First Minutes
The discovery sinks in as we spring into action
Adrenaline kicks in, heart pounding, blood rushing.
My mind confusedly putting pieces together.
First Few Hours
Calls are made to paramedics and cops and investigators swarm our house.
Our car goes faster than what is safe as we follow the ambulance as it carried what we would later learn was only her body and a few dedicated paramedics.
A time of death is announced and more tearful calls are made, this time to family and later to friends.
We leave hours later surrounded by a mournful silence.
First Day
We sat on the on the couch in a shocked silence, which was only broken by my calls to her friends, the ringing of the house phone and doorbell.
First Week
The silence was deafening and I had to escape.
So I returned to school after making arrangements with my family for the cremation and shedding my own tears for the first time. I caught the last two classes of the day and began burying myself in my classwork after telling those who needed to know.
First Month
Our own questions were behind every turn as we handled finances, possessions, settling things and celebrating her short life.  
I began to tell more and more of my friends.
Second Month
The pain was still fresh and stinging,
My mother returned to work for the first time.
Third Month
I held back my tears in English.
The play we read reminding me of her and running lines with her the previous year.
Fourth Month
I let it get to me while locked in my room, wishing it was my boyfriend's arms around me instead of my paint-stained jacket as I painted the canvas as black as I was feeling.
Recording my tears for him and watching how he hid his own watery eyes the next day in class as I honored our promise.
Her birthday passed and my mother planted flowers.
Fifth Month
After an uneventful spring break, my dad began staying home from work, unable to handle the weight of his thoughts.
Sixth Month
School ended and summer began and for the first time in what was now fourteen years, I didn't have a sister. I was alone.
Seventh Month
Slowly but surely the pain faded, with the help of scattered therapists, counselors, and mountains of support from family and friends. Summer traditions continued but were never the same.
Eighth Month
The weight of her absence doesn’t rest on my shoulders as heavy anymore.
Ink stains me with her memory. The pain I felt, saw and personified over many pages as we still face it.
My father has returned to work as we each learn to deal with the missing piece of our family in our own ways.
Ninth Month
School begins.
It's my junior year and school is starting for the first time since 3rd grade without my sister. My mother would always take a "first-day" picture, the tradition faded when we attended different schools. Maybe it wasn't so annoying after all.
Tenth Month
It's October, my, our, favorite month. Lost memories run through my head along with missed opportunities. Did we even carve pumpkins last year? Last year we argued about passing out candy but both ended up falling asleep. When was the last time we went to the County Fair? The Mullet Festival? Missed opportunities for silly reasons.
Eleventh Month
The Holiday season is kicking off. Soon it will be Thanksgiving. Her absence is noticeable as I stand amongst my family and celebrate. The only ones who don't ignore it are the little ones, repeatedly asking where she is as the grownups look uncomfortable. I don't know what to tell them.
Twelveth Month
The Holidays are in full swing and I can't help but think of the last one we all spent together. She passed before Christmas. They aren't the same anymore.

One Year
Its hard to believe that a year has passed without her. Her room is the same as if shes just at school. We spent the anniversary doing things she enjoyed, like taking the family dog to the beach and sharing cotton candy.
We haven't moved on, not in the slightest. My mother still cries, I don't think she'll ever stop. But as the days pass I can see how it gets easier and easier for my family to be happy again.

Of that sort of Dramatic Poem which is call’d Tragedy.


Tragedy, as it was antiently compos’d, hath been ever held the
gravest, moralest, and most profitable of all other Poems:
therefore said by Aristotle to be of power by raising pity and fear,
or terror, to purge the mind of those and such like passions, that is
to temper and reduce them to just measure with a kind of delight,
stirr’d up by reading or seeing those passions well imitated. Nor is
Nature wanting in her own effects to make good his assertion: for
so in Physic things of melancholic hue and quality are us’d against
melancholy, sowr against sowr, salt to remove salt humours.
Hence Philosophers and other gravest Writers, as Cicero, Plutarch
and others, frequently cite out of Tragic Poets, both to adorn and
illustrate thir discourse.  The Apostle Paul himself thought it not
unworthy to insert a verse of Euripides into the Text of Holy
Scripture, I Cor. 15. 33. and Paraeus commenting on the
Revelation, divides the whole Book as a Tragedy, into Acts
distinguisht each by a Chorus of Heavenly Harpings and Song
between.  Heretofore Men in highest dignity have labour’d not a
little to be thought able to compose a Tragedy.  Of that honour
Dionysius the elder was no less ambitious, then before of his
attaining to the Tyranny. Augustus Caesar also had begun his
Ajax, but unable to please his own judgment with what he had
begun. left it unfinisht.  Seneca the Philosopher is by some thought
the Author of those Tragedies (at lest the best of them) that go
under that name.  Gregory Nazianzen a Father of the Church,
thought it not unbeseeming the sanctity of his person to write a
Tragedy which he entitl’d, Christ suffering. This is mention’d to
vindicate Tragedy from the small esteem, or rather infamy, which
in the account of many it undergoes at this day with other common
Interludes; hap’ning through the Poets error of intermixing Comic
stuff with Tragic sadness and gravity; or introducing trivial and
****** persons, which by all judicious hath bin counted absurd; and
brought in without discretion, corruptly to gratifie the people. And
though antient Tragedy use no Prologue, yet using sometimes, in
case of self defence, or explanation, that which Martial calls an
Epistle; in behalf of this Tragedy coming forth after the antient
manner, much different from what among us passes for best, thus
much before-hand may be Epistl’d; that Chorus is here introduc’d
after the Greek manner, not antient only but modern, and still in
use among the Italians. In the modelling therefore of this Poem
with good reason, the Antients and Italians are rather follow’d, as
of much more authority and fame. The measure of Verse us’d in
the Chorus is of all sorts, call’d by the Greeks Monostrophic, or
rather Apolelymenon, without regard had to Strophe, Antistrophe
or Epod, which were a kind of Stanza’s fram’d only for the Music,
then us’d with the Chorus that sung; not essential to the Poem, and
therefore not material; or being divided into Stanza’s or Pauses
they may be call’d Allaeostropha.  Division into Act and Scene
referring chiefly to the Stage (to which this work never was
intended) is here omitted.

It suffices if the whole Drama be found not produc’t beyond the
fift Act, of the style and uniformitie, and that commonly call’d the
Plot, whether intricate or explicit, which is nothing indeed but such
oeconomy, or disposition of the fable as may stand best with
verisimilitude and decorum; they only will best judge who are not
unacquainted with Aeschulus, Sophocles, and Euripides, the three
Tragic Poets unequall’d yet by any, and the best rule to all who
endeavour to write Tragedy. The circumscription of time wherein
the whole Drama begins and ends, is according to antient rule, and
best example, within the space of 24 hours.



The ARGUMENT.


Samson made Captive, Blind, and now in the Prison at Gaza, there
to labour as in a common work-house, on a Festival day, in the
general cessation from labour, comes forth into the open Air, to a
place nigh, somewhat retir’d there to sit a while and bemoan his
condition. Where he happens at length to be visited by certain
friends and equals of his tribe, which make the Chorus, who seek
to comfort him what they can ; then by his old Father Manoa, who
endeavours the like, and withal tells him his purpose to procure his
liberty by ransom; lastly, that this Feast was proclaim’d by the
Philistins as a day of Thanksgiving for thir deliverance from the
hands of Samson, which yet more troubles him.  Manoa then
departs to prosecute his endeavour with the Philistian Lords for
Samson’s redemption; who in the mean while is visited by other
persons; and lastly by a publick Officer to require coming to the
Feast before the Lords and People, to play or shew his strength in
thir presence; he at first refuses, dismissing the publick officer with
absolute denyal to come; at length perswaded inwardly that this
was from God, he yields to go along with him, who came now the
second time with great threatnings to fetch him; the Chorus yet
remaining on the place, Manoa returns full of joyful hope, to
procure e’re long his Sons deliverance: in the midst of which
discourse an Ebrew comes in haste confusedly at first; and
afterward more distinctly relating the Catastrophe, what Samson
had done to the Philistins, and by accident to himself; wherewith
the Tragedy ends.


