthew 24:40, 41) Those who prove themselves ready will be “taken along,” or saved, when the ungodly world is destroyed. Others will be “abandoned” to destruction because they have been selfishly pursuing their own way of life. These may well include individuals who were once enlightened but who did not keep on the watch.

7. What does not knowing when the end will come allow us to do?

7 Not knowing the exact day of the end of this old system gives us the opportunity to demonstrate that we serve God out of a pure motive. How so? It may be that the end seems to be a long time in arriving. Sad to say, some Christians who feel this way have allowed their zeal for Jehovah’s service to cool off. Yet, by our dedication, we have without reservation presented ourselves to Jehovah to serve him. Those who know Jehovah realize that a last-minute display of zeal will not impress him. He sees what is in the heart.​—1 Samuel 16:7.

8. How does love for Jehovah move us to keep on the watch?

8 Because we truly love Jehovah, we find the greatest delight in doing his will. (Psalm 40:8; Matthew 26:39) And we want to serve Jehovah forever. That prospect is not less precious just because we must wait a little longer than we may have expected. Above all, we keep on the watch because we eagerly anticipate what Jehovah’s day will mean for the accomplishment of his purpose. Our earnest desire to please God moves us to apply the counsel of his Word and give his Kingdom first place in our life. (Matthew 6:33; 1 John 5:3) Let us consider how keeping on the watch should influence the decisions we make and the way we live our life each day.

Where Is Your Life Heading?

9. Why is there an urgent need for people of the world to wake up to the significance of our times?

9 Many people today recognize that serious problems and shocking events have become everyday occurrences, and they may not be pleased with the direction that their own life is taking. However, do they know the real meaning of world conditions? Do they realize that we are living in “the conclusion of the system of things”? (Matthew 24:3) Do they recognize that the prevalence of selfish, violent, even ungodly attitudes marks these times as “the last days”? (2 Timothy 3:1-5) There is an urgent need for them to wake up to the significance of all of this and to consider the way their life is heading.

10. What must we do to be sure that we are keeping on the watch?

10 What about us? Every day we face decisions that involve our employment, our health, our family, and our worship. We know what the Bible says, and we endeavor to apply it. Therefore, we do well to ask ourselves: ‘Have I allowed the anxieties of life to push me off course? Am I letting the world’s philosophies, its thinking, determine the choices I make?’ (Luke 21:34-36; Colossians 2:8) We need to continue to demonstrate that we trust in Jehovah with all our heart and not lean upon our own understanding. (Proverbs 3:5) In that way, we will keep “a firm hold on the real life”​—eternal life in God’s new world.​—1 Timothy 6:12, 19.

11-13. What can we learn from the examples of what happened (a) in the days of Noah? (b) in the days of Lot?

11 The Bible contains many warning examples that can help us to keep on the watch. Consider what happened in Noah’s day. Well in advance, God saw to it that warning was given. But apart from Noah and his household, people took no note. (2 Peter 2:5) Regarding this, Jesus said: “Just as the days of Noah were, so the presence of the Son of man will be. For as they were in those days before the flood, eating and drinking, men marrying and women being given in marriage, until the day that Noah entered into the ark; and they took no note until the flood came and swept them all away, so the presence of the Son of man will be.” (Matthew 24:37-39) What can we learn from that? If any of us are allowing mundane concerns​—even the normal activities of life—​to crowd out the spiritual activities that God urges us to keep in first place, we need to think seriously about our situation.​—Romans 14:17.

12 Think, too, about the days of Lot. The city of *****, where Lot and his family lived, was materially prosperous but morally bankrupt. Jehovah sent his angels to bring the place to ruin. The angels urged Lot and his family to flee from ***** and not to look back. Encouraged by the angels, they did leave the city. Lot’s wife, however, evidently could not let go of her feelings for her home in *****. Disobediently, she looked back, and for this she paid with her life. (Genesis 19:15-26) Prophetically, Jesus warned: “Remember the wife of Lot.” Are we acting on that warning?​—Luke 17:32.

13 Those who heeded divine warnings were spared. That was true of Noah and his family and of Lot and his daughters. (2 Peter 2:9) As we take to heart the warning in these examples, we are also encouraged by the message of deliverance contained therein for lovers of righteousness. That fills our heart with confident expectation of the fulfillment of God’s promise of “new heavens and a new earth” in which “righteousness is to dwell.”​—2 Peter 3:13.

‘The Hour of the Judgment Has Arrived’!

14, 15. (a) What does “the hour” of judgment include? (b) What is involved in ‘fearing God and giving him glory’?

14 As we keep on the watch, what can we expect? The book of Revelation outlines progressive steps in the fulfillment of God’s purpose. Acting on what it says is vital if we are to prove ourselves ready. The prophecy vividly describes events that would occur in “the Lord’s day,” which began when Christ was enthroned in heaven in 1914. (Revelation 1:10) Revelation alerts us to an angel who has been entrusted with “everlasting good news to declare.” He proclaims in a loud voice: “Fear God and give him glory, because the hour of the judgment by him has arrived.” (Revelation 14:6, 7) That “hour” of judgment is a brief period; it includes both the pronouncement and the execution of the judgments that are depicted in that prophecy. We are now living in that period.

15 Now, before the hour of judgment concludes, we are urged: “Fear God and give him glory.” What does this involve? Proper fear of God should cause us to turn away from badness. (Proverbs 8:13) If we honor God, we will listen to him with deep respect. We will not be too busy to read his Word, the Bible, regularly. We will not minimize his counsel to attend Christian meetings. (Hebrews 10:24, 25) We will cherish the privilege of proclaiming the good news of God’s Messianic Kingdom and will do so zealously. We will trust in Jehovah at all times and with our whole heart. (Psalm 62:8) Recognizing that Jehovah is the Universal Sovereign, we honor him by willingly submitting to him as the Sovereign of our life. Do you truly fear God and give him glory in all such ways?

16. Why can we say that the judgment against Babylon the Great stated at Revelation 14:8 has already been fulfilled?

16 Revelation chapter 14 goes on to describe further events that are to take place in the hour of judgment. Babylon the Great, the world empire of false religion, is mentioned first: “Another, a second angel, followed, saying: ‘She has fallen! Babylon the Great has fallen!’” (Revelation 14:8) Yes, from God’s viewpoint, Babylon the Great has already fallen. In 1919, Jehovah’s anointed servants were set free from the ******* of Babylonish doctrines and practices, which have dominated peoples and nations for millenniums. (Revelation 17:1, 15) They could henceforth devote themselves to promoting true worship. Global preaching of the good news of God’s Kingdom has taken place since then.​—Matthew 24:14.

17. What is involved in getting out of Babylon the Great?

17 That is not all there is to God’s judgment against Babylon the Great. Her final destruction is soon to come. (Revelation 18:21) With good reason, the Bible urges people everywhere: “Get out of her [Babylon the Great] . . . if you do not want to share with her in her sins.” (Revelation 18:4, 5) How do we get out of Babylon the Great? This involves more than just severing any ties with false religion. Babylonish influence is present in many popular celebrations and customs, in the world’s permissive attitude toward ***, in the promoting of entertainment involving spiritism, and much more. To keep on the watch, it is vital that both in our actions and in the desires of our heart, we give evidence that we are truly separate from Babylon the Great in every way.

