I am not a poet.
I am only a wanderer in the marketplace of words,
a fool who follows the glimmer of syllables
as others follow the scent of bread.
Poetry is not ink on paper.
It is the pulse beneath the page
a breath moving through the hollow reed of the poet,
a secret that leans close to the ear of the heart.
When I meet a poem, I bow.
I circle it once,
then twice,
then again,
as though it were a shrine whose mystery
can never be entered in a single step.
Each reading strips away a veil.
Sometimes the veil is my own blindness,
sometimes the poet’s mercy in hiding the flame
until I am ready.
There are nights I leap from sleep crying, I have it!
and mornings when the truth laughs,
gently reminding me:
Child, that was only the shadow of the meaning
come back, and drink deeper.
Poetry is a journey without map or return.
It is the caravan of joy
that passes through my heart again and again.

Do not be sad
For fate is inevitable,
What’s destined will find its way.
The pens have dried,
The pages have been folded,
And every matter has already been settled.
So your sorrow changes nothing
It neither hastens nor delays,
Neither adds nor takes away.

My granddaughter and me
the best artists to ever be!
We make, we write, we draw wild things,
So strange and bold, with scribbled wings.
We paint the sun with purple glue,
And give the moon a mohawk too.
We turn the clouds into mashed potatoes,
And make giraffes wear sweet pink halos.
You might look once and raise your brow,
“Is that a dragon... or a cow?”
But we just laugh and say with glee:
“You don’t see it? That’s on you, not me!”
We’re the best and no need to boast
Of silliness, we make the most.
So when you see our crazy art,
Know it's made with love and heart.

Not by rules or timelines,
not by others' silence or advice.
I will carry this grief as I must
slowly, fiercely, or quietly
but always in my own truth.

I’m weary of your winds,
soft whispers that promise fire,
then vanish in the hush of “just friends.”

You speak like a lover in the moonlight,
then vanish at dawn with your walls drawn high.
Yet when I smile at another flame,
your silence burns louder than words.

What is this dance you lead me in?
One step forward, two steps back,
your heart a maze I cannot read.

Am I a passing breeze in your garden,
or a root you dare not let grow?

Speak, Lily
not in riddles, not in sighs.
Tell me where I stand in your sky,
before I drift too far to return.

Me

Made swirls and lines, a crazy trick.
Not pictures neat, of birds or trees,
Just messy marks upon his knees.

The rain came down, a heavy weep,
For vanished souls, gone to their sleep.
It fed the grief that grew inside,
Where willow branches, deep did hide.

He hushed his pride, kept still and low,
And called to God, in gentle flow.
He called and called, with burning heart,
Until it felt it fall apart.

A whisper came, a light so bright,
"Your peace is veiled from common sight.
Only a love, so strong and true,
Can find the quiet, kept for you."

She said, “My dear, I want you
Come taste the honey that drips from my mouth.”
“Take it slow,” she begged, “but hurry
I’ve waited long enough.”
“Just so you know,” she whispered low,
“I’m the only daughter of my father and mother
The mint that grows along our orchard fence,
Shaded by banana leaves from prying eyes.”
“In the game of love, I was Napoleon
But now my carriage has stalled.
Even the banded wheels won’t move.”
I filed a complaint with the Mayor.
He sighed and said:
“Your case is adjourned—until the end of time.”
The mint of music rested on her lap.
I asked her name.
She smiled and said,
“It’s written in the clouds above your head.”
I looked up and saw: Blue Sky.
Her hands were kissed by henna,
Six golden bangles danced at her wrists
A shimmer of wealth and mystery.
I said, “Yes… yes… and yeah.
You are green as spring,
Yet burn with the fire of the devil.”
Innocence and seduction
All wrapped in one.
A beautiful teen,
The chaos of heaven in a single form.
Yes, I would love to taste your lips...

Oh devil,
play your crooked song.
My cup was born empty
not for lack,
but for the thrill of being filled
by hands unclean.
You danced,
not in shadows,
but in candlelight and clinking glass.
You sang not sorrow,
but sweet sugar lies
dipped in honeyed brass.
I did not fall.
I followed.
The path was perfumed,
the rhythm too rich to refuse.
Sin, in satin slippers.
Wickedness, with wine on its lips.
Yahoo for me
I did not burn.
I became the fire.
I outshone the flame.