The Persons

Samson.
Manoa the father of Samson.
Dalila his wife.
Harapha of Gath.
Publick Officer.
Messenger.
Chorus of Danites


The Scene before the Prison in Gaza.

Sam:  A little onward lend thy guiding hand
To these dark steps, a little further on;
For yonder bank hath choice of Sun or shade,
There I am wont to sit, when any chance
Relieves me from my task of servile toyl,
Daily in the common Prison else enjoyn’d me,
Where I a Prisoner chain’d, scarce freely draw
The air imprison’d also, close and damp,
Unwholsom draught: but here I feel amends,
The breath of Heav’n fresh-blowing, pure and sweet,
With day-spring born; here leave me to respire.
This day a solemn Feast the people hold
To Dagon thir Sea-Idol, and forbid
Laborious works, unwillingly this rest
Thir Superstition yields me; hence with leave
Retiring from the popular noise, I seek
This unfrequented place to find some ease,
Ease to the body some, none to the mind
From restless thoughts, that like a deadly swarm
Of Hornets arm’d, no sooner found alone,
But rush upon me thronging, and present
Times past, what once I was, and what am now.
O wherefore was my birth from Heaven foretold
Twice by an Angel, who at last in sight
Of both my Parents all in flames ascended
From off the Altar, where an Off’ring burn’d,
As in a fiery column charioting
His Godlike presence, and from some great act
Or benefit reveal’d to Abraham’s race?
Why was my breeding order’d and prescrib’d
As of a person separate to God,
Design’d for great exploits; if I must dye
Betray’d, Captiv’d, and both my Eyes put out,
Made of my Enemies the scorn and gaze;
To grind in Brazen Fetters under task
With this Heav’n-gifted strength? O glorious strength
Put to the labour of a Beast, debas’t
Lower then bondslave! Promise was that I
Should Israel from Philistian yoke deliver;
Ask for this great Deliverer now, and find him
Eyeless in Gaza at the Mill with slaves,
Himself in bonds under Philistian yoke;
Yet stay, let me not rashly call in doubt
Divine Prediction; what if all foretold
Had been fulfilld but through mine own default,
Whom have I to complain of but my self?
Who this high gift of strength committed to me,
In what part lodg’d, how easily bereft me,
Under the Seal of silence could not keep,
But weakly to a woman must reveal it
O’recome with importunity and tears.
O impotence of mind, in body strong!
But what is strength without a double share
Of wisdom, vast, unwieldy, burdensom,
Proudly secure, yet liable to fall
By weakest suttleties, not made to rule,
But to subserve where wisdom bears command.
God, when he gave me strength, to shew withal
How slight the gift was, hung it in my Hair.
But peace, I must not quarrel with the will
Of highest dispensation, which herein
Happ’ly had ends above my reach to know:
Suffices that to me strength is my bane,
And proves the sourse of all my miseries;
So many, and so huge, that each apart
Would ask a life to wail, but chief of all,
O loss of sight, of thee I most complain!
Blind among enemies, O worse then chains,
Dungeon, or beggery, or decrepit age!
Light the prime work of God to me is extinct,
And all her various objects of delight
Annull’d, which might in part my grief have eas’d,
Inferiour to the vilest now become
Of man or worm; the vilest here excel me,
They creep, yet see, I dark in light expos’d
To daily fraud, contempt, abuse and wrong,
Within doors, or without, still as a fool,
In power of others, never in my own;
Scarce half I seem to live, dead more then half.
O dark, dark, dark, amid the blaze of noon,
Irrecoverably dark, total Eclipse
Without all hope of day!
O first created Beam, and thou great Word,
Let there be light, and light was over all;
Why am I thus bereav’d thy prime decree?
The Sun to me is dark
And silent as the Moon,
When she deserts the night
Hid in her vacant interlunar cave.
Since light so necessary is to life,
And almost life itself, if it be true
That light is in the Soul,
She all in every part; why was the sight
To such a tender ball as th’ eye confin’d?
So obvious and so easie to be quench’t,
And not as feeling through all parts diffus’d,
That she might look at will through every pore?
Then had I not been thus exil’d from light;
As in the land of darkness yet in light,
To live a life half dead, a living death,
And buried; but O yet more miserable!
My self, my Sepulcher, a moving Grave,
Buried, yet not exempt
By priviledge of death and burial
From worst of other evils, pains and wrongs,
But made hereby obnoxious more
To all the miseries of life,
Life in captivity
Among inhuman foes.
But who are these? for with joint pace I hear
The tread of many feet stearing this way;
Perhaps my enemies who come to stare
At my affliction, and perhaps to insult,
Thir daily practice to afflict me more.

Chor:  This, this is he; softly a while,
Let us not break in upon him;
O change beyond report, thought, or belief!
See how he lies at random, carelessly diffus’d,
With languish’t head unpropt,
As one past hope, abandon’d
And by himself given over;
In slavish habit, ill-fitted weeds
O’re worn and soild;
Or do my eyes misrepresent?  Can this be hee,
That Heroic, that Renown’d,
Irresistible Samson? whom unarm’d
No strength of man, or fiercest wild beast could withstand;
Who tore the Lion, as the Lion tears the Kid,
Ran on embattelld Armies clad in Iron,
And weaponless himself,
Made Arms ridiculous, useless the forgery
Of brazen shield and spear, the hammer’d Cuirass,
Chalybean temper’d steel, and frock of mail
Adamantean Proof;
But safest he who stood aloof,
When insupportably his foot advanc’t,
In scorn of thir proud arms and warlike tools,
Spurn’d them to death by Troops.  The bold Ascalonite
Fled from his Lion ramp, old Warriors turn’d
Thir plated backs under his heel;
Or grovling soild thir crested helmets in the dust.
Then with what trivial weapon came to Hand,
The Jaw of a dead ***, his sword of bone,
A thousand fore-skins fell, the flower of Palestin
In Ramath-lechi famous to this day:
Then by main force pull’d up, and on his shoulders bore
The Gates of Azza, Post, and massie Bar
Up to the Hill by Hebron, seat of Giants old,
No journey of a Sabbath day, and loaded so;
Like whom the Gentiles feign to bear up Heav’n.
Which shall I first bewail,
Thy ******* or lost Sight,
Prison within Prison
Inseparably dark?
Thou art become (O worst imprisonment!)
The Dungeon of thy self; thy Soul
(Which Men enjoying sight oft without cause complain)
Imprison’d now indeed,
In real darkness of the body dwells,
Shut up from outward light
To incorporate with gloomy night;
For inward light alas
Puts forth no visual beam.
O mirror of our fickle state,
Since man on earth unparallel’d!
The rarer thy example stands,
By how much from the top of wondrous glory,
Strongest of mortal men,
To lowest pitch of abject fortune thou art fall’n.
For him I reckon not in high estate
Whom long descent of birth
Or the sphear of fortune raises;
But thee whose strength, while vertue was her mate
Might have subdu’d the Earth,
Universally crown’d with highest praises.

Sam:  I hear the sound of words, thir sense the air
Dissolves unjointed e’re it reach my ear.

Chor:  Hee speaks, let us draw nigh.  Matchless in might,
The glory late of Israel, now the grief;
We come thy friends and neighbours not unknown
From Eshtaol and Zora’s fruitful Vale
To visit or bewail thee, or if better,
Counsel or Consolation we may bring,
Salve to thy Sores, apt words have power to swage
The tumors of a troubl’d mind,
And are as Balm to fester’d wounds.