18. In view of what is described at Revelation 14:9, 10, what are alert Christians careful to avoid?

18 At Revelation 14:9, 10, a further aspect of ‘the hour of judgment’ is described. Another angel says: “If anyone worships the wild beast and its image, and receives a mark on his forehead or upon his hand, he will also drink of the wine of the anger of God.” Why? “The wild beast and its image” are symbols of human rulership, which does not acknowledge Jehovah’s sovereignty. Alert Christians are careful not to allow themselves to be influenced or to be marked, in either attitude or action, as being in servitude to those who refuse to acknowledge the supreme sovereignty of the true God, Jehovah. Christians know that God’s Kingdom has already been set up in heaven, that it will put an end to all human rulerships, and that it will stand forever.​—Daniel 2:44.

Do Not Lose Your Sense of Urgency!

19, 20. (a) As we get deeper into the last days, what can we be certain that Satan will try to do? (b) What should we be determined to do?

19 As we get deeper into the last days, pressures and temptations will only intensify. As long as we are living in this old system and are plagued by our own imperfection, we are affected by such things as poor health, old age, the loss of loved ones, hurt feelings, disappointment in the face of apathy toward our efforts to preach God’s Word, and much more. Never forget that Satan would like nothing better than to exploit the pressures we face to induce us to give up​—to stop preaching the good news or to quit living by God’s standards. (Ephesians 6:11-13) This is not the time to lose our sense of urgency regarding the times in which we live!

20 Jesus knew that we would be under much pressure to give up, so he counseled us: “Keep on the watch . . . because you do not know on what day your Lord is coming.” (Matthew 24:42) Let us, then, keep ever alert to where we are in the stream of time. Let us be on guard against Satan’s ploys that could cause us to slow down or quit. Let us be resolved to preach the good news of God’s Kingdom with ever greater zeal and determination. By all means, let us keep our sense of urgency as we heed Jesus’ warning: “Keep on the watch.” Doing so, we will bring honor to Jehovah and will be among those in line for his eternal blessings.

GO TO JW.ORG AND LEARN
Jessie Jan 2016
Page 1 The first time I met Duke, I was tripping on shrooms. In fact, it was the first time I dabbled in psychedelics as well-- just don’t underestimate me in the marijuana department. The moment I can recall vividly comprised of the walk from the music hall which brought us to underneath the Moody Towers residential buildings, where there is wind and benches. A square of dirt rests behind the two benches facing one another; the distance apart from the benches being just far away enough to notice the gap of distance when conversing with someone on the other side. There was a main square of dirt, consisting of hundreds of butts twirled within the earth, scraggly weeds, and one relatively low sitting, yet ominous tree. This tree often glowed during the segments of the day in which the sun found itself to gazing down on the towers and its delinquent inhabitants. On many occasion during these occurrences you could find me, or perhaps Duke, basking in the serenity of the simplicity of the slivers of light breaking free through the emerald green mass of the tree. On this particular night I’m recalling, it was nighttime, causing the yellow of porch lights to dim the other color palettes. Except the sky was royal purple, and the grass in the distant hillside was writhing and crawling and breathing-- according to the mushrooms. Half of the bodies there that night were standing, half sitting, and there couldn’t have been more than a dozen of us. Here is this person in my indirect line of sight, and I couldn’t quite pinpoint the gender, but cute regardless. My guess of girl pursuing boyhood turned out to be correct. Small, almost delicate frame like mine, only he attempted to conceal his when I had long ago grown out of that. With a plaid button down and the collar poking outside of his oversized dark casual suit blazer. It was tied off with baggy khaki pants and clunky black sneakers similar to the ones the chefs in the cafeteria wear with a sense of longevity.
Page 2 His hair took inspiration from the typical pubescent teenage boy, straight and shaggy, and nearly covering the ears and eyes with a combination of strips of platinum blonde, ***** blonde, and light brown wisps. His almond shaped almond colored eyes were framed with black, square and thick glasses, but they seemed to help compensate for size with the natural petiteness of his face. Pink snakebites resided beneath his bottom lip, emphasizing the common nature of his lips that often formed a tight line, even when speaking. I only saw him from a distance that night. We didn’t introduce ourselves to each other until the next day, at that same location. There were less people now, and I was no longer in an altered state of mind. Well, to be honest, I still most likely was, but it certainly wasn’t shrooms. I don’t remember who began the introduction first, but I know his was accompanied with an abundance of compliments on my outfit and level of cuteness. As masculine as his mind was, he could still have an appreciation for the arts, for unique style, as any natural born writer would be so inclined. So there, underneath moody, I met him, within a social circle so new to me yet so familiar within the ebb and flow in the air of cigarette smoke, sometimes so pungently thick and keen against the tide of stimulating conversation. I felt a sense of belonging new to me.
Page 3 And there again and again, I saw him. The central station of our friends. There I slowly got to know him. I learned he lived about an hour away from Houston, he was a creative writing major, he was a freshman just like me and lived in the same building as me. We were both INFP’s on that Meyers-Briggs personality test. I had never met another INFP. In fact, the more I thought about it, the more his general profile seemed familiar to me. And then I remembered. RoomSync, an app the university had us use to select a random roommate. I remember considering someone’s profile that possessed all the qualities of Duke, before my current roommate reached out to me, unfortunately. Duke might have been my roommate in another reality-- remember the Multiverse Theory. I wonder if that would have even changed anything. But that thought process is futile. Once, in the initial stages, Duke had been rambling about modern horror and the author of the fight club, and where the two converge with the product of a gruesome short story. Not many accepted Duke’s invitation to read the short story, but I volunteered. But that is when I remember the beginning of Duke’s admiration for fight club. The concept of it. In fact, one of the first nights, I remember vividly as the Fight Club Night. Where Duke insisted on starting up our own Smircle fight club sometime, what what better time to do so, he thought, then right at that moment with his buddy Otis while drunk on ****** life and four lokos and *****? They were both at least eight shots deep in their sorrows when they ended up disappearing for what seemed to the rest of us like mere seconds. When we found them, we had ventured that way due to the need and ability to smoke a bowl behind the dumpster a few steps nearby. And when we found them, only one was standing. In the recounting later, Duke had apparently taken a nasty blow to the stomach after slamming a few hits in himself.
Page 4 As he lay there, sprawled face-down on the pavement, disoriented and disheveled, for a solid eight minutes at least until he determined he wasn’t going to puke. The remainder of the night was spent accompanying the rest of the group with Otis, forever refusing to let go of the moral dilemma that had just been established by this pseudo-fight club on which it is incorrect on all accounts to punch a drunk person in the stomach, because they are, in fact, drunk. This might appear annoying after a while, but the radical and lively energy that would radiate from the banter of Duke and Otis made this situation anything but.

Page 5   And so were my first stories of Duke, and so it was for many stories to come. Our stay at this place began to feel more permanent as our bodies would steadily adjust to the ranging, sporadic temperatures outside and as our eyes took in absorbing the physical evidence of the seasons. As it was, at any time throughout the day, my route would take me down to our spot underneath Moody, where Duke might or might not be there himself, shmoozing around with cigarettes and doodles on pen and paper noteworthy of Tim Burton. I got to know Duke. He seemed to have mastered the skill in which I prided myself most in, and that is the warmth near him that urges someone near him to just open your heart and reveal your thoughts and secrets-- that blind trust. Duke had a way of getting to exactly what was on my mind. And in exchange of me sharing, out came the stories of Duke’s life, the sad, ****** up, abusive stories. I heard those the most, for they were also the most compelling, and most exciting, and ******* sometimes Duke could even make them funny.

