"camels" poems
Blameless as daylight I stood looking
At a field of horses, necks bent, manes blown,
Tails streaming against the green
Backdrop of sycamores. Sun was striking
White chapel pinnacles over the roofs,
Holding the horses, the clouds, the leaves
Steadily rooted though they were all flowing
Away to the left like reeds in a sea
When the splinter flew in and stuck my eye,
Needling it dark. Then I was seeing
A melding of shapes in a hot rain:
Horses warped on the altering green,
Outlandish as double-humped camels or unicorns,
Grazing at the margins of a bad monochrome,
Beasts of oasis, a better time.
Abrading my lid, the small grain burns:
Red cinder around which I myself,
Horses, planets and spires revolve.
Neither tears nor the easing flush
Of eyebaths can unseat the speck:
It sticks, and it has stuck a week.
I wear the present itch for flesh,
Blind to what will be and what was.
I dream that I am Oedipus.
What I want back is what I was
Before the bed, before the knife,
Before the brooch-pin and the salve
Fixed me in this parenthesis;
Horses fluent in the wind,
A place, a time gone out of mind.
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Consider Icarus, pasting those sticky wings on,
testing that strange little tug at his shoulder blade,
and think of that first flawless moment over the lawn
of the labyrinth. Think of the difference it made!
There below are the trees, as awkward as camels;
and here are the shocked starlings pumping past
and think of innocent Icarus who is doing quite well.
Larger than a sail, over the fog and the blast
of the plushy ocean, he goes. Admire his wings!
Feel the fire at his neck and see how casually
he glances up and is caught, wondrously tunneling
into that hot eye. Who cares that he fell back to the sea?
See him acclaiming the sun and come plunging down
while his sensible daddy goes straight into town.
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"While I sit at the door
Sick to gaze within
Mine eye weepeth sore
For sorrow and sin:
As a tree my sin stands
To darken all lands;
Death is the fruit it bore.
"How have Eden bowers grown
Without Adam to bend them!
How have Eden flowers blown
Squandering their sweet breath
Without me to tend them!
The Tree of Life was ours,
Tree twelvefold-fruited,
Most lofty tree that flowers,
Most deeply rooted:
I chose the tree of death.
"Hadst thou but said me nay,
Adam, my brother,
I might have pined away;
I, but none other:
God might have let thee stay
Safe in our garden,
By putting me away
Beyond all pardon.
"I, Eve, sad mother
Of all who must live,
I, not another,
Plucked bitterest fruit to give
My friend, husband, lover;--
O wanton eyes, run over;
Who but I should grieve?--
Cain hath slain his brother:
Of all who must die mother,
Miserable Eve!"
Thus she sat weeping,
Thus Eve our mother,
Where one lay sleeping
Slain by his brother.
Greatest and least
Each piteous beast
To hear her voice
Forgot his joys
And set aside his feast.
The mouse paused in his walk
And dropped his wheaten stalk;
Grave cattle wagged their heads
In rumination;
The eagle gave a cry
From his cloud station;
Larks on thyme beds
Forbore to mount or sing;
Bees drooped upon the wing;
The raven perched on high
Forgot his ration;
The conies in their rock,
A feeble nation,
Quaked sympathetical;
The mocking-bird left off to mock;
Huge camels knelt as if
In deprecation;
The kind hart's tears were falling;
Chattered the wistful stork;
Dove-voices with a dying fall
Cooed desolation
Answering grief by grief.
Only the serpent in the dust
Wriggling and crawling,
Grinned an evil grin and ******
His tongue out with its fork.