Sam:  Your coming, Friends, revives me, for I learn
Now of my own experience, not by talk,
How counterfeit a coin they are who friends
Bear in their Superscription (of the most
I would be understood) in prosperous days
They swarm, but in adverse withdraw their head
Not to be found, though sought.  Wee see, O friends.
How many evils have enclos’d me round;
Yet that which was the worst now least afflicts me,
Blindness, for had I sight, confus’d with shame,
How could I once look up, or heave the head,
Who like a foolish Pilot have shipwrack’t,
My Vessel trusted to me from above,
Gloriously rigg’d; and for a word, a tear,
Fool, have divulg’d the secret gift of God
To a deceitful Woman : tell me Friends,
Am I not sung and proverbd for a Fool
In every street, do they not say, how well
Are come upon him his deserts? yet why?
Immeasurable strength they might behold
In me, of wisdom nothing more then mean;
This with the other should, at least, have paird,
These two proportiond ill drove me transverse.

Chor:  Tax not divine disposal, wisest Men
Have err’d, and by bad Women been deceiv’d;
And shall again, pretend they ne’re so wise.
Deject not then so overmuch thy self,
Who hast of sorrow thy full load besides;
Yet truth to say, I oft have heard men wonder
Why thou shouldst wed Philistian women rather
Then of thine own Tribe fairer, or as fair,
At least of thy own Nation, and as noble.

Sam:  The first I saw at Timna, and she pleas’d
Mee, not my Parents, that I sought to wed,
The daughter of an Infidel: they knew not
That what I motion’d was of God; I knew
From intimate impulse, and therefore urg’d
The Marriage on; that by occasion hence
I might begin Israel’s Deliverance,
The work to which I was divinely call’d;
She proving false, the next I took to Wife
(O that I never had! fond wish too late)
Was in the Vale of Sorec, Dalila,
That specious Monster, my accomplisht snare.
I thought it lawful from my former act,
And the same end; still watching to oppress
Israel’s oppressours: of what now I suffer
She was not the prime cause, but I my self,
Who vanquisht with a peal of words (O weakness!)
Gave up my fort of silence to a Woman.

Chor:  In seeking just occasion to provoke
The Philistine, thy Countries Enemy,
Thou never wast remiss, I hear thee witness:
Yet Israel still serves with all his Sons.

Sam:  That fault I take not on me, but transfer
On Israel’s Governours, and Heads of Tribes,
Who seeing those great acts which God had done
Singly by me against their Conquerours
Acknowledg’d not, or not at all consider’d
Deliverance offerd : I on th’ other side
Us’d no ambition to commend my deeds,
The deeds themselves, though mute, spoke loud the dooer;
But they persisted deaf, and would not seem
To count them things worth notice, till at length
Thir Lords the Philistines with gather’d powers
Enterd Judea seeking mee, who then
Safe to the rock of Etham was retir’d,
Not flying, but fore-casting in what place
To set upon them, what advantag’d best;
Mean while the men of Judah to prevent
The harrass of thir Land, beset me round;
I willingly on some conditions came
Into thir hands, and they as gladly yield me
To the uncircumcis’d a welcom prey,
Bound with two cords; but cords to me were threds
Toucht with the flame: on thi

I was born a sickly, screeching baby, two months earlier than expected. The doctor and midwife did everything they could to keep my little limbs moving and to keep my tiny heart beating, fluttering like the wings of butterfly.
“Is it a boy?” my mother whispered through her pale lips, as they bathed my naked body in hot water.
“No, ma’am, it’s a girl” The midwife struggled to add on something that would make the wailing creature seem more desirable. “With exquisitely shaped feet, so perfectly miniature”
She let out a croak of conflicting emotions: the joy and pride of a newly-founded motherly love, the fear of presenting a girl as a first-born, the relief that the hours of agony in childbirth were over and the dread of facing her husband once he found out about me.

My mother was not healthy after my birth for a long time; and when I was only one and two months old she fell dangerously ill, and the house whispered footsteps running to her room late at night and muffled voices of different doctors. Mercifully, she survived but was left barren and forever unfertile.
I can not imagine my father’s fury. He believed in having sons to carry on his old last name of thirty-one generations; it was his religion and had I been a son, I would have been worshipped as a god. I can imagine how my mother prayed and thanked her ancestors that her dowry was of a large one.

He could barely tolerate being in the same room as me during my toddler years. Every time he entered a room I was playing in, nurse would sweep me to our garden out side; answering to my startled queries, “Be an obedient daughter, don’t bother your father and don’t ask questions”
My body had been born frail, but my natural spirit was as healthy as could be, full of inquiries, wonders of the world around me and everyday I would learn something new just wandering around the neighborhood observing things, with my nurse trailing with a worried eye behind me muttering, “Girls are not supposed to be exposed to this” she spoke the words as if they were sour, “you should be sitting at home and accompanying your mother.”

Every day at dinner, the two females of the house, me and my mother, were silent while my father ranted on and on. My appetite being very delicate, I often just sat there as still as I possibly could and listened to my father talking about politics, jobs, money. Things he called ‘men business’. I longed to ask questions about these ‘men business’, especially ‘university’ for I had an inquisitive sort-of nature but was refrained with a sharp, piercing look from my mother every time I opened my mouth and sometimes, she pinched me under the table leaving purple splotches which flashed, “Don’t question your father”
Sometimes, he would talk about the future he had decided for me, “You will marry off, sixteen at the latest, to some one rich and beneficial to our family. You will do as I say till I marry you off, and then you will do as your husband tells you.”
“Yes father, for I should repay everything you have done for me” I replied as sweetly as I could.
“Yes, you’re a good daughter. Bear lots of sons for him and your house will be one of happiness.”
I was proud that he had given me a compliment. “Yes father, for it will make you joyful as I always wish to make you so”
My childish heart did not understand why my mother turned her head down while her left eyebrow twitched, and why that night, as she tucked me into bed, I thought I saw a tear roll down her cheek and why as she kissed me that night she whispered, “Do not love me so; love your father. The men in your life are your gods.”

My physical health would constantly limit the desires of my free spirit. I could not to do what others who were as free of spirit as I was could do, and couldn’t socialize with them and the rest of the children in my neighborhood had their siblings to mingle with, causing me to become the pitiful outcast.
I saw children around my age, around seven or eight, climbing trees and wanted to do so as well, but my white feet did not have grip enough to grasp onto the fat branches.
Father caught me once trying to propel myself up a tree and his expression was both of a resigned anger and sadness before he turned him and his face away and back into the house without a word.
That night, mother told me not to climb trees ever again. I noticed a faint bruise on her cheek bone that had been covered with white powder.