These days, Moody feels empty. Just because of minus one.
This is a short story I wrote for a dear friend I met my first semester in college, and this dear friend committed suicide before Thanksgiving in 2015. The page numbers stand for the pages in which I wrote the original copy, on fragmented pieces of notebook paper. It’s a very rough draft, but I wanted to put it out into the world. You will be severely missed, forever and always, Duke.
Rachel Mena May 2014
There occurred a dual
Between my instinct and you
About a world behind my back
Of which the light it utterly lacked
It was so dark that even your eyes,
what your hands did, could not visualize

But of course your brain knew
What you allowed yourself to do
And as you lied straight to my face
I watched it all leave you, goodbye to your grace
Lindsey Eleanor Dec 2012
Sometimes I feel pretty
or cute
or even beautiful
but those occurrences are very rare
for me
because I'm not pretty
or cute
or beautiful
and then you came along
and you started to tell me
how cute
how pretty
how beautiful
I am
but I never believed you
because I knew you were lying
but you kept telling me
how cute
how pretty
how beautiful
I am
and I started to look
at myself differently
when I walked past the mirror
but I never thought
I was
cute
or pretty
or beautiful
JeanlBouwer Dec 2009
Freedom of choice, can never be
Rather, a designed destiny

With
Accidents, default settings by design
Coincidences, planned occurrences in time
Surroundings, attracted by rhyme
Then what, is the influence of time?

A matrix known, to only a few
The rest a drift, never knew
Only filling gaps, for the few

Like sheep, alive in meadow
On man’s command, they go
Slaughter sheering feeding, they never know
So, do we really want them to row?

Do they want to row?

Do we actually harvest what we sow?
Or is it just, part of the flow?
Ben Jones Nov 2013
A legendary sweet tooth, had Lady Felicity Barratt
So swift towards the sugar bowl, so wary of the carrot
She dined on only trifle from a honey coated spoon
But tooth decay accosted her and left her in a swoon

By the time she turned just twenty, her two front teeth were gone
By thirty she was running short and on her final one
When that fell out, she sought a dentist, promptly one arrived
She opened up her grizzly mouth and in the fella dived

He took a cast and took his leave with dentures to be hewn
With satisfaction guaranteed by Friday afternoon
And never did the lady have a reason to suspect
The secret intervention of an evil dental sect

By bribing several bakeries and sweetie shops and stalls
A dossier had been compiled within their sacred halls
For crimes against good dentistry were nothing short of sin
Their retribution must be swift or people might join in

Upon that self same Friday, at the very cusp of noon
One Doctor Bingo Rogers and his burly hired goon
Came knocking at her premises with dental kit and drills
With a mission to sedate her and to exercise their skills

They knocked her out with ethanol and chloroform and air
And strapped her to a hastily erected dentist's chair
The evil teeth were lodged in place and ******* into her gums
The bill was quite extortionate, for monumental sums

The shamanic orthodontist, with his henchman in his wake
A martyr to the vegetable and nemesis of cake
Was keen to see his handiwork and kept a watchful eye
For curious occurrences as days went quickly by

By Christmas there was nothing, until on New Year's Eve
Her teeth got uncooperative and forced the girl to leave
They dragged her by her dainty face and led her to the shops
She stood and munched on sugar canes and giant lollipops

They stuffed her face with chocolates, still nestled in their packets
And then a rack of nylon shirts and seven leather jackets
On every size of shoe, she munched; from sixes up to twelves
She nibbled through the party food and gnawed upon the shelves

Then off she sped, into the street, to pursue a passing horse
Dragged along by wicked teeth and supernatural force
But dentures lack in vision, and especially at pace
So when she caught it by the foot she caught it in the face

She skidded to a grizzly halt with arms and legs all twisted
And next to her, a note with all her dental errors listed
So beware the wrath of dentists and obey when they command
And sleep with one eye open and a carrot close to hand

For though our poor Felicity was buried good and hard
Despite floral cupcake with the Dental Cult's regard
And though her body, to this day, lies safely in the ground
The horse escaped that evening and the teeth were never found...
Curt A Rivard Sr Jan 2015
Heed these words, write them upon the tablet of your mind for I have returned.

When you finally come to the point in your life and comprehend that the dreams with which you have been bestowed are to be used as a blueprint, you then and only then will win remarkable success in what ever calling that you adopt. You will begin to visualize things with a much greater understanding and you will experience sights stranger than you have ever seen before. You will know that these new visions are all true, for you will see that you have been given the ability to pick out and notice clusters of confirmations and on an imaginary scale. The fear of premonitions and ignoring notable occurrences by dismaying them all off as if they are just figments of your imagination is to be avoided. It is not out of random chance, the thought that things are bound to line up from time to time and for no apparent reason or that evolution had a major impact on us to evolve into begins to recognize pattern recognition, but rather, it is to be construed as if you have been blessed with the gift of foresight and you will notice that you are able to think and speak things into existence. Never again will you live with the fear of the unknown for you will know all. The truth of all things will manifest themselves and be disclosed to you in a vivid clear contrast. There will be many people who will find it extremely difficult to interpret what is being explained to them and in the process they will then start to display that they are trapped within there own gridlocked mind and be confused with just your mere presence. You will find that people who do not understand you will then try to get you to conform to what they see, ignore them. Life is but an enigma, one that is full of complex-ed riddles, when you accept to follow your dreams and with an open objective you will then have the opportunity to harness all its power and in return all the pieces of the puzzle will be spread out for you for your taking. Once you find the first piece, you then will be given the license required to take part of this phenomenon so you can complete life's grander picture found outside the ivory tower. You will know with all certainty that you are not dreaming and that what you are witnessing is not a mirage, that is until, the silver cord be loosed, after that, when death finds its way to sting and the grave can then claim its victory, welcome and accept a Re"quies'cat In Pa'ce.

As always, Welcome to the show!
Nicole Dec 2018
I hope this is the last set of letters
Because I am so tired
Of hanging onto these things that
Happened so long ago now
And allowing other people
To have this type of control over me
I love myself now and
That really is an amazing thing
I didn't even like myself back then
I couldn't even comprehend the idea
That I could care about myself this way
And that's exactly the reason
Why all of these past occurrences
Suffocate my thoughts so much
Because I cannot fathom how
People who claimed they loved me
Could treat me the way they did
How I could let them
Use me and
Abuse me and
Manipulate me to such a degree
Where I stayed in those conditions
For much longer than I should have
The reason I haven't let go yet
Has nothing to do with my exes
It has to do with the ways in which
I allowed important people
Those who I shared love and a life with
To hurt me so deeply
It is not about the people
It is not about their names
It is not even about the individual love
It is solely about me and
The love I carry for myself now
And my own inability to comprehend
How I could hurt myself so much
By letting other people
Actively hurt me so much
(AP) another tragic report today of snow mermaids resurfacing a phenomena of drastic blizzard conditions young men lost in blinding blowing winds that sends a person forging foreword then back a step are sightings of real or imagined snow nymphs naked gorgeous young women giggling frolicking through 8’ snow drifts arching limbs grinding hips twiddling fingers toes swaying long hair spreading thighs exposing privates pinching ******* pursing lips gesturing to be seduced beckoning into freezing snow entrapment eventually freezing victims into lifeless blue corpses only additional forensic evidence left behind are definite female snow angel signature tracks in surrounding snowfall areas since onslaught of February 1st storm strike 18 male bodies missing 13 bodies recovered all found grasping clutching clinging desirously to unknown source 5 men still missing if you suspect the whereabouts of any of these individuals please contact 911 authorities warn men of a certain age wear appropriate winter gear scarves raised hats lowered eyes squinting look away without delay if you think you are witness to one or more of these deadly snow mermaids GPS immediately to Police postscript in the several thousand years since these occurrences have been recorded not a single snow mermaid has ever been caught
Eleanor Apr 2020
Today we talked about Christmas  
and saw a Liverpool match on T.V.
While we tried not to let these things hurt,
Because that’s life for my family and me.