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Her hair was long
Down to that place where *** just barely meets back
The place his fingers linger
Every time she says goodbye
The place where two tiny dimples make up for the fact she never smiles
Long like the days he spends
Wondering if she's happy at home
wondering if she's just as good at pretending to be in love
As she is at pretending not to be
Like the time he spends waiting for a sign from her... or of her
Long like her absence in his bed
He hears her laughter in his head
He'd settle for hearing her name
Her hair was thick
Like the way his tongue feels after a midnight pack of camels
She says she doesn't smoke anymore
But she does
Because she says a naked man can't smoke alone
It looks funny
Thick like her thighs
And silky smooth when they graze his stomach
Like his great grandmother's accent
He doesn't understand her but finds comfort in the texture of the syllables
Her hair was strong
Like her conviction
Her determination to stay at home where she belongs
Though she longs to be with him
Strong like the coffee she brews
Because she's too rebellious to measure anything
Coffee grounds or consequences
Like his addiction
His compulsion to reign her in
To keep her in his bed
In his heart
In his head
Her hair is dark
Like her eyes
Black pools that reflect her black heart, rotten soul
Dark like the way she makes love with the lights off
Because then she can make him into anybody
Whoever it is that she wants that day
Dark like that space between waking and dreams
Where everything is mixed up and nothing like it seems
Where he reaches out to touch her and finds only hair
A few strands on his pillowcase to remind him she was there
He finds them everywhere
Last night he found one wrapped around his big toe
He freed himself but found it hard to let it go
She says she hates to wear a ponytail
Like she doesn't want her hair to look like a horse's rear end
And he's just a ******* for letting her go again
Sep 23, 2014
Sep 23, 2014 at 2:08 PM UTC
Daddy liked his whiskey
Momma liked her smokes
Momma cursed like crazy
Dad told ***** jokes
To all the people 'round here
They was ordinary folks
Momma puffed on camels
Dad drank whiskey cokes
I dropped out of high school
By the time I was fourteen
I had no direction
And I got mighty mean
Sis, she had two babies
But neither one was seen
And to all the people 'round here
We were just both normal teens
The apple doesn't fall far from the tree
You do not want to grow and be like me
Listen to what I tell you, don't you do the things you see
The apple doesn't fall far from the tree
Nope, the apple doesn't fall far from the tree
When ever there is fighting
Folks 'round here go blind
They all have got their secrets
they don't want us to find
That apples in around their house
Are not quite as designed
It's best to look at others
For the truth, it isn't kind
Momma kept on smoking
Daddy drank his rye
sis and I both left here
No one ever asked them why
Nothing changes ever
so nobody will try
and all the folks around here
live inside this little lie
The apple doesn't fall far from the tree
You do not want to grow and be like me
Listen to what I tell you, don't you do the things you see
The apple doesn't fall far from the tree
Nope, the apple doesn't fall far from the tree
Jan 22, 2015
Jan 22, 2015 at 11:19 AM UTC
He filled his week bag
with quick picks from the commissary
cover blades and skull cap
canned goods and half stated pearl
liquor bills and bleeders
for the flight of weary
Into the ****** bunks
of the western front
past sivana and nurture sage
past the pomp and ceremony
out of robes and into jumpers
and casings
and masks of gas
Light infantry and yelling men
muscled and scorned
fly boys high in 3 wing flight
mounted gunners filling the night
in hawkers and packards
and scabbard chape
Tarrant tabers and camels
dodge the vicker gun
skeleton hands grease the mill trap
carnage makers mark the rhineland
(buried in bunkers and pile bags and earth pack)
Trench helmets and metal back
under machine fire
minefields burn in muzzle and coil
deep in the shadows
and shrapnel and spear
the razor wire
and dead cold despair
Slouch hats and burning rats
kerosene lamps and droopers
the soldier stares down
the broken lines and limbs
a ****** holds steady
(shelved at a distance)
on ripped and rolled pipe and beam
It was an all in end game
a grapple for the ages;
*** in the fokker pursuit
over rolling hills and fallen comrades
into the bishop bullet
(and sporadic cheer)
which sealed the deal
in an empty field
off the brae corbie road
Jan 8, 2017
Jan 8, 2017 at 6:50 PM UTC
They hate the shadow of the bird
over the high water of the white cheek
and the conflict of light and wind
in the salon of the cold snow.
They hate the bodiless arrow,
the precise handkerchief's farewell,
the needle that keeps the pressure and the rose
in the cereal blush of the smile.
They love the blue desert,
the swaying bovine expressions,
the lying moon of the poles,
the water's curved dance at the shore.
With the science of tree trunk and street market
they fill the clay with luminous nerves
and lewdly skate on waters and sands
tasting the bitter freshness of their millennial spit.
It's through the crackling blue,
blue without worm or a sleeping footprint,
where the ostrich eggs remain eternal
and the dancing rains wander untouched.