When I was eleven or twelve, and was allowed to wander further out into the neighborhood with my nurse I saw the boys fishing in the nearby pond and wanted to do so as well. Starting that day, every week I pocketed the three coins mother gave me until I could buy the best fishing rod in the little store and ran as fast as my skinny, weak legs could carry me to the pond. I mimicked the way the boys flung the fishing rod out over the water but the metal pole was too heavy for my pale, shaking arms. I tried over and over again as my nurse watched, biting her lip in anxiety. I held the fishing rod with trembling sore arms till  I felt a bite; I pumped my small arms to reel it in, but they were so tired and I was far too slow, losing the fish I had spent half the day trying to catch. “Ah, just bad luck, don’t worry! It was a smart fish, I tell you!” nurse exclaimed, though her eyes flashed a look of pity and I knew she knew it wasn’t just bad luck or a smart fish.
In anger, I sold the fishing rod to one of the boys for two-thirds of the price I had bought it for. He was delighted with the bargain and I watched with a lump in my throat as he caught three fish with the tug of his healthy, muscular arm within fifteen minutes. “This is a beautiful rod, and the pond is just filled with fish today, Little Sister!”
Wanting to spend the money jingling inside my pocket, money that to me was just a reminder of a painful memory, I headed off to the collection of little shops close to my house where I was guaranteed distraction. Nurse, sweating and complaining of the heat, followed me.
An ageing man with a bunch of filthy hair working away on a piece of thick, rough paper with wondrous colors inside a shop caught my eye as I peered inside the window. He turned the picture upside down and continued blending in the dark colors of the shape to create a shadow along the curve of it. I entered the shop. “What is that?” I asked of him.
“A face” he replied back absentmindedly.
“Doesn’t look like one to me” I confessed with my honesty.
He looked up at me, “No, it does not to you, and maybe, neither will it at the end. To me, it looks like an angle of a faded face. But slowly, with time, it will become clearer and clearer, yet only to me, and as it does, I will be able to choose more colors to make it yet more beautiful. The outcome of this painting is entirely up to me.”
I felt my challenging self rising up. “But what if you imagined a certain color in your head but couldn’t find it or be able to mix it to your mind’s perfection?”
“Then I would create my own paint color.”
“You know how?”
“No, but if I could not find the paint color already made I would make it myself, and no matter what, would learn how to. So far I have always been able to compromise and mix different colors to please me.”
“You do an awful lot of shadowing light colors with dark colors”
“Why do you think I do so?” he questioned me this time, with bright eyes.
I pondered for a moment to give as good an answer as he had given me and then told him my answer.
He nodded with impress, “Yes, yes, absolutely right. I never thought I’d hear that from a child” and looked at me with his head cocked in curiosity.
“What would you like to buy from here, Little Sister?”
Still deeply interested in our conversation I pulled out the coins I had in my pocket. “How much stuff can I buy with all this money? I’d like those crayons, I’ve tried them once before and they are so creamy and smooth.”
“Oil pastels?” he asked, a little confusedly.
Feeling ashamed of my ignorance, I nodded. The tutor father hired evidently bent to father’s strict rules of what should be taught and what would not be taught. Father disapproved of women painting, and would’ve dismissed nurse had he known that instead of taking me out for a little walk to smell the blooming daffodils, she in fact let me explore the environment around me to the best of my ability even in disgruntle.
The man gave my red-patched cheeks and undeveloped translucent frame a sympathetic look and when he spoke, his voice was gentle. “Little Sister, I’ve a whole basket of oil paints that I’ve used but rarely and so are still in perfect condition. Would you like to carry the whole basket home for all the money you have in your pockets?”
I handed him all my golden coins, “But first I must see if I like it.”
“You won’t be disappointed” he chuckled and walked with an imbalanced limp to the back of the store. I noticed a wooden stump protruding from the bottom of his long, black pants. My heart throbbed achingly; he was ****** limited too. I turned to his painting and smiled from deep inside, a smile I rarely wore.
He came back tugging a huge brown basket filled to the brim with sticks of oil pastels, some longer or thicker than others. He lifted an orange one up and showed the tip of it to me, which was stained with a black mark. “Sometimes when you blend colors this will happen, but it’s easy to rid off. Just softly, and patiently rub it off on a cloth until it disappears.” He demonstrated upon his black pants.
“Thank you. It’s kind of you. But...I can’t carry this home myself. It’s heavy.”
I turned to nurse and smiled my best pleading smile.

The basket was toiled up as nurse undressed me from my shower and father and mother were otherwise occupied. That night, with my precious basket safely under my bed, I cleaned all the multi-colored oil pastels on an old shirt, and as soon as the house was ringing with silence, I locked my door and flicked on the lamp light, and started pressing the smooth colors into the paper to blend and make a picture of kissing colors on a relatively large piece of white paper. A thrill ran from my finger tips and along my arm, and made my palms tingle as I held the colorful sticks in my hand to the paper. I hid it underneath my bed just as a rosy sun was rising.
*
I was sixteen, and I was thought beautiful: for now, at this age, it was considered beautiful to be so pale of skin, so small of feet and hands, graceful to have tiny limbs and charming to have little strength for it was now considered ‘feminine’.
It was three weeks after I had turned sixteen and for dinner, father had brought over an ugly man with a bulging waist and shiny bald head who continually made ****** jokes at the dinner table while he believed I did not understand them. He was infamous for the two wives he had had (before they died from sickness), and how he not only hit them but kept other lovers too. Yet he was desirable for his vast richness. He leered at me obnoxiously, in an attempt to smile.
Father caught him looking at me, “She’s incredibly silent, never says a word of defiance and will be a most dutiful wife.”
“Yes, she is beautiful”
My heart froze and my brain was stimulated to work twice as fast. Him?! Him?! The man who’s wives were killed through an illness called ‘abuse, neglect and disloyalty?!’
I cast my eyelashes down in order to appear a calm, modest young lady while my heart hammered in fury, disgust and a rising hysterical panic. I shot a look at my mother whose left eyebrow was twitching as she stared down at her dinner plate, and I knew she was having the same thoughts as I.
“I would be glad to have you as my son-in-law. You would have no trouble with her, and would be embraced with open arms into our family.”
They continued this path of talk through dinner while he eyeballed me in a way that made me cringe. I felt his foot nudge mine under the table and in haste tucked it under the chair with a little gasp. His eyes glittered at my gasp and I was furious with myself for letting him feel a rotten triumph. Though I had always felt an extremely strong dislike towards him from what I knew of him and sometimes saw of him with an immoral lady, something pushed in the pit of my tummy, and I knew it was pure hatred.
When mother tucked me in she was being strange. On closing my door she whispered, “I love you… so I wish you to know… don’t ever contradict men”

As I was secretly drawing a picture as I did every night till dawn, I heard my father’s voice roar in the dead of the night. In a sudden, I shoved my portrait under the bed and threw all my oil pastels into the basket, hid it, and switched the light off. I heard his voice roar again, accompanied by a thud. I was wild with fear as I crept to my door and pressed my ear against it, barely even shocked at my own daringness as my instinct, love, took over- my instinct of must knowing what was happening to my mother.
“How dare you say I’m wrong!?” there was another thud, and this time I heard a soft whimper. “She is worthless to me, not a son. And I will marry her off to a rich man who can actually benefit this family.” He roared.
There was a whisper which I strained to hear, “He will **** her”
“From the moment she was born she wasn’t made to live!” he yelled.
A hiss escaped my tongue and I coiled like a serpent, flinching as a thud was heard yet again and an immediate cry of pain escaped from both my lips and my mothers’.
A fire awoke inside me, burning my temples and my whole body and my eyes stung with hot tears; tears that burned my face as they splashed down. My whole body was shaking and my tightly squeezed eyes were going through spasms. I was no longer wild with fear, but with anger.
I turned my light back on and tugged my basket of oil pastels out. I yanked my portrait off from a thick of pile of different pictures I had drawn.
My breath was coming in quick short breaths as I finished my portrait to the utmost perfection, using every oil pastel in the basket. Every time I heard a thud, I colored with more fiery… shadowing my jaw line with the fat black oil pastel, in the crook of my ear, the corner of my mouth… where the light shone upon my fore head, how it reflected in the color of my eye and glowed on my cheeks.
When I was finished, the house was deadly quiet again and dawn was breaking. I looked down upon it and realized something that changed my life.
In frenzy I swatted out all the things I had ever drawn and stared at them in an awakening.
The colors on them were the events of my life, the things that characterized it, the decisions. They were beautiful for they had been chosen and controlled by me … I had chosen the colors I wanted and thought best for my pictures; and spent thought over how to blend different colors to the color I wanted.
And everyday, as I worked into the drawings with time, they became clearer and clearer on what was the right thing to do, and how it should possibly look like in the next stage.
I leaned over and kissed the thin lips of my portrait that didn’t look exactly like me for not even the most skilled artists have complete control over what they draw.

