Our house is for sale in my memory town,
The colours you bought have been sold.
I've searched the joys of this wondrous world
but somehow returned here to you.

They said we had gold,
but the fire of life burnt us down.
And now that I'm older,
I'm leaving behind what we found.

Ive placed my last stone at our fountain of life,
there where we once met.
The sun stood still as I painted your name,
I tried but I could not forget...

The light on your face and that look in your eyes,
the bells that jingle jangle as you walked on by.
The touch that you gave and us lost in a haze,
Goodbye my beautiful, beautiful, beautiful world.

----------------------------

Gone to the grave all my sentimental feelings,
My nights wont be plagued anymore.
Im throwing a way an illusive dream,
Burnt in with visions of you.

You took our chance,
and threw it away to the wind,
your shallow glance,
betrayed the love I thought was true.

No more tears that have eaten these years,
baby I'm leaving this life of grieving,
no more crying, no more dying,
no more wishing that I could see...

The light on your face and that look in your eyes,
the bells that jingle jangle as you walked on by.
The touch that you gave and us lost in a haze,
Goodbye my beautiful, beautiful, beautiful world.

Bird Fly
into your blue sky.
It is cold here,
Go find the warm sun.
Sell all
that weighs you down dear
for a dream and
so far away.

I'll stay
here in my night sky
where thousands of fireflies
are keeping me dreaming
of a true love,
brave and bleeding,
of a dream and
so far away.

Glistening skyscrapers are calling you on
to your tower of hope and your journey beyond.

May you find your way
from this hollow ground.

Glistening skyscrapers in Eastern skies
where streets are safe and money spins like dice.

But it all fell down
when I kissed your ground,
when you took me home-
oh I knew you'd go.

I'll stay
here in my night sky
where thousands of fireflies
are keeping me dreaming
of a true love,
brave and bleeding,
unafraid.

Sit with me in a pitch dark room
and lets imagine bright coloured paintings
on the walls and the ceiling.

I need a dark cave to hide me from the sun.
Too much burning beauty,
I'm on the run.

The neon lights,
they loved me true,
they drew me far away from you,
my mind is churned.

I want the freeze,
I want the tease,
to break it down.
I need a slave,
I am a slave,
I am enslaved.

It's because life is so fragile
that the colours are so intense,
that the pain is so immense,
that we love and hate.

This corruption sweetens us,
then prunes us,
then buries us.

Loss teaches us to find,
our honey lies in seconds that tick by,
an eternity of connectedness
that dissipates into the morning fog.

This is the reality we breathe in like shining shadows.

I want to write stars into your eyes,
paint admiration into your mind,
walk an epic movie into your life.
You are honey dripping off a peach of desire.

Come sit with me in a pitch dark room,
Let us be,
Lets sing in a whisper,
in a thick space,
of dreams and desire.

Sit with me,
lets talk some,
for another fragile memory
to be forgotten in time.

Our clock beating hearts stop dead
Having measured length and breadth
Of love that we held and lost in this hell
Of beauty that faded with senile minds

We long to remember hands that we held
Fresh kisses connecting stories we told
Together for moments but ages apart
Silent night prayers relinquishing love

The ticking ticks on through the hours we wasted
Pointless pursuits to fill up the cracks
Alliances made with time stealing chores
Passion wasted on uncaring bores

But through all the beating I see some unflinching clocks
With broken hour hands spinning their dreams

Strong and courageous,
Mind set,
Words and intention impeccable.

Money flows
from talent and desires,
time,
managed in exact
and perfectly planned compartments.

Influencing friends and family,
perfect relationships,
ruling as a king.

I'm a well oiled machine,
in my seldom recurring dream.

I'm a man of the sea and I have to,
I have to be free.
I'm a sun of a gun with a bottle,
a bottle of ***.
I'm a man on a mission and the mission,
the mission is me.
I man on an edge and on this edge,
I'll end up dead.

Do you know there are blue skies baby?
Do you know that storm clouds save me?

There's a burning horizon and it's calling,
it's calling my name.
There's this burning ambition for gold,
to save me from shame.

I remember when this world was formed.

I danced with the sun and you danced with the moon
and the stars danced around this newborn
celebrating her beauty and magnificence.

The sun glowed through my skin
projecting streams onto the Himalayas.
The red became blue and pure
as the dusty water creeped
through granite ledges and Crushed ice-bergs.