Yesterday I saw a red car
And friends of his walked by.
I also heard his favourite song.
And Robert asked when horse would die.

We must always count the dinner plates
And number of seats in the car.
We must constantly watch our words
Because pain is never far.

There are more red things in my life now
Than back when Aaron was alive.
I didn’t do that on purpose  
The colour just seems to thrive.

And if he was still here  
I'd share a Spanish teacher with him.
And still see jam on table clothes.
And porridge bowls filled to the brim.

I wear a red heart around my neck
And a blue one for me.
The green one’s on its way in the mail
To represent child number three.

I still use Viber to talk to people
But there’s no annoying messages to see.
And I always see boys with bright curly hair,
Whenever I feel lonely.

My runners look like the ones we bought him
Just before he died.
And dinner tomorrow would have been his favourite.
Something spicy, slow roasted, not dried.

Today we talked about Christmas  
And watched a Liverpool match on T.V.
And because these were once happy times,
They will now never be pain free.
There are a lot of small things related to loss that happen everyday. Everyone's experience is different but similar in how they affect you.
Hunter Shields Feb 2013
Let me paint you a picture
Using nice long strokes
And beautifully vivid colors
And as with most works of art
My muse is the tale of two lovers
Plus one, two, three
Or was it four others
I seem to have lost count
With re-occurrences and all
And their masks seem to blur
As I get lost in our thrall
I tell you love is like a sun
Beautiful to look at
But will blind you
If you stare just a little too long
Unable to see a single mistake
When everything is going wrong
So I paint over the visages
Of him, him, her, and him
But the paint is just not thick enough
How could it be?
When the stain of betrayal
Isn’t quite painted, but carved
When the knives in the back
Sink through to the heart
And while it’s true
That the color of apology
Works well as a cover-up
Only time truly hides scars
And that’s what you wanted
Wasn’t it
Was time apart?
But it’s just not right
That you got to make that call
Without even a fight
You just want to call it a night
So go ahead and sketch the dark
And I will paint the stars
Because that’s what we are
Memories mirrored in paint
From the nights
Where you cried and I kissed you
To the days
Where our phone calls
Ended with I miss you
And I know
You’re not cursed with the memory
People think I’m blessed with
So let this serve to remind you
Of when times were best and
Then maybe you’ll feel some regret
Not the kind where watercolors
Stain your perfect portrait
I’m talking about life changing emotion
So that maybe there won’t be reprints
Sold at every corner auction
I want something hung in a museum
Something people would traverse
The world to see
And when they do
They don’t know what they feel
Because it’s hard to believe
That it’s even real
Seeing love with its contrast
And how you treated it
Like a contract
Made with an expiration date
Set even since our first date
When you gave me that brush
Inspiring me to paint
So that is what I did
And this is its masterpiece
And now

I guess I need a new brush
When I reached in to clean off the glitter on your face,
Did your throat ache because of the unheard voice?
When I said: relax I won't kiss you
did the unheard voice say: "I wish you would!"?
This then music that was denied

All the times I didn't touch you,
did you shiver and get chills?
Did my wondrous breath caress your hairs then?
Did your follicles once wake?
Leading to yawning pores
Inviting the warmth,
of a touch, and the moist excretion of the connection
thereof

And your dry lips with lines dividing symbolizing the walls of your soul yet to be broken
and your bright eyes when the right words are spoken
Or the nerve-wrecking look that had me choking
I was myself and I truly was, maybe you thought I was joking

Was it the distance or questionable persistence?
The fear maybe, that had you critical of what you should feel
Perhaps the vicissitudes of fate that have a stationary couple reel
Or the gravity of occurrences, where I had to keep up appearances
Maybe just you. Maybe just me. Or the doubtful We.

In all reason; logical to think that perhaps the feel
that keeps me away from you
and you feeling like a slave when with me
if you believed and trusted, we could have eloped
Escaped the prison of doubt and insecurity, uplift the hope
Use the ladder of surrender
climb down the 'chance' rope
and then we'd elope

But you stayed with the other guy who says what you want to hear
who drives the car that has them cheer
who sports a profile that gives him credit
Never minding your heart's merit
I leave and enter the wild
I am a wolf from afar
And a die-hard romantic at heart
These are the melodies that live on
Unsung hymns of love lore
May they be heard deeply and penetrate as the sound of spores.
Anonymous Sep 2012
Lying on the bed
I think of what to write...
....words don't flow out
of my pen
my mind is clogged
vaccum surrounds me
I've ****** all the noise
into my self.
It's waiting to explode.
I realise I am too conscious
of myself,
I realise I am trying to pretend.
My pen leaks out
a random flow of ink
shaped in words
I strike them out
they don't manifest my feelings.
I don't want farce to appeal
to the eye,
I want honesty to touch
the heart.
I am waiting
for my words
to strike a chord
with the strings of my heart.
I am longing
for clarity
that will give my writing
a sense of purpose
and shorn it
of its randomness.

Lying on the bed
I think of what to write....
....my mind is a clean slate
I want to colour it
with thoughts
and feelings,
I want for it to
lose its barrenness
and be fertile
with imagination.
I want for it to
be bereft of fear
for it is,
the place
where revolutions were conceived
and philosophies were born;
the sole reason
for Man's greatness.
It boasts of coveted freedom,
which,
feared tyrants failed to ******,
it is a guiding light
to the often faltering humanity.
It has been
subject to manipulations,
deceiving history
into changing its course;
scripting moments
of momentous change,
all, of course,
owing their occurrences
to the enchanting influence
it wields over the body.

Lying on the bed
I think of what to write....
....my mind is deluged
with a rush of thoughts
flowing in and out,
a haze of colours
mesmerises me,
letters, words
dance before my eyes,
songs play out in a loop,
a multitude of
smudgy-outlined faces
gazes at me....
....And I realise
with an epiphany,
It is this very train of thoughts
I shall elaborate on!
Lying on the bed
I think I know what to write on.
Joseph Schneider Oct 2014
It was half past noon as Professor Lynch came barreling into the drive way in his hunt for the unknown. His actions so urgent he forgets to even close his car door. He sprints up his steps and swings the door open to his house and there it was.

Why was he is such a hurry? Well this goes back a little over a week prior when he had some guests over for the first time since he bought his new home. It was the day after he had finally unpacked the last box. This was a gathering to celebrate his new job as a History Professor at the University of California and his beautiful new home. The gathering was going as planned till he heard a strange noise coming from the basement.

The guests didn't hear this noise and continued having a great time as Lynch went downstairs to check it out. As he opened the back door he heard some things fall over as if an animal had skirmished to the noise of the door. As he continued down the stairs after this so called animal his heart about hit his stomach. He has a small door in his basement he figured was used for child’s play made by the family before him. So in his unpacking process he had left it alone. Well he could of sworn he seen the door **** to it turn. Too afraid to check it out on his own he ran upstairs. Trying not to embarrass himself he quickly ran up the stairs into the main room and continued the gathering as if nothing had happened.