What Remains

Sometimes, it isn’t death that takes them
but something quieter, crueler.
We still see their face,
still hear their voice,
but the soul we loved has gone elsewhere.

No thunderclap of farewell,
just silence
where laughter used to live.
A dimming light,
a soft betrayal of warmth once constant.

They don’t vanish all at once.
They fall from us
in pieces.
A kindness gone here,
a tenderness gone there
until we’re holding a ghost
with a heartbeat.

We mourn them in secret,
while they walk beside us.
Not lost,
but no longer found.

And in the end,
what remains?
Only the name
echoing,
hollow
in the chambers of memory.

To My Red Pen
When did you grow so gentle?
You, once sharp with correction
Marking every stumble
A judge in crimson ink
Now you spill like sunlight
Waltzing across the page
Not to scold
But to sing
What the hell changed—and why?
I'm left wounded, wondering
When right began to feel so wrong?

"The hardest fight is the one inside you."
Not the blade nor the beast,
not the curse in the woods,
but the voice that whispers
when all else is still.

The night is loud with silence,
and the mirror knows your name.
He carries his mother’s magic,
but it’s his shadow he cannot tame.

Eyes meet, shadows speak,  
questions coil in tender air,  
truth hides, sharp, unknown.  
Our silence—both wound and balm,  
bridging what we fear to say.

You write to lift the heavy heart,
To pull the shadows far apart.
Your words, a balm, a gentle breeze,
That sets the weary soul at ease.

You offer joy through ink and rhyme,
A gift more precious than all time.
A poet’s pen, both sword and shield
A garden where the hurt is healed.

So thank you, friend, for all you give,
For helping weary hearts to live.
May peace and love be yours, always
In silent nights and shining days.

Truly honored to share this space with you. Keep writing, keep healing.

Thank you 🙏

Forasmuch as I have lov’d this life,
No sorrow shall I bear in death.
My gladness have I sent on high,
To vanish in the azure breath.
I ran and leapt with falling rain,
The wind I clasp’d unto my breast.
Mine own cheek, like a slumb’ring babe,
Upon the earth’s fair face did rest.
Forasmuch as I have lov’d this life,
No sorrow shall I bear in death.
Take thou my love, sweet soul so nigh
And know, this parting is not goodbye.

*******.
I don’t need your flowers.
Then I ran to the hill
screaming, dancing your name
into the sky.
“Follow me, *******!”
A teenage heart
with a woman’s craving for love
yielding, radiant,
beautiful,
****,
full of lust, honey.
Come, fill your cup.
Come, warm your blood.
I am your dream, teen.
I am your soul’s dare.
Come to rest,
come to burn.
My wine was stored in animal skin
aged in darkness,
waiting to be broken.
Sweet, sweet me.
Come and have me.
I dare you to my madness.
I dare you to be brave.
I dare you
to enjoy my wine.

To “read” a painting is to listen with the eyes.
Begin with silence. Stand before it not as a judge, but as a guest and a stranger in a land of symbols and hues.
Describe what you see, as if describing a dream, you’re not sure you had: the colours, the lines, the tension, the flow. Is there chaos? Stillness? Invitation? Resistance?
Then ask the questions the paint does not answer:
Who made this, and when?
What storm or serenity shaped the artist’s hand?
What did the world look like when this pigment first touched canvas?
This is the visual pilgrimage:
from surface to structure, from brushstroke to breath.
You trace the grammar of form and the logic of light
how shadows fall, how space unfolds.
You seek the why beneath the what.
But to read a poem
Ah... to read a poem is to let it read you.
You bring all that you bring to painting attention, analysis, context.
But then you must offer something more:
your ache, your longing, your bruises, your silences.
You must bleed a little.
You must taste the honeyed poison of words too true to ignore.
Where a painting might say, “See me,”
a poem whispers, “Feel me and dare to be changed.”
In poetry, time distils.
A single line may carry a century.
A single word may resurrect a forgotten wound.
And so, the witch’s son says:
To read a painting is to walk through a doorway.
To read a poem is to fall through it, willingly
drunk on the sweet wine of beauty,
cut by the edge of truth.

My friend, take hence a letter to my dear,
Perchance he sees the weeping written clear.
Between the lines, let silent tears confess
A love that words alone could not express.