It's through the blue without history,
blue of a night without fear of day,
blue where the **** of the wind goes splitting
the sleepwalking camels of the empty clouds.
It's there where the torsos dream under the gluttony of grass.
There the corals soak the ink's despair,
the sleepers erase their profiles under the skein of snails
and the space of the dance remains over the final ashes.
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[From Fragments, The Following...]
... so it was that the Urth bled less. The Birch Moot was becalmed by the Anvil Cloud of Impending Deluge.
The Young Gods made sport of Their Names, and aimed to Oblique the colony of clever flesh
groping at the tender roots of an insipid devastation. The First Ones had vanished.
But Time was born and the Mortal Whirl released the Hounds of Change. Transition fused -
with the Eternal; and the offspring of unloved Spirits, roamed the Tangible. All Suffering was amplified
in the diamond lungs of a divine corpse, dreaming.
... for when the iron heart of The Cast Out was retrieved, the Legion of Heaven poured unseemly Grace upon the Fathoms
and the High King of Doubt, forced his blade ' Nimue '
into the soft palette, of the First Mouth. The Stars were born and The Void overheard the First Naming.
A solid drizzle of enchantment cloaked the oaken Yggdrasil
and The Pattern unleashed the folly of Pattern
to mask the virtue of succinct Chaos. The Children of The Lower Sky ate their Masters and thereby swollen -
gathered in the underbrush of the Fecund.
They came to Know Regret by Answering Prayers. The Kingdoms of Wane were waning in the fearsome riot of Creation
and not a boy, a man from no woman
and no woman
a man.
... the siege lights of the petty stars, babbled in the wake of yawning eruption and nullification. the ****** theater of blood
was made Holy by way of forcing camels into eyes of needles in constant dystopian joy.
... and that's how the rain gets in.
[ From the ' Kingdoms Of Wane ', a Lost Tome from Antiquity and Dada ]
What ?
Jan 27, 2013
Jan 27, 2013 at 7:07 PM UTC
I'm Bailey.
I sometimes forget to recycle.
I'm from singing camels and trigonometry.
From soap bubbles and yellow scarves, Irish hymns and Zucchini the ferret,
piano keys, bluebonnet seeds, and DO NOT ENTER signs.
From salt.
I'm the color of hosed off sidewalk chalk.
I'm all summer in a day.
I'm a conglomeration of artistic thoughts that make me look more profound than I actually am.
I'm your infinite playlist.
I'm from elephant necklaces and rosemary bushes
from high-heeled taps and Camelot
threadless socks, shopping carts, and impromptu salons.
I'm the fifth ninja turtle.
I live where you laugh so hard you cry.
I'm from carrots and ranch.
I'm a happy cow from California, a fortune cookie with your enchilada, a drill team skirt over marching uniforms.
I'm from unfinished crossword puzzles and forgotten dead languages
from pixie dust and snapcracklepop
from actually-it's-pronounced's, because-i-said-so's, and that's-not-my-name's.
I am Nancy Drew with a Peter Pan complex.
I come from honeysuckle candles and sunroofs of pickup trucks
broken-down fences and peach salsa
the second you step onstage.
I'm from in between.
I'm Bailey.
I don't drive the speed limit.
And I'm from you.
Dec 22, 2009
Dec 22, 2009 at 6:08 PM UTC
If there is a God,
my God
is a **** brunette.
Doe eyes,
stunning violet,
dark with eyeliner.
Star tattoos
twinkle on her face,
shooting across the skies
of her cheeks. A lower
lip piercing
accentuates
the **** curve
of her pouty lips.
Her lithe body,
also inked,
golden from the sun.
She smokes Camels,
sunlit smoke glowing
as it pours from her lips.
She’d ask me to join her
every time
she went outside
to have one,
grinning when she exhales.
I believe already.
My God.
Feb 27, 2015
Feb 27, 2015 at 2:33 PM UTC
December, 1870
After the beef was gone,
after the pork and the lamb,
and the fowl and the fish
and the dogs, and the cats,
and the rats in the gutter,
the butchers turned to the zoo.
We ate the wolves.
We ate the wolves
broiled in sauce of deer,
the antelope truffled and terrined.
We ate the camels
with breadcrumbs and butter,
and when they were all gone,
we sharpened our knives
and primed our guns
and came back for the elephants.