Then I remembered what I had told the one-legged man in the shop a few years go:
“Lights not only illuminate, they also cast shadows. The contrast makes you able to appreciate the power of both.”
Now it was time to truly let the light illuminate my life, and let the shadows let me appreciate the light that shines upon me; I color my own life, and choose my own colors.

To pull out the colors underneath the darkness of my bed…
And spill it to the world outside.

It’s 6:15pm. Peter, Anna, Sophy and I are studying in the common room of our suite.

“We need to get serious,” Peter whispered, but there was no subject in the declaration, so I was left confused and uncommitted, “about getting serious,” he clarified.

“I’m not sure I can get serious about a guy who doesn’t separate whites and darks in the laundry,” I say, gently.

“No,” he said, shaking his head in brief vibration, “we need to get serious about DINNER.”

“Oh!” I said, maybe a little too relieved.

“Ha!” He chortled, “YOU overthink everything!” He said, nodding his head up and down to prove it was true. “And speaking of laundry,” he continued, seeing me start to open my mouth, “the other night YOU asked me if your pastel purple ******* should go with the whites or darks - so I must be an EXPERT!”

I laughed at the idea of his laundry expertise, sailing in from out of the purple like that, it was haywire. “Well,” I said, becoming introspective, “I didn’t know you’d hold onto that question like a grudge,” I said, in quiet, wounded accusation, “from now ON, maybe you should stay as far away from my ******* as possible.”

“What are you two grousing about NOW?” Anna asked, looking up from her computer. “You guys are like an old married couple.”

“True THAT.” Sophie said, like a judge right before knocking her gavel to finalize a ruling.

“We weren’t arguing!” I said, looking around confusedly. I looked at Peter, who was smiling broadly, “Were we?”

“Nope,” he said, wrapping his arm around me in a bearhug, “we were flirting.”

SHE is foremost of those that I would hear praised.
I have gone about the house, gone up and down
As a man does who has published a new book,
Or a young girl dressed out in her new gown,
And though I have turned the talk by hook or crook
Until her praise should be the uppermost theme,
A woman spoke of some new tale she had read,
A man confusedly in a half dream
As though some other name ran in his head.
She is foremost of those that I would hear praised.
I will talk no more of books or the long war
But walk by the dry thorn until I have found
Some beggar sheltering from the wind, and there
Manage the talk until her name come round.
If there be rags enough he will know her name
And be well pleased remembering it, for in the old days,
Though she had young men's praise and old men's blame,
Among the poor both old and young gave her praise.

Kind solace in a dying hour!
Such, father, is not (now) my theme—
I will not madly deem that power
Of Earth may shrive me of the sin
Unearthly pride hath revelled in—
I have no time to dote or dream:
You call it hope—that fire of fire!
It is but agony of desire:
If I can hope—O God! I can—
Its fount is holier—more divine—
I would not call thee fool, old man,
But such is not a gift of thine.

Know thou the secret of a spirit
Bowed from its wild pride into shame
O yearning heart! I did inherit
Thy withering portion with the fame,
The searing glory which hath shone
Amid the Jewels of my throne,
Halo of Hell! and with a pain
Not Hell shall make me fear again—
O craving heart, for the lost flowers
And sunshine of my summer hours!
The undying voice of that dead time,
With its interminable chime,
Rings, in the spirit of a spell,
Upon thy emptiness—a knell.

I have not always been as now:
The fevered diadem on my brow
I claimed and won usurpingly—
Hath not the same fierce heirdom given
Rome to the Caesar—this to me?
The heritage of a kingly mind,
And a proud spirit which hath striven
Triumphantly with human kind.
On mountain soil I first drew life:
The mists of the Taglay have shed
Nightly their dews upon my head,
And, I believe, the winged strife
And tumult of the headlong air
Have nestled in my very hair.

So late from Heaven—that dew—it fell
(’Mid dreams of an unholy night)
Upon me with the touch of Hell,
While the red flashing of the light
From clouds that hung, like banners, o’er,
Appeared to my half-closing eye
The pageantry of monarchy;
And the deep trumpet-thunder’s roar
Came hurriedly upon me, telling
Of human battle, where my voice,
My own voice, silly child!—was swelling
(O! how my spirit would rejoice,
And leap within me at the cry)
The battle-cry of Victory!

The rain came down upon my head
Unsheltered—and the heavy wind
Rendered me mad and deaf and blind.
It was but man, I thought, who shed
Laurels upon me: and the rush—
The torrent of the chilly air
Gurgled within my ear the crush
Of empires—with the captive’s prayer—
The hum of suitors—and the tone
Of flattery ’round a sovereign’s throne.

My passions, from that hapless hour,
Usurped a tyranny which men
Have deemed since I have reached to power,
My innate nature—be it so:
But, father, there lived one who, then,
Then—in my boyhood—when their fire
Burned with a still intenser glow
(For passion must, with youth, expire)
E’en then who knew this iron heart
In woman’s weakness had a part.

I have no words—alas!—to tell
The loveliness of loving well!
Nor would I now attempt to trace
The more than beauty of a face
Whose lineaments, upon my mind,
Are—shadows on th’ unstable wind:
Thus I remember having dwelt
Some page of early lore upon,
With loitering eye, till I have felt
The letters—with their meaning—melt
To fantasies—with none.

O, she was worthy of all love!
Love as in infancy was mine—
’Twas such as angel minds above
Might envy; her young heart the shrine
On which my every hope and thought
Were incense—then a goodly gift,
For they were childish and upright—
Pure—as her young example taught:
Why did I leave it, and, adrift,
Trust to the fire within, for light?

We grew in age—and love—together—
Roaming the forest, and the wild;
My breast her shield in wintry weather—
And, when the friendly sunshine smiled.
And she would mark the opening skies,
I saw no Heaven—but in her eyes.
Young Love’s first lesson is——the heart:
For ’mid that sunshine, and those smiles,
When, from our little cares apart,
And laughing at her girlish wiles,
I’d throw me on her throbbing breast,
And pour my spirit out in tears—
There was no need to speak the rest—
No need to quiet any fears
Of her—who asked no reason why,
But turned on me her quiet eye!

Yet more than worthy of the love
My spirit struggled with, and strove
When, on the mountain peak, alone,
Ambition lent it a new tone—
I had no being—but in thee:
The world, and all it did contain
In the earth—the air—the sea—
Its joy—its little lot of pain
That was new pleasure—the ideal,
Dim, vanities of dreams by night—
And dimmer nothings which were real—
(Shadows—and a more shadowy light!)
Parted upon their misty wings,
And, so, confusedly, became
Thine image and—a name—a name!
Two separate—yet most intimate things.

I was ambitious—have you known
The passion, father? You have not:
A cottager, I marked a throne
Of half the world as all my own,
And murmured at such lowly lot—
But, just like any other dream,
Upon the vapor of the dew
My own had past, did not the beam
Of beauty which did while it thro’
The minute—the hour—the day—oppress
My mind with double loveliness.

We walked together on the crown
Of a high mountain which looked down
Afar from its proud natural towers
Of rock and forest, on the hills—
The dwindled hills! begirt with bowers
And shouting with a thousand rills.

I spoke to her of power and pride,
But mystically—in such guise
That she might deem it nought beside
The moment’s converse; in her eyes
I read, perhaps too carelessly—
A mingled feeling with my own—
The flush on her bright cheek, to me
Seemed to become a queenly throne
Too well that I should let it be
Light in the wilderness alone.

I wrapped myself in grandeur then,
And donned a visionary crown—
Yet it was not that Fantasy
Had thrown her mantle over me—
But that, among the rabble—men,
Lion ambition is chained down—
And crouches to a keeper’s hand—
Not so in deserts where the grand—
The wild—the terrible conspire
With their own breath to fan his fire.