Once the guests left he found himself sitting in his living room saying to himself “it was nothing, you’re just seeing things.” He talked himself into believing this because he hadn't slept much in a few days with all the unpacking trying to get ready for the new week. So he finally decided to go to bed and get some rest. It wasn't for another week till he had started to notice some strange occurrences. He came home from work that day and noticed his refrigerator was left open. Lynch however was uncertain on if it was him who left it open so he shrugged it off.

Another day had passed and again he came home from work and his refrigerator was open again. This now struck an uneasy feeling; he had made sure he closed it before work today. As he continued through his house with caution he had seen nothing unusual nor seen anything more out of place until he walked by the basement. He once again heard this skirmishing sound of what seemed like an animal trying to escape the basement. As he entered the basement the sound stopped. He was frightened but hadn't been threatened in any way, so he continued throughout his day although not in ease. He was uneasy about this happening a second time so he decided to come home early from work and see if he could catch whatever it was in action.

So at work the next day as he planned he left work early, about half past noon. “Professor Lynch came barreling into the drive way in his hunt for the unknown. His actions so urgent he forgets to even close his car door. He sprints up his steps and swings the door open to his house and there it was.” This was unlike anything he had ever seen before. Something so frightening, so terrifying his jaw hit the floor. Before Lynch could speak a word, he was snatched and drug into the basement through the little door he thought was used for “child’s play.”

-Joseph B Schneider
© Joseph B Schneider. All rights reserved
Janet Li Feb 2010
Time is measured
in problem sets and exams
birthday parties and housewarming parties and frat parties
going out to eat with chattering friends,
anxiety in the wait for the week’s end,
finding the time for peace in ‘alone’
or calling our parents up on the phone.

Specific occurrences far from each other:
Weeks.

... or daily:
Watching each minute slide by,
Digits slipping one by one
Into ever-so-slightly increasing quantities.
Like a microscopic tortoise
on an infinitely stretching number line,
Moving steadily,
always so steadily,
toward the invisible finish line.
Why?
PJ Poesy Apr 2016
Allowance of difference transforms not entirety, but perhaps enough. We are cast all over the place. By chance some grow. Seeds of diversity bloom without genetic precursors. Hybrid’s forerunning amalgamations were somewhere in time not as pure. Half-bred mongrel dogs the same. Romulus and Remus suckle a wolf-***** surrogate. Even after hardships and trials together, turn on each other. Conditioning may not change what is inheriting, but has its influences. Feral children of ancient mythography become heroes of a Rome, who has since seen rise to popes. What injects change into society? Today’s biotechnology gives birth to genetically engineered seed of change. Who bows to New God, by its name Monsanto? Collectively, third-world nations in a final Round-Up. Extermination business as usual.
Ah, why, why is t'is desire still here, Vladimir?
T'is generous, yes, and unmistakable desire
to love thee, and imagine thee here-
fidgeting softly and so tenderly
within th' nourishing charms of my arms.
And thy bronze hair!
Swiftly moving away, along with thy own fantasy
as I rub my palm across its comeliness
and bestow a kiss on its fairness.
Oh, what a morbid, morbid image!
An image I should dream of not!
I am allowed not to love thee, allowed not!
For I am his already, and might just be his forever-
and thus to befriend all his mistakes,
bear all his troublesome resolutions,
and cheer and sheepishly flourish
in th' seemingly very occurrences of his triumphs.
And his days, Vladimir-are supposedly my ways,
my ways towards yon now unbearable fascination,
whose murky door is a key to fate, ah-
a fate to my mind, and assumed, t'ough dreaded, salvation.
But look, look how my conscience is burnt!
O, burnt upon thinking of leading t'is life-
and th' remnants of my thy age, without thee!
Burnt so atrociously together as it shalt be-
with my loitering delight, which lies just, tragically,
in th' layers of thy salubrious lips, and
th' very sole guiltlessness of thy blue eyes.
O, how immortal is its blueness, Vladimir-
in whom shalt never t'ere be mortal misery!
A mortal, mortal misery-
like yon one of t'at roaring seagull,
suffocating and out choking upon its first fly
over th' highlands next to th' sea
and behindst its deafening nightmare across th' sky
innocent and trembling, in such coldness,
without having but anywhere to lie;
meanwhile trampled along by th' sinister heaven
until its tower of love, and wreaths of wisdom, die.
But look at t'ose angels above 'im!
With paeans so eloquent and fulled by eagerness,
shalt t'ey sing above its eccentric grave-
ah, but only a grave of stateliness, and not 'is body
until wherein a touch of t'eir finger
wakes 'im back up, and resuscitates 'is rays of laughter
so t'at it celebrates forever eternity-
and in return, its very own eternity, forever.

And here I am-like a pale tree, standing *****
'mongst most of th' nightly valley-
animated with green light, and shapes of madness
in th' entirety of whose torso;
so t'at I wilt, with such a wildness in my heart,
hover over thee against in today's dreams,
and thy magic which is buried humbly in thy Moscow.
O, my Russian prince, for th' battles of my heart thou hath won
and from whose sarcasm thou hath shone.
I am drawn, drawn, hungrily-and selfishly, to thee!
And I caught thee, again, yesterday, behind th' bushes,
far not from th' rich forests and distant gravel paths,
waving at me, with a gentle smile on thy lips
defined t'ere so clearly, so young and free!
O, but cannot I declare t'at I love thee,
how sadly and tortuously!
Ah, for I am entwined with him only,
how thou but came late to my life-
oh, if only t'ose dreadful seconds hath but never existed!
Remorse, remorse, and accusations are but th' mere ones
t'at I deserve; and shalt forever just I preserve
for from thy love I canst never run;
and t'is ode shalt be meaningless and just fun
as to nature I wilt do harm
should I ever be swirled lost in thy charms.

Ah, Vladimir! I reckon thy love is as poisonous
as Eden's evil fruit; and soon I consumed my sight-
by peering up into thy eyes;
I caught th' sense of boyish starlight,
which lulled me t'en to a new sleep, all day and night.
Thy very mirth is to me laughs;
but thy sadness is to me tears.
But all thy touches are to me love;
and of which no-one shalt ever hear.
For thinking of thee is a sin, my love-
and a wound to him, and his course a fear.
How forbidden, forbidden thou art, to me!
But sadly I canst only love thee!
Oh, Vladimir, I doth love thee, with all th' strictness
and assurances t'at I might have-as all th' powers I may still save.
My Vladimir! And in th' afterlife,
with blossoms of snow in our cold Moscow
Might just we be t'ere for our tomorrow;
and cherish t'is end of our strained sorrow.

And just hath I always done,
'Tis time needed I retreatst from my poetry;
and faced, ah, faced t'is troublesome relapse
of my reality. Oh, t'ese wan, surreal chores!
And t'at knock on my door-which is insidiously
his, and his only.
But I shalt think of thee again, t'is evening-
and may just be more ever after,
with such an ardent thoughtfulness in my mind
and violent; as how is t'is craving, for making thee mine.
Most occurrences
are innocuous enough
to provide a sort-of
false sense of security
such that,
when those other occurrences;
those, which send forth poison daggers
into the hearts of the otherwise Joyous;
rend in twain the velvet fabric of Comfort.