Tell him I’m lost, by longing overthrown,
My heart, from parting’s fire, is cracked to stone.
What good is distance? Shall we choose to part,
When all that’s good is living heart to heart?

I asked the night: “Have you not felt him near?
Did not his shadow stir your silence here?”
The night replied with tears upon his face:
“My patience, too, has waned in love’s embrace.”

The moon declared: “I basked in all you said,
But when you cease, my light itself is shed.”
O you who poured sweet love in every vein,
How shall I live in mask and cold refrain?

So when you reach him, let this message shine:
I am in love with his name is etched in mine.
My life was penned with hope and passion true,
And every breath I take still longs for you.

It hurts
like trying to hug a cloud
that owes you money.
You live in my heart
rent-free,
but my arms?
Evicted.
You are emotionally Airbnb
booked out,
but the photos were misleading.
Pain is elegant.
It wears a tuxedo to breakfast.
It sighs like a French poet
watching their croissant float down the Seine.
And elegance is everywhere
especially in the unseen.
Like your *******.
Yes, those
the hidden diplomats of heartbreak,
curled like sleeping cats
at the bottom of your laundry basket,
smelling faintly of rebellion and lavender-scented denial.
Keep them fresh.
Not for me
I’ve joined a monastery made of memes
but for the next poor soul
who mistakes your playlist for a spirit.
Let him be dazzled.
Let him be devoured.
Let him know, too late,
that lace is a trapdoor.

How on earth I end up with you
a question I bury in silence,
where answers decay.
How did I spend thirty-five minutes
trading my peace
for your poisoned lullaby?

How many times I should have left,
but stayed
each time a bruise
on the soul I pretend is whole.
Each moment,
a thread unraveling my name.

Deep purple sleep
where I float, numb,
ends nightmare.
Not with rest,
but with forgetting.

Thank God
for the wicked wake
the jolt, the break,
the moment truth
slices through the dream.
At last,
I breathe
alone.
Alive.

Once, the word was a whisper
carved into a cave wall
by a man who saw lightning
and wanted to marry it.
He did not know grammar,
but he knew:
****.
It is the sound a soul makes
when it remembers it left the stove on
in a past life.
It is a sneeze of truth,
a hiccup of the cosmos,
a four-letter eclipse
of reason and restraint.
“****,” says the poet,
when words betray him.
“****,” says the scientist,
when atoms refuse to behave.
It is the punctuation of panic,
the jazz note in an otherwise silent scream,
the laugh-track of God.
It means everything
when you don’t mean anything,
and it means nothing
when you feel everything.
It is both
the crime
and the confession.
The knock, the door, the absence of door.
So how do you write it?
You don’t.
You exhale it through clenched teeth
as you fall in love with a mistake.
You etch it into the back of a napkin
after three whiskeys and a revelation.
You scream it into a pillow
until the pillow understands.
Then you kiss it.
And never speak of it again.

I want to taste the sweetness of your lips again
again, and again
'til sweetness turns to ache,
and ache becomes need.
Old wood is best to burn,
old wine to rot in the blood,
old friends to betray,
old books to whisper truths too heavy for the day.
But your lips
they are the darkest wine,
fermented in silence,
laced with lust,
dripping the sins saints dare not name.
Fill my cup.
Let me be drunk.
Let me forget the light.

I’m the one now
sitting in the old chair,
saying all the silly,
mischievous things
to my grandchildren
and somehow,
they love it.
They laugh and call it Grandpa Wisdom.
I just call it joy.
And oh, how I love it.
Thank you
for that joy.

Pleasant to contemplate
Sweet,
Warm.
To share it,
or savor alone?
Maybe.
But more than likely,
a dream never to be realized.

I slept beneath a murmuring tree,
the breath of wind like whispered song
when from the dusky thicket near
a dove broke forth in sorrowed tongue.
Its coo, a tremble made of light,
a flame of grief in feathered white,
did pierce the veil of slumber’s shroud
and stir my heart to waking loud.
O! Sweet-winged ghost of aching skies,
you summoned tears from sealed eyes,
and sang of loves I once had known,
and all the souls I’d called my own.
How far I’d strayed from spirit’s call,
how deep the hush, how slow the fall
but in your cry, celestial dove,
I heard again the voice of love.
So let me weep and wake anew,
beneath the sky’s immortal blue,
and bless the winds, the wings, the morn,
where grief and beauty are reborn.