The gunsmith Devisme did the deed,
hurled an explosive ball
through each of their docile heads.
They fell like mountains,
like the pillars of Dagon
pulled down by mighty Samson,
and then we hacked them up
and carted them away to the kitchens,
to feed the wealthy and the rich
in the clubs of bright Paris.
Dec 29, 2011
Dec 29, 2011 at 4:51 PM UTC
camel
C-A-M-E-L
...
... (?)
...
Why?
I don't know, cause they're cool ! . ?
his favorite animal is a camel
and he doesn't know why
but i do
i think, as a kid, he read about it
in an encyclopedia
And decided, "that's how I want to live my life"
the humps on camel's backs that can store water
and they can go days, weeks, months,
I even heard years
without replenishing
crossing dry, barren deserts
carrying cargo, people
i didn't know camels wore graphic t-shirts,
crocs and cargo shorts
but he is a camel
tall and lanky
takes in tons and never gains a pound
(i hate camels)
a camel exists in the Arabian world
is in love with a Middle-Eastern girl
and they even have a miracle of that descent
He IS A Camel!
but the humps on his back
are hope and inspiration
and with just a little in the tank
he will cross a world of deserts
and bring you back a treasure chest full of dreams
but he enjoys simplicity ...
Sometimes,
then sometimes not at all
he takes things way overboard
and carries far to much cargo
but he crosses the desert anyway
i didn't know camels were such good teachers
didn't know they made such good friends
Jul 2, 2012
Jul 2, 2012 at 4:30 PM UTC
A cold coming we had of it,
Just the worst time of the year
For a journey, and such a long journey:
The ways deep and the weather sharp,
The very dead of winter.
And the camels galled, sorefooted, refractory,
Lying down in the melting snow.
There were times we regretted
The summer palaces on slopes, the terraces,
And the silken girls bringing sherbet.
Then the camel men cursing and grumbling
and running away, and wanting their liquor and women,
And the night-fires going out, and the lack of shelters,
And the cities hostile and the towns unfriendly
And the villages ***** and charging high prices:
A hard time we had of it.
At the end we preferred to travel all night,
Sleeping in snatches,
With the voices singing in our ears, saying
That this was all folly.
Then at dawn we came down to a temperate valley,
Wet, below the snow line, smelling of vegetation;
With a running stream and a water-mill beating the darkness,
And three trees on the low sky,
And an old white horse galloped away in the meadow.
Then we came to a tavern with vine-leaves over the lintel,
Six hands at an open door dicing for pieces of silver,
And feet kicking the empty wine-skins.
But there was no information, and so we continued
And arriving at evening, not a moment too soon
Finding the place; it was (you might say) satisfactory.
All this was a long time ago, I remember,
And I would do it again, but set down
This set down
This: were we led all that way for
Birth or Death? There was a Birth, certainly
We had evidence and no doubt. I had seen birth and death,
But had thought they were different; this Birth was
Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death.
We returned to our places, these Kingdoms,
But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation,
With an alien people clutching their gods.
I should be glad of another death.
Jun 13, 2016
Jun 13, 2016 at 11:31 AM UTC
"In a row???" I ask, incredulous.
"Nah, man."
"Were you at least #37?"
"Well, yeah. But still that gets to me," he says. He starts counting change, playing with pennies on the glass counter.
"If you didn't see it, it didn't happen," I reply. I pull out a $5.00 bill.
"That's childish!" He looks at me like I'm a babbling idiot.
"That's my life!" It was my life.
"I can't believe you sometimes," he says. Nobody can, bud.
"You better start. I'm smarter than I look." I'm bluffing now; I'm a ******* idiot.
"Yeah, yeah. Do you wanna buy anything or not?" he goes back to his pennies on the glass counter.
"Yeah--Marlboro Reds," I reply hesitantly. For a moment I thought about Camels.
"$5.00 even." It's always $5.00 even when you're with friends.
"Alright."
"Shorts or 100s?"
**** man, shorts!" It's my turn to look at him like he's a total stranger.
"Just asking." He puts the bill in the register.
"Shorts say badass. 100s say suicide mission."
"I suppose you're right."
"It makes perfect sense!"