Look ’round thee now on Samarcand!—
Is she not queen of Earth? her pride
Above all cities? in her hand
Their destinies? in all beside
Of glory which the world hath known
Stands she not nobly and alone?
Falling—her veriest stepping-stone
Shall form the pedestal of a throne—
And who her sovereign? Timour—he
Whom the astonished people saw
Striding o’er empires haughtily
A diademed outlaw!

O, human love! thou spirit given,
On Earth, of all we hope in Heaven!
Which fall’st into the soul like rain
Upon the Siroc-withered plain,
And, failing in thy power to bless,
But leav’st the heart a wilderness!
Idea! which bindest life around
With music of so strange a sound
And beauty of so wild a birth—
Farewell! for I have won the Earth.

When Hope, the eagle that towered, could see
No cliff beyond him in the sky,
His pinions were bent droopingly—
And homeward turned his softened eye.
’Twas sunset: When the sun will part
There comes a sullenness of heart
To him who still would look upon
The glory of the summer sun.
That soul will hate the ev’ning mist
So often lovely, and will list
To the sound of the coming darkness (known
To those whose spirits hearken) as one
Who, in a dream of night, would fly,
But cannot, from a danger nigh.

What tho’ the moon—tho’ the white moon
Shed all the splendor of her noon,
Her smile is chilly—and her beam,
In that time of dreariness, will seem
(So like you gather in your breath)
A portrait taken after death.
And boyhood is a summer sun
Whose waning is the dreariest one—
For all we live to know is known,
And all we seek to keep hath flown—
Let life, then, as the day-flower, fall
With the noon-day beauty—which is all.
I reached my home—my home no more—
For all had flown who made it so.
I passed from out its mossy door,
And, tho’ my tread was soft and low,
A voice came from the threshold stone
Of one whom I had earlier known—
O, I defy thee, Hell, to show
On beds of fire that burn below,
An humbler heart—a deeper woe.

Father, I firmly do believe—
I know—for Death who comes for me
From regions of the blest afar,
Where there is nothing to deceive,
Hath left his iron gate ajar.
And rays of truth you cannot see
Are flashing thro’ Eternity——
I do believe that Eblis hath
A snare in every human path—
Else how, when in the holy grove
I wandered of the idol, Love,—
Who daily scents his snowy wings
With incense of burnt-offerings
From the most unpolluted things,
Whose pleasant bowers are yet so riven
Above with trellised rays from Heaven
No mote may shun—no tiniest fly—
The light’ning of his eagle eye—
How was it that Ambition crept,
Unseen, amid the revels there,
Till growing bold, he laughed and leapt
In the tangles of Love’s very hair!

perhaps if you have time,
take a moment to read the
predecessor poem in the notes below first,
in order to better understand this one


<>

the love poetry curfew so lately announced
misshapen, growing without respite, by hate extensions distended,
poet's sanity uncomprehending, for yet another! sabbath desecration,
debating internally, how long should this cessation be extended,
for the pockmarking of earth's face with fresh bloodshed,
continues unashamedly, swiftly apace, these unholy days of dread,
all haggard his mind, hazard his eyes, harden his heart
no muse could sway

but shocking himself,
poet's mirror image stares and dares
with a finger-pointing,
his own specter's absurd challenge of

"and yet, now more than ever "

when children are killed like bowling pins,
there can be no satisfaction in revenge
cannot expiate evil deeds with avenge
measure for measure add-on sins,

and yet,

poet thinks quietly, repeatedly, self-surprisingly,

and yet,
love poetry, now more than ever

asking confusedly, almost ashamedly, out loudly, yet secretly,
how can this be, for there will be again, more painful awakenings,
is it the end of days, of greeting sunrise, with a love for love poetry?
with madness come and confusion everywhere rampant,
'tis a doubtful thought, the carnage having wrought
an insoluble dissolution and can love poetry be any solution?

in poet's Adirondack safe place where life tributes were
birthed, bred and trials borne, a right writ place for unmasking,
a private soul in equal parts of joy and shame,
love and pain, loss and gain,
here the weighing scales bore equal measures
of old bereft, and life uplifting visions of,
what will come, what will be, the unforeseen,
the hopeful yet of

"and yet"

a dotted line of whitecaps  beckons the poet to tread upon,
the glassine bay's waters that lay before him, go, walk on water,
a path to point where and whence the quaking waves
have gathered, calmly begging, Oh poet!
provide  assurance, explanation, comprehension,
querying him as if all sanity, has flightly, unsightly, fled
from the home shores of human sailors, gently asking poet,

"your fellow walking earth-beasts have all sensibility killed,
these times so human terrible, we waters, cannot understand"

poet's rebellious soul all so confused, asking and answering the
waters in his head, the waters that address his eyes,
seeking wisdom words from a place where logic
has been whittled and willed away,

and yet,

love poetry, now more than ever

now is the time when a love poem beyond merely necessary,
poet's eyes cast downward in shame, his thinking, hesitant and wary,
time for prayer, not madness distraction of a love poetry commentary

the waters dissatisfied at his confusion,
part as if by Moses's staff, majesticly powerful rise up,
confronting poet with the sweetest tasking
as if they were the downtrodden and the hurting, asking...

"we storm, drown and take, for such is nature's angry periodic way,
something beyond our control no matter what we say,
to another's dictate and momentum, we must bow and obey,
but you human, have choice, and we have none -
choose love poetry and let it comfort like no other"

and the poet sighed and wrote

this poem

this poem of love,
realized and conjectured,
with inserted verses of

"and yet,"

for though the poet possessed no well of well words
more than these few saddened and impoverished,
wearied, hard scrabbled ones

and yet,

gasping and grasping a potent notion, a portent of what if,
of a world with no love poetry,
a planet that could not ever-overcome hate, dooming itself,
for love poetry and all its cousins and associates,
the only method to confiscate
these grill blackened marking silent barbell weights
so let this be ,
this is a love poem,
and now,
this is the time,
to let

"and yet"

vindicate...


<>
6:20am
Saturday July 16, 2016
and yet

...Frankenstein...dear Frank--green with disparity, confusedly amongst parts that
were sum...O Frank--never a creature under no sun could sow dark's reaping so.
Yours is a terrible Art...meat thrown to a black and white world.
Towering clumsily...wobbling that meat before a black and white world...you're
already spoken for by the precedent of your freakdom.
Your wear is worse than the ******* child moon wearing the sun's clothing...
O Frank!
Your awkward beauty...is as winter's very struggle towards spring--only to die upon
your feet while thawing.
You were never cerebral enough to have a clandestine affair with nothingness in motion...
your body's your confession.
You were struck alive...not dead...ALIVE...ALIVE--thunderously so, called an: IT!
Runaway automata...the collective unconscious of humanity's hypnotized waddle--
O Frank...where is your Heaven...where is your Hell?
You can neither be showered by, nor Fall from grace.
The longest-drawn pity to never be taken...O...the duration of your life...YOUR LIFE!
..."ALIVE"..."ALIVE"...cried your euphoric namesake...God taken step of, to play God to thee--
as such...yours is a terrible Art.
One of living-death...O Frank!


Konstantinos Mark

My lips are tired even if nothing is being said yet.
It's always those 'sometimes' that's nailed to my head.
Please stop crying again.
Aren't you the one who will wipe away those tears?
Don't you get annoyed every time you are blamed?
I gained my freedom from you.

While there is still strength left, I want you to know.
Here I am swearing not to do it again,
Here I am ready to leave you,
Here I am and will live alone,
I'm here and are you still there?

Please forgive me for my train of thoughts,
It's always been illogical and selfish.
I know the past is over,
It's not worth doing anymore.
Don't you get bored every time you stare at yourself?

But now I will return again,
Just for a single moment to look at you again.
Here I am standing before you,
Here I am hoping and ready to be hurt.
I'm not going to hold back anymore.