Our hair soaked with dew glided with the wind
and planted into the earth spreading our life
your beauty and my strength.

The song you sang made beings rise from clay to hear your wonder.

I remember your sorrow when the killing began,
my rage was a desease infecting them with blood lust.

That terrified time your cancer formed from thier smoke,
their hatred, their hardness.

Were the tears for them for me too?
The offspring I tainted with sorrow?

Tommorow I will burn them with vengeance for my guilt,
I will ******* them and remove thier sustainence!

Stay my hand my love,
I still love my broken children.
Soothe me with your music
may we be happy once again.

Her Garden

Her world is an explosion of colour.
Flowers paint her pumpkin walls,
Fuschias dance in her back garden
and exotic roses watch over the plants that play to her music that breezes from her soul.

She is their sun
and their shade-
their very earth
and their rain.

Her children are loved
and her beauty adorned
with the essence of God.

Her Home

So warm.
Large wooden windows give light to the rooms.
To be there is to be in history:
faded photos, art, collectibles, aged mirrors,
take me on journeys to old souls and to myself.

The walls that hold them are boldly coloured and yet so comfortable. Every corner is a suprise placed with care.
The butch duck on the grandfather clock has laid an egg and curiously glares at the fireplace in the opposite corner.
I will always remember her fireplace.

Her bed is dressed with a red and gold silk oriental throw and large pillows resting on the headrest.
In the corner a tree laden with colourful handbags and hats for all occasions.
She has a mirror on an antique dresser for company
decorated with rings and makeup and jewelry
and many many interesting things.
The basket holds scarves and gloves and shoes,
and her sheets hold the moment i was born anew.

Her Art

She is her art.
Full of suprise,
eclectic,
eccentric,
bright.

Her home,
her garden,
her songs,
her interests,
her way.

She smiles poetry and wears classical movies.
She dances flowers and daggers
and speaks mystery and passion.

So soft and perplexed-
a roller coaster of colourful tastes
and memorable aromas.

To meet her is a pilgrimage,
to lose her is to lose an eye.

Mkay so I cant spel,
sue me wat the hel!
Mown like an old gramar
who is stuk in payamas.

Jus leev me an let me be three

>:(

Love,
I  just  want  know,  
like a child.

Is your world cracked with crucifixes?
Are your  life  eyes sparkling?
  
We die  lost,  
We are ill with a sickness called time.

Feel  the beautiful  sun.
Pursue light.
Make  pain flow from your face-
find the salt river called Shiloh
and let her pour down  your lonely path.

Drift  away  in your dream.
And quietly scream.

I met with her again last night on the upper deck.

English tea shop surrounded by culture and interesting antiques.

She visits me often in places like these
to remind me to care for my child
and to live beautifully.

My life is infected by her colours,
her imagination,
her intricacy.

It was dark
and I was in a void.

A void?

A void.

A void
blacker and stenchier
than your charcoal little souls...

And then in the night-
I saw a light!

The light grew brighter and brighter
and whiter and whiter-
when suddenly I heard a sound...

Chook...

Chook a puff puff...

Chook a puff puff oh **** its a train!

And that is why I'm here in hell
with all of you.

Beautiful creatures
haunt our past
they glide through our fingers
in memory mists
we are wanting to hold
but they tease our grips

If they could have seen the love that we had
and seen past their eyes of dream that went bad
they would still be here
as tangible as the sun
and waste some time before the day comes to an end

Beautiful things
cause the sadness to grow
the emptiness to show
our hope to dim

We learn by learning to die
leaving beautiful creatures behind
******* in the tears
as the years go by
knowing belonging is for another life not here
and faerie tales are only true far away from here
and when we are buried
we will be as hard as the earth that covers us

Prophets of doom,
dishing out sorrow and gloom,
glorying in their knowledge,
tying weights to burdened souls,
receivers of blackened light and soiled truth,
if they only knew,
there are many others just as they,
spewing lies in God's name,
leading sheep
to a fiery hell.

Corpses in the carvery,
mouths watering with glee,
children running up and down,
one big happy family.
Daddy's having eisbein,
and mommas having roast,
there are innards on the burgers
and flesh smeared on the toast.