"Either way you're going to die."
"Yeah? So are you, buddy."
**** you."
I exit the convenience store, pack my Marlboro Reds, turn two up (one for luck, one for **** to be smoked lastly out of the pack) and light one.
Jun 14, 2014
Jun 14, 2014 at 10:03 PM UTC
Meal is still lame like an injured camel. For lame are the camels name Amel and Elma and Emal and Lema.
For all these are blind to their danger, their gamble
But truly I tell but one camel is lame
Now I beg ye fair maiden please tell me it's name?
Aug 1, 2014
Aug 1, 2014 at 1:48 AM UTC
Down from Aleppo to the sea we rode
Down from Aleppo to the sea
On swaying, snow white camels we rode
Down from Aleppo to the sea
We sailed on a thin jade ship with hope
On a green jade ship with hope
Drifting upon endless seas
In a thin jade ship with hope
To the empty seas for love, we cried
To the empty sea for love
We saw Her walking the curling waves
To the empty seas for love
Visions came through that foggy night
Fantastic, never again seen
Spider lights sliding between the masts
That foggy night never again seen
The cook saw floating jewels, he said
Purple crystals in the sea
Uncovering the inner truths of foam
Purple crystals in the sea
The mate felt an eternal wind
He felt an eternal wind
Breath from the unknown sea it was
Rustling eternal winds
The stars chanted sutras of icy warmth
The stars chanted sutras of ice
Sailing below a schizoid sea
Chanting warm sutras of ice
Before tomorrow we left the glad sea
Before tomorrow we left
Blazing vacuities of nightshade explode
Before the light gathered we left
Down to Aleppo from the sea we rode
Down to Aleppo from the sea
On swaying silk white camels we rode
Down to Aleppo from the sea
Nov 2, 2011
Nov 2, 2011 at 12:12 AM UTC
Imagine if the nativity
Took place now instead of then
With technological advancement
It'd be on the news at ten
In fact it would make youtube
A film clip at the stable
Taken by a shepherd boy
Underneath a table
The three wisemen would go on Skype
The gifts would be en route
No need to travel all the way
With the traffic in Beirut
Phone banks would be all set up
To raise funds for the birth
The internet would be a buzz
With the greatest news on earth
No camels, inns or drummer boys
There'd be no one there at all
The Angel of The Lord would be
Black Friday shopping at the mall
In fact I do not think that it
Would be a deal that we would follow
Social media and the press
Would make it all seem hollow
I'm glad it happened when it did
As time has come to pass
With Jesus in a manger
And wisemen there en masse
I don't think it'd be Christmas
If Christ was born today
Without a cd or a movie deal
Or a sport that he would play
Christmas is...and always will
Be the story we were told
I'm glad it didn't happen now
If I may be quite so bold
Unto man a child was born
And he, the son of God....
Dec 3, 2013
Dec 3, 2013 at 11:51 PM UTC
Camel faces
Darkness is in every corners of desert animals
witnessing the faces of donkeys and camels
The owner opens the gate for them to rest
but the unkind wind breaks down from the east
Caravan of camel is not decorated in colours
walking towards the desert without any flowers
Everywhere I see women wearing their veils,
without seeing their lips and simple smiles,
their white-pink garment is handmade,
Inside, suffers an unseen house maid
She is bold and gentle, but dark by birth ,
Same like God’s own created Earth.
Looking at the distant burning flame
Thirst for soft touch rises to blame
Not grasped by inner heart desires,
Dried ,withered dreams Disappears
By Williamsji Maveli
Email:[email protected]
Oct 21, 2012
Oct 21, 2012 at 7:53 AM UTC
setting myself down on an anvil pillow. sleep is an anvil pillow. anvil and stone are a suicide dressed in 8 hours of mini-Godheads.. you become a repeat offender in the ever expanding realm of emerging fractal patterns sewn upon the quilt you lay across your sleepy bones like rushing water in an underground cave miles below the Yucatan Peninsula..
by electronic firelight they lay on my leather couch with the scraps of bedding I could afford to share, as if for some reason I can't escape the money analogy and see this, too, as a transaction.. buying.. a transaction.. as transfat is to nutrition.. money is tao.. my hate for money is tao.. I'm a love-and-lost buddhist like every other dreamer before me.