Scars of Light
My body is full of cuts and scars,
A statement written in quiet lines
Each wound a whisper from battles past,
A language of pain that never lies.
They said, “The wound is where the light breaks through,”
Then I should be glowing, shouldn’t I?
But some nights, even stars seem bruised,
And hope feels like a well run dry.
I walk like driftwood lost at sea,
No anchor, no wind to carry me.
Steps unstable, breath unsure
I’m chasing something that’s never pure.
My eyes, two windows to a fading spark,
Cannot find where the light ends or starts.
It flickers in dreams I barely hold,
A warmth remembered, now turned cold.
Yet still…
In the silence between every ache,
A softer voice begins to wake.
It hums beneath the weight of scars,
Like moonlight bleeding through prison bars.
Pain has been my cruelest friend,
But even sorrow must someday bend.
If I can breathe, then I can crawl
And if I crawl, I might still stand tall.
So let the wounds be open doors,
Not graves, but cracks that beg for more.
Let hope be stubborn, small, and slow,
A single seed in winter’s snow.
Yes, let it be…

Love in its fullness comes but twice: first, in the mirror of desire; second, in the ruin of illusion.

Devil 👿

I met the devil.
She didn’t ask.
Just lit the pipe
and blew death into my lungs.

My veins caught fire.
My soul cracked open.
Everything changed.
Nothing mattered.

Time?
I spent it bleeding in heaven
and screaming in hell.

I fell into her arms like a drunk punch,
and crashed into a winter storm
naked, high, and laughing.

She was beautiful.
Ugly.
Perfect.
My sleep paralysis in flesh.

Yes
I ****** the devil.
She wore my guilt like perfume.

Ecstasy?
To you, it’s a word.
To me, it’s her body over mine,
nails in my back,
truth in her lies.

Yes
I slept with the devil 👿
And she never left.

Knowledge is power
My grandmother and father told me,
Knowledge is power.
What a masterpiece of comedy that was.
I believed them, like a fool with a library card.
Now I’m stuck with a brain full
of useless wisdom and a heart full of regret.
Even the doctor said,
‘Sorry, we don’t treat chronic belief in motivational slogans.’
So yeah… hats off to me.
Clown of the century. 🤡📚🤣

Never trust again
nor reconnect with
anyone who tried to silence your voice,
break your spirit, or shatter your being.
A snake, no matter how smooth
or beautiful, only sheds its skin to grow.
But never forget:
“a snake remains a snake”

"Behind every successful man, there is a woman."
To which George Bernard Shaw, with his cutting wit, replied:
"Yes—but the man would be greater without her."
And I?
I say this:
"I do not conquer her
I submit…
like a sinner to the sweetness
of sin,
drenched in its lust,
lost in its pleasure."

You came without footsteps.
I did not hear the door
only felt you
arrive
beneath my ribs,
like smoke curling into a sealed jar.
I was praying,
but you were the breath I used to say your name.
Now I live
in a room without walls.
No ceiling, no floor
only your nearness,
pressing me open
from within.
I am not asking for paradise.
I am asking
for the warmth of your palm
on the small of my back
when I am weary of seeking.
I am asking
to lean into you
as a tree leans into wind it trusts.
Let the world do what it wants
let time collapse,
let stars fall into rivers
but let me keep
the wine of your presence
on my tongue
a moment longer.
There are days I am nothing but hunger.
Days I mistake your silence
for absence.
But then a bird lands on the windowsill
and it is you.
Then my spine tingles
for no reason
and it is you.
And when I weep without knowing why,
it is because you are
too close to name.
You are the touch I can’t return.
The kiss I give inward.
The home I carry
in the hollows of my being.

I Want to Stay Here
We went to see the Three Sisters
in the Blue Mountains
an iconic rock formation,
etched in stone by time
and by legend.
The old story tells:
three sisters turned to stone
to be saved from war,
frozen forever
by love and fear.
Nearby, where Norman Lindsay
dreamed his wild and wicked dreams,
the air still hums
with the laughter of ghosts,
and the soft madness of artists.
My grandchild,
with his small voice and wide heart,
was asked to come home.
He looked up and said,
"I want to stay here."
And my heart
my old, tired heart
heard him and answered too:
I want to stay here.
To feel the pleasures,
the madness,
the thrill
these mountains have lived and seen.
I wonder
how can a place bear so much
and still remain
green,
shining,
calm?
Yes.
I want to stay here too.