The smell of death hangs in the air,
it goes nice with the wine,
the music makes so elegant
the massacre they dine.
They stuff their bellies heavy,
the fat sits in their throats,
they're happy that they came again,
they grab their murdered coats.

Today I drive  in silence
with no song to calm me down.
The only radio playing
is a hole within a hole.
The DJ is a martyr
and the music's harsh and cold,
but my mind is far away from here
with someone I could not hold.

I look through my cracked windscreen
at the rain thats pouring down
and ghosts driving on the highway
to some forgotten town.
My fuel is running empty
but still my engine drones.
My mind is far away from here
with someone I could not hold.

All this time
I've tried to find,
within the recess
of my mind,
the lie I crave
to keep me blind,
to clear the air-
the dark dispair.
To find my peace,
to **** the beast,
the blackened truth
that holds me down.

For you my dear,
are neither here nor there,
your love is cold,
you couldn't care.
Your sparkling face,
and your heartfelt touch,
Do you truly feel that much?

I pierce my heart on your hidden thorns
and bleed love onto your wounded soul.
Your fragrance is my poison,
your softness- the lie I live by.

Your beauty is fleeting,
but I wont last to see it end.

Aged,
riddled with sores,
confined to a wheel chair,
His head shaking uncontrollably
and drooling onto his napking,
he smiles.

We're walking in a hazy maze,
always lost,
always found,
always almost...
nearly touching,
nearly staying,
nearly keeping...
then its over.

She  swallow the sun, before the days begun,
keeping him in the dark, with her silly little lies.
He prays she finds love and he hopes that it's he.
He's scored  long enough,  he knows it's only in his head.

He watches from afar, while she's beside  him in  bed,
Pretty as a poem he read.
There, but uninvolved, someone is waiting round the bend-
This dream is just a page he read.

He's been here before, an old hand at goodbye,
years are moving on to a safe and cozy night:
where slide shows flicker on walls of unknown photo scrawls
and moments covered in dust,  
dead forgotten trust.

If only she belonged to a wasted life with him:
grounded, broken and free;
with few Hollywood lights hanging on her tree,
a sense of sanity.

She is held like a doll that can never love back,
plastic blue eyes keep him entrapped.
Compromising compassion compels him to her door-
He swears he's been here before...

Your light is but a mere reflection of broken stars,
of whose nuances and rumoured brilliance you act out so well.

You are blind my love,
in all our time you never met me.
All you see are the faerie tales
tattooed on the insides of your eyelids.

When the hype is over you fly to the next
and the next
and the next.
I knew from the day we met you would leave.

Even with all the songs you write,
the writers you quote,
your elegant chatter,
your flare that melts men and women alike-
you are still as shallow as pink bunny's and baked beans.

You are the most lethal kind,
if you were at least a ***** you would be honest,
but your softness and kindness
sets men up
to be dropped like broken toys from a fat spoilt brat.

I really don't know why I'm still so tender towards you.

I swam in her eyes-
It didn't make sense.

I went to her street,
I went to her house,
I tried to get in.

But her walls
are higher than the Ivory Tower.
and her doors
are four foot steel.

(chorus->)
Open the vault.
Break down the walls!
Let me in.
Open the vault.
Break down the walls!
Let' begin-
a beautiful
complicated
love affair.

I know she's there
-I can hear her breathe...
I know she's scared
I can
feel her bleed!

(chorus)

Space,
Satin skin on black lace.

She smells like a dream
and tastes like reality,
but all i find is space.

I want to visit your planet,
I want to stop and stay.
I want to visit your planet
one more day.

I want to visit your planet
but now youre going away.
I want to visit your planet
please delay.

I want to swim in your ocean baby.
I want to bask in your sun.
I want to feel your sunbeam shine on me.

I want to cry at your midnight hour.
I want to dance in your dawn.
I want to see new horisons with you baby.

I want to go on a journey
to all your foreign lands.
I want to find those treasures no one knows of.

I want to be your poet.
I want to sing your songs.
So please consider this offer before it's gone.

Love lurks like a wounded animal,
starved for affection,
scarred by rejection,
stalking weak minds,
seeing who next will be devoured,
it longs to lift it's prey on the wings of hope,
and drop them down
to it's inevitable conclusion,
despair.

The world is your mirror.