I'm tired of giving myself a *******
All I ever give myself is a *******
I refuse to bend over and at least try to give me a ******* or go to the next level in love and **** myself.
I keep telling me to do it. Keep grabbing my own *** during passionate tongue-twisters but I keep on insisting that I just CAN'T go any further.. rationally I may be right, but irrationally I still get shrieks of jealousy because I see that ******* sneaking out to kiss girls all the ******* time* as if I didn't exist. As if I wasn't always watching.
I stalk myself. It's a terrifying state of affairs. No matter where I go, there I am.
Watching.
One night, I invited me over, and as usual, I gave myself a ******* yet refused to go any further.
This was the straw that cracked the camels back.. and come 4 AM I kissed myself softly on the forehead as I slept and slipped into the night, hailing the first taxi to sail past me on the concrete river.
I awoke slowly the next morning and.. still dazed.. noticed I was nowhere to be found.
A great grief flooded my solar plexus and moved into my hopeless bones.
I had not even left a note. What a ******* I am!
I had not even left a note.
The rest of the day was spent in sordid grievance. I shivered, lonely, under my ever expanding realm of emerging fractal patterns sewn upon the quilt I lay across my sleepy bones like rushing water in an underground cave miles below the Yucatan Peninsula..
Jan 15, 2014
Jan 15, 2014 at 8:37 PM UTC
there was once a little camel he had great big ****
and it used to wobble went he hit a bump
the camel got a pump and laid across the floor
pumped till it was hard now it dosent wobble anymore
Feb 18, 2010
Feb 18, 2010 at 3:57 AM UTC
Captured
Kidnapped or
Paid
For children
Camel races are held
Using this kids as Jockeys
Ages below Ten
Since they weight light
They are given a shed or a tent
In the desert
Offers just biscuits
Because they won't gain weight
What actually they want for racing
Which will speedup the camel
No bed no pillow
Sleeping on the sand
No positive dreams
They even can't cry
If they do they will be beaten
On the other side
Camels are having
Swimming pools
A pediatrician
Good food
Nice place with
Good comforts
Why this difference?
What they say is
Kid cost 500 dollars
But camel costs Million dollars
Who can stop it
It is illegal to have a kid as jockey
But who cares the ****** rule
Jul 3, 2014
Jul 3, 2014 at 7:08 AM UTC
I sit and watch a camel train go by and as it limps across the pale blue sky,shrouded in the clouds,I wonder if I could get upon a camels back and track along,could I learn the camel drover’s song?
A ditty,not so pretty,more a humpalong than any song I’ve ever heard with words that I can’t understand,though familiar in the camels land up in the sky,
Where I watch them going by.
Hip ,hop, clop, clump being a camel gives me the hump,how I wish to be a fish deep in the sea,like a whale.
I like a scale,a doh, ray, me,as far as I can see I’ll be a camel all my days and wander through a desert haze but my gaze is fixed as I roam free, on a cool and clear deep ocean sea.
Once,
I was a little thing until I grew and learnt to sing and now I don’t know anything,except
I want to be free,a fish in the sea,won’t some kind body please untie me,slip the noose and then un-sky me,set me on the coastal road,with my hump,without my load and let me smell the ocean breeze and slip into those lovely seas.
I want to be free and this you can see,before the clouds all break apart and with them goes my breaking heart and you could at least pretend to start to set me free.
Sep 16, 2013
Sep 16, 2013 at 6:11 AM UTC
my brother Ami,
from the land of
Pineapples and lemons
wanted to write to you
in late hours,
to wish you good
travel tomorrow
to the desert land with camels,
Please, be safe on the road,
may Allah protect you
in the weather hot!
in endless sand dunes
the time is so slow,
even letters from your
lovely sister are
out of the law.
Take care with the guns
and weapons
and how you wash
your blue jeans...
I pray Allah to help you
in that distant place
i'll miss you as always
drawing your portrait
with black ink.
i'll think of you and write,
and dream to be by your side.
My brother
mon frère,
mio fratello,
saudaraku,
kardesim,
akhi, bhai,
you know
I love you,
waiting you
back
after may!
....nour....
may-013
Jun 5, 2013
Jun 5, 2013 at 6:38 AM UTC