Hold your secret, soft and deep,
While silent, watchful thoughts you keep.
A human ear, though kind and dear,
Might let your tender whisper hear.

Go to glass, so still and bright,
And pour your heart into its light.
It listens close with silent gaze,
Through all your hidden, winding ways.

No judging word, no sudden sting,
Just quiet truth the echoes bring.
If sorrow blooms from what you find,
That wound is only for your mind.

They said: Be like us.
I said: Sorry my mother is a witch,
and I am the son of a delicious sin.
I'm not built for statues or titles.

As long as I’ve stolen nothing but hearts,
and wasted nothing but time
in the arms of beautiful women,
leave me as I am:
a blueprint for a postponed scandal.

As for the sheikh
he paused, cracked his back,
then said with a smirk:
“The world, my son, is three things:
A ***** that confuses logic,
A glass that makes logic forget,
And a cigarette... that burns logic altogether.”

We all laughed
then returned to lying,
as always:
In the name of morality.

Beneath the brick, a crumpled note
ink blurred by rain:
No ******* milk tomorrow.

Signed,
in silence.

**** Me With Your Beauty

Float your beauty,
your wild, aching sexiness
a storm in silk,
a sin wrapped in flesh.

**** me
with your pleasure,
with your wicked grace.
Burn me.
Don’t explain.
Don’t wait.

Just do it.
Undo me.
With what God gave you.

A glance,
a touch,
a breath that owns me.

**** me.
**** me
slowly,
completely
until I am nothing
but the echo
of your name.

The poem is the pain of:
love and hate,
happenings and sorrows,
laughter and tears,
day and night,
again and again

Pain, in so many colors and shapes,
in whispers or screams,
in gentle aches or roaring storms

It is pain.
Yes, PAIN.
That ink, that pulse, that shadow in the verse
Always pain.

I dwell now at a nameless address
Where words no longer visit.
I no longer write
Nor do I wish to mesmerize.
Yesterday,
My home was your heart.
Now I echo through absence.
They say,
“’Tis better to have loved and lost…”
But they forget
Lost time
Is never found again.

Eyes meet, shadows speak,  
questions coil in tender air,  
truth hides, sharp, unknown.  
Our silence—both wound and balm,  
bridging what we fear to say.

One morning,
I stood before the mirror
my losses etched across my face.
Staring back was someone who despised me.
How cruel self-loathing can be.
Some days, memory drags me
to my harshest hours
to an old love in an older heart,
to the moment my convictions shifted.
I never left people without reason,
yet I could never fill
the voids they left behind.
A wound, dealt by those I cherished,
taught me this:
those closest
are often the ones we most need to leave.
Only one truth remains
my reflection’s love endures.
But the love of others?
A myth I can no longer believe.
And what is the soul’s departure
if not an ending?
For death doesn’t always come in silence.
How many of the living
do I already treat
as if they’re gone?

My Lord,
pluck out my eyes
for now I see.
Listen,
I have sinned.
I loved the lie
and spat upon the truth.
She came
beautiful,
a marvel of flesh and voice,
and sang,
"I am the devil."
And I,
a fool,
did not believe.
Now I love the sinner.
Now I hate the good.
Now I worship power.
Now I bow to injustice.
She was the devil
or her shadow.
Evil, with a honeyed tongue,
converted me
into a rewound soul,
a God-hating ghost
wearing the rags of flesh.
O God
bless me with Your power
and
**** me
now.

I said to her,
"I will betray you."

She smiled softly, like forgiveness,
but with devilish awareness
and whispered,
"Then let destruction be... beautiful."

I said,
"Teach me how do you fall?"

She said,
"Tango."

And we tangoed
like sinners in a church,
like wolves caressing silk that never sleeps.

A step... then a gasp.
A turn... then a scar.
Wound after wound,
until love forgot its name,
its features scattered between our feet.

And still, we danced
not out of love,
not out of regret,
but because the music never stopped.
Yet.