Mountains of mystery grow and crumble.
Mountaineers conquer the peaks and some stumble.
Poets dream,
And the fearful hide.
Hero cries echo in the crags that crack the skies.
Burning volcanoes exploding with sulphur,
Tall shadows forever hiding within her.

Sweeping tsunamis destroying with rage,
Peace is the ocean that brings this age.
Sailor that loved her she buried below,
Lovers that saw her were lost in her glow.

The Terra Firma,
We walk and are buried.
Like a mother
She fed and has carried.

The blood of the martyrs and murderers she caught,
The food for the children and the dying she wrought.
Sometimes barren and bare,
Or green without care,
Her arid, her acid, her ice and her air.

So much mystery,
So much madness,
All her ecstasy hides her sadness.
So much history forged with newness.
So much truth, so many truths lost in transit.

Our touch,
Our taste,
Our mind,
Our breath-

So much to mention and much left out.
So much discovered and been found out.
Words can never amount or count,
The dim reflection,
The horror,
The magnificence.

The other side,
You.

She's a treacherous thing,
such a beautiful dream,
she's a heavenly creature,
but don't let her darkness entertain you.

She will drive you wild.
She will take you down
to a faraway country.
So don't let her raven eyes enslave you.

Don't be enamored by the things that she holds dear.
Don't believe the sweet words that she whispers in your ear.
Don't look directly at the sun.
Don't fly to high you'll burn your wings.
Don't be a fool for love.
Don't you be a fool.

My throat is in old Tupperware bowl used as an ashtray full of burn marks never been cleaned just emptied.

My body is a punch bag beaten up by beer, take-aways and lazy living.

My mind is a collection of old collectible records all scratched and collecting dust in an old forgotten attic.

My hands are shaky spider legs spinning webs of deceit.

My eyes are tired from looking through this mask of strength wanting freedom from the darkness longing to accept the weakness that is.

My feet point forward but they walk backwards.

My desire is on fire, its always been on fire.

My spirit believes in possibilities so ill stick around to see what happens.

My ship,
docked,
in your harbor,
waiting
for the rage
of your storm
to die down.

How long will I wait,
my love,
for your turmoil to be done?
How long will I long,
my dear-
For your wide open blue,
and the salt of your skin
and the awe of exploring your greatness once again?

My mast is down,
my anchor heavy.

I sit here between the hard earth
and my dream.
I sit here waiting for you
to come around.

Rowing on the moonlight,
that falls upon the water,
quiet is the night
on my lake of intimate desire.

The shores are strung with stars
that dance between the morning mist
and the oars caress the water
like the water in your sensual kiss.

I feel the cool wind whisper on my neck
and then I breathe you.
I taste the salt in the ocean air
just like your skin
and then I want you.

There's a rhythm in this motion that will bring me home to you.

All I see are people with shattered hearts,
walking around with broken backs,
pretentending to have no hearts
and no spines.

Cynics
are dreamers
blinded once to many times
by dazzling white light-
You were there that night.

For so long I longed-
Milk soft skin,
Burning eyes,
inetense desire,
the scent of a woman.

You fell asleep,
but still the room was on fire.

Beauty resting in my naked arms.

I watched over you until dawn.

You awoke
You were there
But you were gone.

How long must I wait for a reply?

I sit
and watch
and wait
while my life slowly ebbs away-
and my eyes dry out-
and my skin
boils away from radiation from my screen
and
I slowly watch the flesh of my hand
bubble away to oblivion
and I eat it.

I need a dark cave to hide from the sun,
the burning beauty,
I'm on the run.

The neon lights love me true,
they drew me far away from you,
my mind is churned.

I want the freeze,
I want the tease,
to break it down.

I need a slave,
I am a slave,
I am enslaved.

My Semiramis.
I used to dwell in the light realm,
I tried to leave but now not even the darkness will take me.
I live somewhere in a mist realm.

My Bathsheba,
I left glory to come find you,
but just like in the light realm,
you still insist on hiding yourself behind your icy walls.

My Delilah,
one night with you broke me forever.
Your sickness has weakened my soul.

My Jezebel,
in my dreams i always look for your passionate black eyes.
Its dumb and illogical my obsession with you,
you destroy me.

My Diana,
I remember when my life was peace and control,
but you seduced me into turmoil and war.

My death trap,
why do i want you so?