I'm here because of you, I'm sorry, I'm a mess.
I hope you believe me.
Here I am singing confusedly.
Please understand me.

I seem to have slipped,
My mind has missed a beat,
For what happened today,
Was quite a simple feat.

The odd pairs of fandoms
Are not spoken of, at best
Alas, I love one of them,
But should have given it a rest.

The pair went into my grade,
A short story that I wrote.
It was all nice and dandy,
Until I almost had a stroke.

My teacher saw my ship,
And looked at my confusedly.
All I knew to do,
Was apologize profusely.

She didn't quite understand it,
But grade still turned out well.
Ah well, it's not horrible,
But class may now be hell.

If you ship an odd couple,
Do not let it show,
Because fandom and reality are quite different,
Trust me--I should know.

A sweet disorder in the dress
Kindles in clothes a wantonness:
A lawn about the shoulders thrown
Into a fine distraction:
An erring lace which here and there
Enthrals the crimson stomacher:
A cuff neglectful, and thereby
Ribbons to flow confusedly:
A winning wave (deserving note)
In the tempestuous petticoat:
A careless shoe-string, in whose tie
I see a wild civility:
Do more bewitch me than when art
Is too precise in every part.

...Frankenstein...dear Frank--green with disparity, confusedly
amongst the parts that were sum...O Frank--never a creature
under no sun could see so deeply into dark.
Yours is a terrible Art...meat thrown to the black and white world.
Towering clumsily...wobbling that meat before a black and white
world...you're already spoken for by the precedent of your freakdom.
Your wears are worse than the ******* child moon wearing the sun's
clothing...O Frank!
Your awkward beauty is as winter's very struggle towards spring--
only to die upon your feet while thawing.
You were never cerebral enough to have a clandestine affair with
nothingness in motion.
You were struck alive...not dead...ALIVE...ALIVE--called an: IT!
Spawn of science...the collective unconscious of humanity born to walk
its nightmare...O Frank...where is your heaven...where is your hell?
You can neither be showered by, nor Fall from grace.
The longest drawn pity to never be taken...O...the duration of your life...
YOUR LIFE!
...ALIVE...ALIVE...cried at you by the maddest of scientists...yours is a
terrible Art...one of living-death...O FRANK!


Konstantinos Mark

Written August 22, 2012

...and another days goes by.



She's not exactly sure how long it's been since the last time she was able to smile and say it came from the heart. She doesn't remember if it was November of last year or sometime in mid February, or just before April... she really wasn't sure. All she knew for sure was that it had been a while.



And the days go by...



Confusedly she carries on with unanswered questions about unanswered questions to months and months of dishonesty and distrust. Recently, she found out that a man she used to know has recently became a mother. She was surprised, but she also wasn't. At least now she knew where her beliefs on karma stood.



Some months before days have gone by, she has no idea where she will be once days have gone by. Maybe she would have some insight on where she would be after days of months have gone by but her perspective of the world is too askew. She should probably fix her tie before carrying on.



But eventually she might understand with some help from the polka-dot woman, but she doubts it. Her mind is too far gone for even those who consider themselves professional polka-dotters. She thinks maybe she could become a polka-dotter one day, but she doubts she can because her dots are way too out'ta line.



Of course she knows she has the animals but they can only help so much. She realizes that when it's clear they can only purr up against her leg so many times before they just can't purr any longer. At least they've helped thus far. With limitations she wants to break down but cannot.



A random thunder rumbles during the sunny summer day and snaps her into realizing it's time to gooooo.

Steadily, she approaches me, hands bound behind her back, observing and forming judgements, discerning our essence, or lack. Does she know? Wait! What would she know? I've nothing to hide, nothing to show! Could it be she's a clairvoyant? In their daunting, cryptic ways? Is she a mystic a gypsy? Does she know of all our days? Can she read between--beyond the surface? Seeking through obscurity? Can she tell who are the martyrs? The traitors and betrayed? Does she know of all the secrets in the diamond dusk of age? Or can she read through the stories of the world, page by page? Alas, as she stands there, confusedly staring into my face's voids, I cannot help but wonder, who has sanity, and who's devoid...

I walked through my forest, stepping over humongous tree roots, green covered veins pumping life to the heart of my peace. I was familiar with this place. Towering trees, trunks thicker than cars shooting into the skies, although those contraptions were not known to this unsullied place. I stared in wonder at the extraordinary beauty as I did every time I came here. It was quiet, still, a place of undisturbed silence. It beckoned me to it. This was my forest.

I navigated my way through the dense woods, my foot becoming caught in a root, causing me to fall. My skull felt broken, as if pieces of it were missing. I put my hand on my forehead, something wet covering it. I put my palm out in front of me, regaining focus of my vision. Blood. The sudden realization of what happened hitting me harder than my fall. I had never been hurt here before.

I felt my pupils dilate, my body beginning to shake, with one enormous release of air I let out a scream that rocked the frame of my body….as I thought. I looked around confusedly, breathing in again and attempting to let the air out with a high pitched shriek. Silence.

I thought back to all the times I came here. I had never spoken because there was no one to talk to. My footsteps never made a sound. My joyful cooing over the supposed beauty of the forest never traveled past my lips. Even when I fell there was no thud. No sound despite the loud shattering of my heart. Suddenly, this was no longer my forest.

The enormity of the trees were suddenly overwhelming, the crisp air suffocating, and the piercing silence deafening. This forest was unusual, there was no wildlife. No birds chirping or squirrels jumping from tree to tree to disrupt the quiet. No breeze rushed through the unbreathing lungs of the dead wilderness. No brush covered the sun starved ground. Not one leaf ever fell from the plentiful amount of trees that went on seemingly forever. Roots stretched across the forest floor like hideous snakes.

Everything I once found beautiful about this place is now twisted and ugly. This was my forest, a place of peace. A place I could go to forget. Or was it ever that? Was I just tricking myself into believing that this place I could not escape was everything I ever wanted. As if I had a choice of coming back. As if I ever left.

I know now what this place is. There is no hope, there is no beauty. I can no longer pretend that what I see is anything but grotesque. I lay on the ground and watch as flames appear, the reflection of fire in my eyes, devouring everything that once was and ever will be of my forest.

I don’t know how long it was before I realized that I could finally feel the warmth of the sun on my skin. How long I laid in the ashes of my sorrow before I realized that there wasn’t just a nothing after my forest was gone. Before I realized that I was staring into the sky, not a black hole.

I felt sensations I had never felt before. No, I had a long time ago before my forest had ever grown here. Slowly I sat up, surprised to find that my body no longer ached. Blood no longer coated my forehead. All that was left of my forest was ash. My forest was gone.

Then I saw it, pink petals spread as if waiting to receive something long overdue. A splash of color amongst the charred blacks and greys of my past. I stared in wonder at the extraordinary beauty. A breeze rushed through the reviving lungs of my hopeful perseverance, carrying the ashes of my denial away.

A vibrant green covered the ground, roots no longer hindering it from spreading throughout the area. Getting up and walking to the flower only to be cast onto my knees once again. How undeserving I was. I stared at it, doing something I had never done looking at my forest. I smiled. This was my flower.

When I thy singing next shall hear,
I’ll wish I might turn all to ear,
To drink in notes and numbers such
As blessed souls can’t hear too much;
Then melted down, there let me lie
Entranc’d and lost confusedly,
And by thy music stricken mute,
Die and be turn’d into a lute.

His sparkling eyes,
His golden hair,
His lips sharing their sweetness with mine..

I closed my eyes to feel them........

But,

I had to do it, now!
I unwrapped the shiny silver knife,
The size of my palm from the foldings in my wavy gown,


Had my throat cut while leaving a scar on his face, his blood on my lips...


I fell with teary eyes, looking into his until my last breath....
He was weeping confusedly...