Wide-open spaces
There is no outside in this circle,
No edge to which ends can rest.
Everything in you
the street, the wine, the noise of shadows
speaks of you.
Do not be ashamed of joy.
Let it bare your heart like a baby in the rain.
Let it tremble for the trembling of a plum,
Or a sigh that escapes your lungs
Like an orphan angel.
Close the eye that sees,
And open the other that waits from beyond the light.
Kneel.
And do not fear breaking.
The cup in your hand
Is nothing but the illusion of fullness.
Let it fall.
Let it spill.
For the hunger you thought was a ****** call,
Was the return of an invitation
From you...to you.
No one emerges from the maze.
We only change the shape of the circle.
Forget what was lost.
Be what is given.
Be water when thirst is forgotten.
Why do you walk
in a cell without walls?
Listen...
There is music that cannot be heard.
A tune formed
from your fall.
So fall.
Fall some more.
For you are destined
to expand.
YES…

Step into my heart
Step into my heart, my line,
Step deep inside and enter my soul in peace.
My wound is your wound,
My pulse is your pulse,
And the words, we speak to them the same.
The street of sorrows begins in me,
A wound awakening beneath my ribs.
And it ends there too,
When one day,
We can finally speak it aloud.
My line, my line and inside my heart,
Step in and enter my soul in peace.
These words yes, they are the same.
Oh, when I speak and you believe,
Believe in the truth and let it rise from your lips.
When I speak and you believe
The truth will find its sound.
From your right,
From your left,
From there, from here
Know me.
You will find me
The possible truth.
Hug me and hold me,
Throw me into the air
Draw me, colour me,
A bird released, flying free.
Oh, when we meet
Meet in the space between our words,
When we meet again,
Let it be on the words
That rise from our hearts.
Step into my heart
Step into my heart, my line…

I married for love,
and love has a price
not in gold,
not in coin,
but in patience,
in silence,
in sleepless nights.
In the slow surrender of self,
until the edges blur.

Yes, I married for love
not for comfort,
not for gain.
But love is no gift freely given;
it asks for everything.
Time.
Trust.
Sometimes, even your dreams.

Love is beautiful
but it leaves marks
where it’s been.

Yes, I married for love.
And no one warned me
how deeply love can wound
how much it takes,
how little it sometimes gives.

Still…
yes,
I paid the price.

Death is nothing—no endless divide,
I’ve only strode to the other side.
I am still I, and you are still you;
Our love remains, unwavering, true.
Speak my name as you did before,
Soft and sure, as in days of yore.
No need for silence, tears, or guise
Let laughter rise, as in brighter skies.
Remember every shared delight,
The tender jokes, the sparks of light.
Sing my name, let it softly ring,
A living breath, an endless thing.
I linger near, not lost, not gone,
Just past the dawn, beyond the lawn.
No need to yearn—I’ll wait right here,
Until you round life’s bending sphere.
So smile, and dance, and let love show,
For though you cannot see me so,
Our bond still holds, our light won’t fade
I’m just around the bend, delayed.
Delayed.

He entered the stable of kings,
thinking the nearness of the throne would crown him.
He wore the saddle of glory,
and tasted the grain of another’s destiny.

But the soul cannot be tricked by garments,
nor the heart by walls.
Essence breaks through every mask.

So when he opened his mouth,
the sound that leapt forth was not praise,
nor hymn, nor neigh of majesty
it was the cry of his own nature,
a bray echoing the secret:
“You are what you are.”

Love isn't just a sweet soft kiss,
Nor how many times you feel such bliss.
It's not the touch that quickly ends,
Or fleeting comfort that it lends.

True love's a warmth that softly stays,
Through quiet nights and busy days.
A gentle echo, deep and true,
Long after the sweet kiss is through.

It lives within, a tender glow,
A quiet river's steady flow.
This gentle feeling, deep and vast,
Is made to last, forever last.

Why won’t you stop
shut up,
or even die?
Why must you speak
in words just as cruel,
just as useless
as the old path I swore to leave?
Oh God
**** my hand,
**** my mind,
or please...
**** my pen.
I’ve thrown you a thousand times,
but like a phoenix
you always return,
refusing to burn,
refusing to die.
I’m done with you, Pen.
Your ink is endless pain.
No more of you
in my realm.
We’re finished.
Today.
My pen looked at me with a snaky eye,
and whispered
I only speak
because you never could.

My lady

I am not your slave, Nor bound to the wine I sip-But if I must surrender, Let it be to your lips, not the cup.