Take heed that the fleeting Comfort
doth indeed not lead to arrogance and entitlement;
for everything is permitted
on some fundamental level;
nothing is granted
in this Life.

Respect what you get
Respect what you lose
Respect what is
Respect what was
Respect what will be
Words…..because words are all I have……..:) Edgar
endearments generosity incantatory new sagacity surprise heresy dissipation violating abyss language warning culminates dalack obdurate serving waiter ossuary occurrences tortured beware silence calm bow physiognomy paucity occurrence exegeses transmogrification effectuation Adjunctive dairy tenure contention tenner reins happy indomitable, connoisseur artifice concatenation vivacity voluptuous solemnity enigmatic burdened glorious line huge……………………some I made myself…..:) Edgar
y i k e s Mar 2014
When did you become a daily part of my life?

I wish I could erase you.
Lock you in a box and disregard the key, toss it in the trash.
Avoid you on the street, like an ex partner or an old pal.
I wish I could throw away your body, lock it in a car and drive it off a ledge.

I wish you wouldn't be a daily occurrence anymore.
It's not fair to me.
Or anyone else that has to deal with you.

If only they made erasers big enough for you.
i sure do hate math class.
Audrey Bautz Mar 2013
Bound for Home
Dawn rested still, upon the horizon as the clouds circled the sun like hungry hawks.
The sky contemplated its’ disguise between a dismal gray and a crisp-blue.
My head ached as I stirred from my winter-induced coma
- and found myself gazing up at an inviting sunrise.
Bright, beautiful colors swam in the sea of sky,
tireless pinks and reds masked in specks of gold
- enveloped the thick purple clouds.
With the immaculate mix of hues
it would have appeared that God Himself
- was trying to entice me to go on living.
For, in the midst of life, we are in death,
Heaven must be of moments like this
- when the balance of life is harmonious.
Perhaps I was dead, I was beyond pain,
- and the sky was the clearest I had ever seen.
I attempted to move but found myself unable to,
- my legs pinned down, seemingly more like hell
as the beautiful open sky before me
clung to the riches of the earth with my poor soul
- confined to the fleshy-tombs of sin.
My eyes fell upon a creature of familiar air,
- as it twitched between the rise and fall of a pulsating-chest.
Upon further investigation,
I was shocked to discover the body to be that of a dog
- no not a dog . . . a wolf . . .
- the wolf from the previous night.
She stirred with a sigh and lifted her massive head.
My breath went coarse and my heart began to pound
- as though it were fighting to presume its’ natural rhythm.
She turned her attention to me as I gasped,
- her deep blue expression seemed tamed, almost human-like.
Though for some unknown reason, I was not frightened,
- only, surprised and relieved at how tender she was.
She stumbled in her morning-daze to her feet and stepped back.
I studied her manner, still skeptic, but overall excepting of my new friend.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
A few hours after staggering to my feet,
I was working the feeling back into my right foot.
It never regained itself as did the rest of me,
- so I stooped over a blazing fire vigorously rubbing it.
The sun shone bright through the tree tops
- and I relished every moment she spared.
Back in my limbo, I pressed on,
- no food, and limited supplies.
My wolf-friend jumped through the snow
- racing me along the path,
- she only stopped to look back when she did not hear me.
I adored how it was that she could have easily disguised herself in the snow,
- her beautiful white fur carrying only a slight tint in the tail and behind her ears.
I halted in my steps to process my thoughts,
-but the grip of winter tightening about my brain, made it impossible,
All that could be accessed was the presence of a single quote.
(Funny how moments can be broken by the strangest occurrences.)
I gazed ahead at the majestic grace of the wolf, only to say:
“The joy in looking and comprehending
- is nature’s most beautiful gift.”
“That was poet John Dryden . . . " I continued.
Life has a reason to its' madness as did I to my thoughts,
That quote had its' reason for presenting itself at that moment.
And as though needing some approval I began to think aloud:
“The greatest gift given to humankind is the blessed view around us.
The process of slowing down
so one might gaze upon the glories of mother earth.”
“I am still here, so I must consider the reasoning behind this.”
The wolf tilted her head then jumped back into a running position
- left me far behind.
I suppose I am not terribly angry at this most unfortunate dilemma.
Why who knows, it could bring forth a plethora of final moments to reflect upon.
Anyhow, if winter does not finish me,
- then most certainly hunger and dehydration will, I thought to myself.
My friend, at this point, was not in eyesight and the first snowfall started.
And with any signs of our existence soon disappearing beneath the fresh layer of snow,
I took it upon myself to rest my aching feet.
I glanced up and called, my voice shaking through the empty walls of land.
"We shall rest here."
The trumpeting gallop of paws brought her back into my sight.
She circled around my stooping body and stretched herself out.
“You are very kind to aide me in my final days.
You are not like the others.
I haven’t had the pleasure in having a true friend in years.
So . . . since you are a friend,
I can’t very well be calling you, “Wolf . . . ”
Everyone needs a name if they wish to be claimed
. . . You remind me of an old beauty.
- Something not seen since long ago.
Hmm . . . Mika!
- . . . Yes, with a foreign beauty such as yours’ . . .
Mika fits very well indeed.”
She glanced up at me with a light dispersing from her eyes,
- as though satisfied with my decision; a blessing upon her name.
After a while my eyelids fell victim to a weight and slowly they closed.
“Perhaps . . . ” I mumbled.
“ . . . a nap for us aged-souls.”
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
The fresh frost seeped into my pants as I forcibly opened my eyes.
The hours chasing away the light as twilight descended.
My head ached and stomach cried out from hunger-pains.
I found Mika sound asleep upon my legs.
She had an atrocious snore that could wake any nearby town.
“Mika!” I whispered. “Wake up Mika.”
Her eyelids moved,
- then slowly blossomed two beautiful blue eyes.
I pulled out from under her and grabbed any nearby sticks and fallen branches.
Of all my supplies the matchbox was the most used.
I pulled out one of the few remaining matches and struck it.
Within moments the fire spread throughout the wood and light flooded us and the trees.
Mika stood to her feet and yawned. She then ****** her head and ran into the darkness.
“Mika!” I cried.
She had not returned for some minutes when I heard the rustling of something from within the thick black surrounding myself and the fire.
“Mika?” I cried out again.
A dark figure appeared dragging with it some unknown object.
As it came closer I noticed the gentle white of Mika’s fur.
She had with her a branch of some sort. I arose to look closer.
It was a holly branch, on which grew clusters of bright red berries.
She struggled with bringing it toward the fire
- but the branch was no match for her strength as she dropped it at my feet.
I sat back down by the light and stared at the branch.
She let out one enormous bark,
demanding in tone, as though giving me an order.
“What, am I to do with this?” I asked puzzled.
Again she barked that demanding bark and began to incessantly whine.
“Mika, if this is what I’m thinking your actions to be true . . .”
I continued. “I am not eating that!”
"I appreciate your enthusiasm
- no matter how inconvenient and wearisome it maybe.
However, I must put before, anything else that of which I came here to do."
She whimpered beneath her pants
- stepping in closer as if to gesture an insistence.
The fire pulsated against her thick coat as she nudged the branch toward me.
I gazed at her unmoved continuing:
“You’ve delayed me a day already!
You were a witness to last night.
You watched me lie by the fire,
you saw the emptiness in my eyes, the lack of life."
She did not understand I could see
as she remained just as stubborn as I in her position before me.
My weariness grew and after some moments of exchanges I stated:
"I will not entertain your desire to continue on!”
“Do you understand . . . I refuse to.
I am ready to die . . . I miss my family.”
She walked over to me and rested her head delicately upon my lap.
“I know what you must be thinking.” I went on.
“You’re thinking, no problem is worth dying over
and perhaps you’re right,
but I no longer wish to waste my life living in this hell.”
She lifted her head to gaze up at me.
“I’ve lost everyone . . . I dug the graves for each one with my own two hands.
I live with that knowledge,
and this painful beating continues to pump the blood through my veins."
She retained her composure of wistful regards in the deep pool of her blue sight.
"I no longer wish to live,
- when my family remains six-feet deep in the rich soil they helped to plow!
Without family what is there to life? Whom do I laugh with, cry with?”
“Family is life . . .
- without them there is no life.
It has been this way since the dawning of all humanity."
I stopped upon the realization that my conversation was one-sided
simply finishing by stating:
“My dear little Mika, you are a wolf
and wolves are known for their obedience to their pack.
I am simply longing to return to mine."
The fire popped and cracked in its’ brilliant motion
and I remained quiet until my consciousness surrendered to the night.
Chapter 2 of my poetry novel. Enjoy. Any comments would be appreciated.
At once at the top of the Estinfalos, Marie des Vallées avoided all of them being injured and being swallowed by the strait. The bronze birds with great vigor avoided being part of the vast shore that hit them as Nephelleidae Helles. Here they were compelled by the Myth Frixo and Hele, in the process of their sacramentals. They took the assignments before running with the same fate as the children of Atamante and Nephele. Ino the second wife of Atamante wanted to get rid of them by burning the grain so as not to have crops. This is where the soul of the Herophilus Sybilla appears to them, consulting the Oracle of Delphi. The Children of Atamante were destined to be sacrificed, being Nefeles who sent a Golden Ram, the children were saved by climbing Ram's spine, taking him away from the executioners. When Heles was going to a great height he looked towards the sea that caused him vertigo, falling into the sea in its celestine waters, remaining from this instance with the patronymic Hellespont. His brother, Phryxus, clung tightly to his back and arrived safely at Colchis. Marie could see some Gerakis and then react in search of Heles, taking time to decide and enter. It was only a few hours before dusk, and the lacerated seventy were lowered from the Stymphalos to cross the waters in search. Marie joined the bronze birds with the interaction ratio of all the times that they would intertwine in the lines showing exploration, supplying what Theus and Vikentios did to grow in number, and with all the occurrences that occurred for the contemporary coincidence of thousands of years, for the current figure of millions of light-years that reacted towards the sky crashing in everything that a maximum roof allowed, and then allowed them to be in the interaction when crossing the Sea of Heles, where she always was, only being diverted by the bronze birds from above, and only being tangible by Marie's conscience when she saw that she had never fallen from the Golden ram, but had been only a weightless creature among the clouds of her mother Nephele, hanging around her neck some remarkable telesomatic beings sent by herself, in egregious tributes to her most adorable daughter. She subsequently falls into the sea, unblemished that Vernarth would go to rescue her from her. The Lacerates, Theus, and Vikentios gathered in the circular area of the Gerakis, leading them to the ancient Phrygian city of Dardania. The crowded currents of the celestial realm became ocean currents that lifted Heles's living body as Gerakis with her wings signaled to the Stymphalos to grasp her with precision. Silently the psyches of the bodies of the Trojan War were able to make Heles's rampage measurable, doing Vernarth's medication at a distance with Heles when her death throes accused her rejection of the balsamic intentions of Marie des Vallées. Then is she resorts to the bilocation of Vernarth managing to see from the surface the reckless surface of the sea, seeing a figure with a snowy white outfit and also a light blue tunic, in addition, she wore a crown of cocoons as a Diadema.