This is a song for
all that I long for.
This is a song for the birds
I wish that I could

Tell you a secret
because I know you need it.
This is a song for the birds
I wish that I could

Fly to the moon for you,
I wish that I could

Make it and mean it,
trust it and feel it,
be all I mean it to be-
I wish that I could

Fake it and feed it,
pretend that I need it,
live as your ***** kitchen *****
I wish that I could

Fly to the moon for you
I wish that I could

I must admit that
my loves not all that
Im not your hero on a steed
but I wish that I could

I want to write to immortalize my name,
but my heart is poured out on the ground like wax,
So like Jesus and Solomon and some others,
If I'm lucky,
maybe I could immortalize my pain.

It has all been redone, rehashed, rewritten, and reread, (this included)
and like billions of others,
my world revolves around me,
my instinct and my survival,
wedged in my head.

We are all philosophers, scientists and sheep,
from princes to murderers,
from mothers to sailors,
the remembered and forgotten,
the drunks and the tailors-
We're sincerely believing the delusions we keep.

I think some found truth,
and others found lies,
and some found excuses
for the passions of youth.

But I have favourite things that keep me alive,
the songs and the family and friends that help me pass time,
conquering problems and getting things right,
the fragile ecstasy,
the rare intimacy,
touch.

I constantly feel the drain of time running out,
my back is in knots,
I'm tired and in doubt.

I see people I love aging and fading,
and I know we all share it,
our lives are decaying.

My heart has grown hard from the sorrow I've seen,
so many bleeding,
I'm also bleeding.

It's too hard too cry tears for all the begging children I see
they never run out,
we're always needing.

I want to live hope and love in this world,
despite my terminal condition,
my weakness and waywardness,
my incessant betrayal,
there must be some good to flow from this cracked jar.

And I want to walk with you,
none of us are alone here,
this pain belongs to us all.

I will fail from time to time,
in my self-centerdness forget you are mine.

But there will be times when we will touch on eternity.
We will calm the blame with soft whispers of each others names.
We will laugh and clown until our tears have run out.
We will know we belong, pretend that were strong.

In this sense I do live for you, and you for me,
imagine without that what a hell this would be.

And when I die, who knows what will be next?
But I will leave behind some beautiful things.

And if you go before me,
I'll carry you home,
then bury your bones,
then bury your memories inside me
and let them fade with me.

When it rains outside,
and their choirs grow,
while the crickets sing high,
the frogs sing low.

But where do they go when they're tucked in there beds?
And what are the voices they hear in their heads?
How loud are the screams that shatter the dreams?
And the sighs and the moans of the life in between?

And who gives them warts on their necks and and their hands?
Whose legs do they eat?
Whose fate do they meet?
And which prince will they kiss just to make him their own?
And where do they go when their frogging is done?

If I were you my little friends,
I'd make this vow to make amends,
with the green blood splattered on the cold road side,
and the twitching arms trying to stay alive...

Because from the dark there are eyes that peer,
and amphibious ears that are longing to hear,
of a hardened tongue and a wicked stare,
and the crooked hands that will lay a snare,
for the one who owns that-
sorrowless,
merciless,
cruel,
in-compassionate glare:
will find his end on a gondola,
while the night creatures doom him
to Frogola.

Crazy Jane is cold outside,
she dances in the winter pain,
she feels the heat of the cold dark sky,
and the stars that never ask her why.

The chill's a thrill
to her wandering mind,
its what she finds,
it makes her blind.

And nobody will understand,
nobody will take her hand,
and fly with her to an insane land.

Where dreamers rule,
and the seas are cruel,
and the mirrors hide the face of you.

Where we all dress down,
and the kings a clown,
and there are fines
if you ever wear a frown.

She is a mad dame,
and thats her fame,
but at least I know her name.

Don't waste time on the worthless, the toothless, the "strong"
who plague you with their platitudes, their compliments and songs.
They have no fight or bite and they will drop you like a rag.
Don't entertain the pleasantries of cowardly little nags.

They will never get your madness when your soul is burning low
in the pit of love with Jesus tears as you take it blow for blow.
Never show your darkness burn within as your heart pours on the floor,
they are lazy to go search beyond because "they have seen it all before".

**** the actors and the liars who are always so aloof,
there is always someone better and they're always needing proof.
They will come and steal your thunder and then will leave you laying bare,
and then move on to a "better" soul without a second care.