Nothing made it possible to presume that quantum was not bending in kilometers that separate Patmos and the Sea of Heles when this sacred figure was sighted that was glimpsed as psychosomatic physiology, for the good of the Second Age that Vernarth brought for them, noting that it was Bernardette Soubirous, which became immediate like a Benedict Akashic field. The small and large units of Massabielle's universe were pointed out from where this quantum elitrophic wave came, with living palpitations of Heles granting the inquiry of her by convulsions of his brain with small akashic vibrations before falling into the icy Sea. Non-local logic became arcane before this telepathic event, and the figure of Bernadette notified them by its coherence of subtle connection, that lately the light that she carried when she escaped from Ino will be rekindled, with the oblation for her was subordinating her, and that it would be supremely since there from where they would uproot her and then free her from the Akashic field from minor to major storm, where Marie des Vallées would let them know that she was safe. This space was already local, but it was detached from the terminal that made it originally from it for the connections of having it already on Patmos so as not to have to be transported by the Stymphans. Everything happened synchronously in unison, after the transpersonal boundaries of consciousness that were united among all to free it from these bonds in the freshness in Heles. All the micro-dimensional organisms became more than clairvoyant with the endowments of the falls and the uprisings after the rescue of Heles by Vernarth and the Akashic fields, applying the material field that was transposed in great extensions of material-immaterial time, before the immanent Electromagnetic gravitationally that could only be seen, heard and probed by Vernarth when he was meditating between the hemispheres of Aullós Kósmos, justifying nth parapsychologies where space is not empty and does not have a percentage mass in this case, and what has been called the quantum vacuum is in fact a cosmic plane (Akasha). Thanks to this information, it was conserved and transferred by the Akashic field, from the coherent universe of Heles, where it could be reconverted into a Sub Mythological being, thanks to a superhuman being happening at the site of the Dardanelles and which will also take place in another place in Patmos.

Marie des Vallées says: “everything that happened in one period also happened in the following times here at the Hellespont. Nothing was local, nor limited to where and when it happened. All things are integral, cosmic because everything is connected and the memory of all things extends to all places and times. Here is Vernarth who is the object and subject of his umpteenth parapsychologies, which are the replica of the joyous songs of Bernadette Soubirous's Rosary "

Vernarth sensing that Heles was in frank danger of life, mounts Alikantus and heads for the Strait of Dardanelles. Here he manages to specify that it was compared with the anachronism of the Bronze Birds, who had sailed through the upper Dodecanese, then over the Marmara counterclockwise from Kairos, meeting again with the Helladic period. Here it spread over Hellen; with the eponymous hamlet that boasted of the Stymphalos, as a coerced premonition in the pre-Helladic, towards the end of the Bronze Period. Thus, with this changeable phenomenon, Vernarth was directed, while he flew in the seconds of Kairos time as a symbol of subsisting in each deleterious life, almost with the powers of not getting intoxicated with any substance transited by the sea of the strait. Here Vernarth went to Alikantus, being this one from Thessaly and Sudpichi, right here among them Kanti appears with Etréstles, they came to tone up the survivals that would bear Heles after recreating the two great Ionic and Doric hydric colonnades. While Alikantus being of Cretan, the roots he had to emit breaths from the Eighth Cemetery of Messolonghi to revive the colonnades, to separate the waters and molecules that increased in density to move Heles from the depths of the ocean. Kanti was a super steed, he plunged under the Marmara, like a tiny sea to leave the waters of the Black Sea from one of the abutments of some seams of some Achaeans, which were disengaged from the seas that joined them. In this instance, the Helén together with Vernarth continued to release the ropes of a great Kizara that Nefeles had woven for her daughter, from here from the dean cloud and from the distress where she freed herself to go to her Gaugamellian aid. The Kizara was a Eurythmic wire rope, therefore its sound elucidated the sea and its celestial kingdom, magnifying and complicating Poseidon in the sea that actually resembled the sky. Therefore, Heles was with his ethnonym Hellespont who snatches her and redirects her to Helén, which was similar to her name, in such a way that the sky was embroiled by the point, from Helén by Heles creating the watery element of the Flood of Heles that was retracted by the impetus of Kanti and Alikantus when Vernarth increased with all his vivification when he saw her near the shaft of the Doric colonnade, organizing the waters that would rise from the susceptible Heles wrapped in a Himation that Vernarth had dispensed near the Vas Auric.
Nefheles
Mary Alexander Nov 2015
Though I'm alive,
The breath is stolen from my lungs.
Though I don't cry out,
My heart is being stung.

Though I stand motionless,
I'm thrown back through glass,
Though I remain quiet,
I'm soul screams, yearning to ask.

It all happens as
Time stands still and true.
This pain occurs
Every time I see you.
Every. Freaking. Time. It's really unfortunate.
Black Jewelz Jun 2016
I long to write,
But know not what to speak.
The will takes flight
But the wings of words get trapped in my cheek.

And now I strain
To force effulgent streams to drain
But only muster dull couplets which remain
Too plain.

Jadedness has invaded my brain.
Taken hostage my passion and pleasure,
Stolen my creative treasures.
Now I am traumatized. Will I ever be the same?
Edna Sweetlove Apr 2015
Another poem from the pen of my alter ego Barry Hodges

Half asleep, I sense you rise from the bed
Where we have shared love's passion,
Your sweaty body glistening as the dawn's early light
Peeks through the curtains of our ensuite bedroom.
O! To think that our great love affair must end
Now that your husband has threatened
To asphyxiate your six dear children
If you do not cast me aside like a worn out shoe.
And when I awake fully I find you gone forever,
The only souvenir of our last night together
Being a small squashed **** lying on the stained bedlinen.
O! How can I ever forget such a tragic awakening?

FOOTNOTE
[I knew from bitter experience of similar occurrences that dear old Mrs Bloggs (Seaview Bijou B&B;, The Esplanade, Ramsgate, Kent) was bound to make a hefty surcharge to disinfect the bedding thoroughly. What an unromantic old ***** she was, may she rot in Hell forever.]
Eulogy
Its difficult in moment like these to come up with something  honest and insightful to make everyone feel better. It’s difficult to find the encouragement necessary to get a bunch of ******’s like you to smile when I have a perfect understanding of what you have lost.  Grandmas passing came with a unique set of challenges I can admit I was not prepared to face. Her death left me feeling as equally perplexed as her life.
When grandma started to really get sick and I had to start wrapping my head around her passing I was afraid of a lot more than I am now. I was afraid I was losing the opportunity to know her sober, I was afraid to lose a member of your strange, perfect, functionally challenged  family with its unique jerry springer dynamics. I was afraid I would lose the feeling that someone understood me, the way family only really can. I was afraid I was losing the person and the pace that tethered me to my origins and everything I think I know about myself. I felt like I was losing a person who provided for me my first understanding of the world and introduced me to the intricacies of the human experience I was losing my reasons to be angry the reasons I loved her. I would be losing the way she accepted every imperfect bit of me completely. I would be losing someone who was there for good or bad to watch me collect my scars and change my mind. I knew I was losing one of the most important women in my life and I was absolutely terrified and in a way I did lose those things.
But in a weird way it was as I was losing her that I feel like I finally found her.  I found her in places I had never thought to look before. I found her in myself when I laugh at things that aren’t funny. I find bits of her younger photos in pictures of me in the way my eyes set on my face In the anxieties we shared. I see her in Jasmines complete acceptance of those around her, I find her in Jessica’s ability to take up an entire room, I hear her in cody’s never ending sarcasm. I see her In the way teia will spend days in a creative endeavor,   I watch her in kalebs quiet observances and in the way he distracts  me from my own grief, I see her sometimes when dad is sad but he still smiles and the stony flash in my mother’s eyes when she’s being  super stubborn. I find her in all of our strange occurrences all these idiosyncrasies . I find her in the way we all have strange relationships with one another just as strange as the ones she had with each of us. I know now better than ever before what she gave me what she gave us and its at least as monumental as the things we have lost lost. I know now here with all of you where I belong, where she belongs and  who she was.  And although I can’t say  for certain if she is with God I can’t shake the feeling that perhaps she is with us and if not than at least I find comfort knowing  we all have something of her in us. I hope you find that as terrifying  and disturbing but mostly comforting as I do. Because for better or worse she’s marked us  and also it’s really difficult in a moment like these to come up with something both honest and insightful that makes a bunch of weirdos like us feel  any better.
mysterious Jan 2015
At first sight, she was going to be a nobody
Who knew what the future had for us
Time is elusive. Daily events are random occurrences
Or is it? What is random anyway?
Shuffling your music playlist isn't random
Algorithm.
Niveda Nahta Jun 2016
Times of happiness,
Times like this when everything seems perfectly fine yet imperfect..
When time passes by in an instant and no one knows what might happen next…
We forget all our obsessions, tensions, problems, fears, nonsense
And focus on time...time alone which has no absolute pathway…
No course of action or reaction…
Only a measure of never or forever…
There could be a million alternatives that could take place but…
It’s you and me…
Together.
Among all the possibilities of occurrences,
The choice of the universe accounts to this…
The perfect placement of two bodies of matter,
In this chaotic yet constant time…
You chose me.
And I chose you.
Subconscious and consciously
In this place of uncertainties
There might or might not be someone watching over, controlling us like puppets
Or there might be more to it than we know it,
Or I might not know, if not for the nick of time that happened to cross my destiny,
Destiny…
Was it?
Or was it time?
Or some power wanting to lead us here,
Or was it already written, in the stars?
So many questions but the answer one needs is if we exist at all…
Do we?
Or are we just a figment of someone’s imagination?
Are we dreaming?
Awake and thinking?
Well all I can occasionally agree on is the fact that there was a want…
A want of wanting everything to happen…
The dreams we saw when we were small…
Are we both living it?
Or the thoughts you had…the imaginations…
Are we living it all unknowingly?
Maybe yes? Who knows?
This want that keeps on arising for the want of more want…
Everything wanting to happen at the same time…
The right time, and the right place.
Mornings changing into evenings and then nights
For want of rest,
Books increasing in number
For want of knowledge,
Souls colliding with each other
for want of escape..
Escaping this light of nothingness…
A place familiarly known as world.
We came, we met, we lived, we died…
All in the same place where we
in fact met to be together…
For want of continuity and want of ?
Even I do not know,
I am but a helpless being of matter and my body turns to dust…
But not so ordinary either…
as my existence and my soul does not cease to exist in this world…
I may be a mere mortal…
But when we met…
The universe wanted it,
Destiny wanted it,
You wanted it,
Our souls wanted it,
But our minds…
little did they know of this magic…

That revives dead senses and unknown feelings…
Which has led us into this pathway of love…
A mere flick of brain cells that prevent us to repel each other in all possible ways…
I love you...
You are my eternity..
This is inspired by Stephan Hawking's works and well its something I wrote for my Sailor and told him to read it after he's on ship..
memories..

— The End —