The clock's too short for cold perfume that curdles in it's pain
and seeps through your fingers like acid rain while you're whispering her name.
Just another of the many that passed by you all those times,
You got too deep and in-lust to see those very warning signs.

When push comes to shove
were shoved off a cliff
onto rocks of deceit
and foundations that shift.

The face in the mirror
changes all day-
imprisoned by mortality,
bound by decay.

The smiles we laugh with
are losing their teeth.
The love that we find
is destined for grief.

There are moments of clarity,
moments of hope,
that slip through our fingers
despite how we *****.

Tearing up the road,
I used to have eternity
but now death lurks over me like a hungry animal-
that's why I'm tearing up the road.

There's so much left to see,
there is so much left to be,
I used to be an identity
but now I fulfill the role of my top 100 hollywood dreams.

It used to be siesta on a stream,
floating on cream,
but now it's terminal velocity and the ground is rushing towards me and no matter how hard i flap my wings it seems i still cant use them to fly me out of this beautiful hell hole.

The queen escaped the city walls
to let the bear come in to play
she was sitting by a river called Deliver just yesterday,
waiting for somebody to come wash all her blues away.

But then his sky came crashing down,
the lies he built just couldn't stay.
He was sitting by a river called Deliver just yesterday,
waiting for somebody to come wash all his blues away.

The queen said I am just a girl
trying to figure out this world.
Dont go sitting by a river called Deliver- it wont make me stay.
You dont even know me, dont throw it all away.

Its dark- but wait until the break of day,
In time we will see the way.
theres a river called Deliver- it will show the way.
When you hear the music, it is when we'll stay.

The bear escaped the city walls,
to let the queen come in to play.

Let it slide,
let it glide,
open wide
and let it hide,
let it fade
into the haze,
let it be,
let it be.
let it go
on it's own-
never seek,
never know.
never feel,
never see
what it's like
to befriend me.

In visions,
a coy smile and akward way,
sweet and ****,
on my side.

All my affections have been misplaced,
it has always been her.

Ive seen her shadows in other eyes and felt her tremors in others i touched,
but somehow i missed it and thought they were her.

Im sickened by her only being in my head.

When push comes to shove
were shoved off a cliff
onto rocks of deceit
and foundations that shift.

The face in the mirror
changes all day.
imprisoned by mortality,
bound by decay.

The smiles we laugh with
are losing their teeth.
The love that we find
is destined for grief.

There are moments of clarity,
moments of hope,
that slip through our fingers
despite how we *****.

The beautiful views,
the ***,
the songs,
always living for the rush.

Connecting strong,
feeling deep,
traversing this old life ball.

Flying fast,
always between the sun and the moon,
never lost.

And the moon lights my back,
the sun shines on my face,
Bringing luck where ever I go.

I follow it like a shiny coin,
carrying the moon behind me like a balloon on a string,
my manic high.

Silent night, traffic lights.
All is calm in the rain.
The Cape wind glides over black river roads.
The watered trees whisper under clouds that bellow.
While it sleeps in heavenly pieces,
while it sleeps in heavenly peace.

This withered night,
the warmth takes flight.
The chill creeps into the sleeping thing.
Glazed eyes fading while lonely lights grow,
the roar of the engine on the tarmac below,
while it sleeps in heavenly pieces,
while it sleeps in heavenly peace.

Wherever I run,
I'm always looking for the sun
to warm this body frozen by the cold.
I hear them say:
The lights not far away,
around the bend and over the next hill.

Someday we'll run
in open fields
with wild flowers blossoming everywhere,
and we will know,
summers here,
were at home and all our weariness will be gone again.
I'll take your hand
and we will dance
and we will never be alone again.

But winters still here,
and the sky is seldom clear
but at least I know that
I am still alive.
So ill just
look for the sun
until the morning comes
and makes this lonely darkness disappear.

Someday my love,
we'll find love,
and I will sing a song to you sweetly.
I'll hold you close
and stroke your hair
and whisper in your ear so tenderly:
"Its okay,
death has gone"
and we will never be afraid again.

Someday
we'll fly
to the stars
and watch the splendor of a billion galaxies-
spinning round
at our command
and there will be nothing that we don't understand.
Even the night
will be light
and we will never look back again.

but until it comes
I'm still longing for the day
when will never be ashamed again.