Quietly, quickly, inconspicuously, daringly, cautiously, knowingly, doubtingly, forcefully, confusedly, consciously, uncontrollably, thoughtfully, dumbly, numerously, abusively, blatantly, spontaneously, thinking of the blank, black, silence that engulfs my being every nocturnal moment I remain frozen in the banks of reality waiting for the hypothetical trigger of the hypothetical gun to be ripped behind its epicenter to allow me the will to be woken from a death that had been disrupted by a millimeter of flame from a centimeter of a stars everlasting life within a never lasting cycle of momentary aliveness in a stillness that ceases to be as such.

Pressed against
And blackened since,
Eyes meet lips meet love.
But when used so loosely,
She sends, "Choose me"
Happy?
Don't look up...


Caressed again,
And lacking since,
Eyes met lips made love,
But when used so confusedly
He don't choose, but
Happily asks,
"Did we just make love?"


Walking behind that boy,
Was me-not bad,
One beautiful then sad
One more fierce than sad...

If pain is a factor
And loss is a gain.
If pain is a factor
And loss is a gain.


She's dressed again
And packing since,
Eyes made lips made love,
But when used so lucidly,
She don't choose him.
Happily, she says,
"You know, this ain't love!"

Walking behind that girl,
Was me-not bad,
One more beautiful, then sad
One more fierce than sad.

If pain is a factor,
And loss is a gain.

If pain is a factor,
And loss is a gain...

If pain is a factor,
And loss is a gain...

Then love as a constant,
Is exactly the same.

It is strange to move unburdened.
Feet so light that
with each step they shoot high up to the sky,
Threatening to kick the teeth out,
or rip my thighs' tendons,
Restraint so foreign to them.

Quite curious my hands feel
released from the duty of holding me together.
Consumed by bittersweet emptiness
As they confusedly try to grasp
something, anything to hold onto or
at least the meaning of what "freedom" actually is.

So please be patient
as I stumble around in this awkward body.
You see, the me this free wasn't here for growing up
So I'm just beginning learning how to
align feeling with being
All Right

Alexander K Opicho
(Eldoret,Kenya;aopicho@yahoo.com)

Yes, you are only asking the answer
I have seen the Chinese, not only one
But I have seen very men of them,

They are all over in African villages
Working in the hinterland of Africa,
All of them I haven are short
Non of them is old nor tall
All of them are short and middle aged,

Their women are not sexually attractive,
They all have small eyes, they walk confusedly,

I have seen very many today in the most remote hamlets
Doing everything for Africans, as if Africans are kings,
Some are digging latrine holes, some are digging graves
Some are building village wells, some are country bridges
Some are selling roasted maize, some are selling pepper
Some are hunting rats, some are trapping snakes,
I have seen one in the toilet downloading loudly
Another one in the lodging uploading silently,

The Chinese I have seen are doing everything for us,
Does it mean now Africans are a race of kings.

"So you're.....what?"
You looked at me confusedly and
I tried my best not to be worried about
what you might think.
This is who I am,
And I can't keep lying about it.
"I'm Pansexual, yeah."
You took a deep breath,
and then you smiled at me as you grabbed ahold of my hands.
"Tell me more," you said.
And that's how I knew I had made an amazing choice.

She looked at me
Confusedly
Pulled her hand back up
Asked me why
I shrugged and apologized
I don't think anyone's
Ever told her no
To getting into their pants

A cascade of raindrops pattered on the tile rooftop that adorned a drab house, the soft yet pronounced sound diverting all thought to it's presence. The lone occupant, a young man of twenty-one years old, stared blankly at the marks on his arms. Some still bled, while others had scarred into permanence long ago. The marks looked like elegant gibberish, but to his trained eye, told a haunting tale. The razor edged blade that had etched this tale lay on the table in front of him, thoroughly coated in his blood. He never felt the bite of the knife, nor the weakness in his legs as the blood left his body. He only felt the desire to be rid of the voices. The horrid voices.
The only way he had found to quiet them was to inscribe their bantering into his flesh. His hands drifted towards his throat, where a long ragged scar lay raised around his neck. He should be dead.
He had wanted to die.
He had tried to die.
But he couldn't.
The voices wouldn't let him.
His name was.... He had forgotten. He blinked confusedly for a moment. He knew it was here somewhere. He glanced at the wall and he could see it, carved into the sheetrock a thousand times. He had trouble focusing on it, his eyes twitching violently as he tried to hold onto a thread of his former self. He shut his eyes tight. He took a deep breath, feeling the icy bite in his lungs as he did. He focused on the cold and pushed the voices back into submission, if only for a moment. He opened his eyes and focused on one single name.
Adrian.
His name was Adrian.
For the first time in a long time, Adrian felt his heart beating. He started shaking. His heart beat faster and harder, almost painfully so.
The voices were breaking through again. Their cacophony of shouts was deafening.
Adrian couldn't hold them back. He had to let them free.
His heart stilled once more and he felt his consciousness fade as thousands of claws swallowed his psyche again.
He stood, following an almost robotic motion. He stepped towards the open window.
No. It wasn't open. It was broken. Blood had caked over the jagged edges. The rain was pouring in. Though by the look of the floor, it had rained through the window for quite some time. The floor sagged under the window, threatening to send Adrian through to the lower floor.

Adrian slowly reached a hand through the window, letting the rain rinse the blood from his arms. He could feel the dull ache as the jagged cuts continued to pulsate blood to the surface. He shut his eyes and leaned forward, ignoring the groaning wood beneath him. His eyes shot open as he felt the floor shift beneath him.
One voice screamed louder than the others, "MOVE ******!"
Adrian panicked and tried to step back, but it was too late. The rotten floor fell out from under him. As he fell, his forearm raked across the shattered glass in the window, one large shard piercing all the way through his arm. He hung there as the shard suspended him in place, screaming as he felt the razor edges tearing clean through his flesh. His vision went completely black for a moment as he faded in and out of consciousness. The screaming voices thundered in his ears and he felt tears streaming down his cheeks. The pain was unbelievable.
Just as he thought he might pass out from the pain, the shard snapped, leaving him to fall to the lower story. He landed on a splintered beam, the impact hard enough to break his wrist as he tried to break his fall. He collapsed, defeated. The voices demanded him to stand, but he ignored them. Adrian lay there, broken, bleeding, wishing more than ever for death to overtake him. He knew he should be dead. He could feel the long sliver of the splintered beam passing straight through his heart, yet he couldn't die.
He cried.
He just wanted this to be over.
Please.
He just wanted to die.
Adrian forced himself to stand, pushing against the beam. He cried out in agony as the shard piercing through his arm and the stake embedded in his chest both cut deeper.
Feeling weakness overtaking him, he took hold of the pane glass shard in his arm, yanking it out swiftly. A spray of blood spewed from his arm before quickly subsiding. He watched in panicked horror as his flesh began to knit itself back together. "No no no just **** me!!!"
He started to hyperventilate as he took hold of the stake with both hands and slowly pulled, feeling smaller splinters digging into his skin. His face contorted into an agonized grimace, letting out a pained gasp as the wood was freed from his chest. He threw the stake away from him, shaking violently.
His clutched his head in his hands as he fell to his knees. When would it end? How much longer would he have to endure?
The voices were quiet. Adrian looked around, still shaking, and realized where he was.
The lower floor.
He shouldn't be here.
The voices said to stay away.
The smell.
How long had these bodies been here?
Adrian stood slowly, seeing with newfound horror where he was. This was evil.  The grotesque, contorted bodies lay scattered haphazardly across the whole floor. Their decomposing flesh had attracted hordes of flies and other carrion creatures.
Adrian threw up.
It was too much.
Had he killed all of these people?
There must have been thirty.
Maybe more.
The taste of ***** brought him back to his senses and he quickly looked for an exit. This was the ground floor, there had to be a door.
He looked around, seeing nothing but the tormented faces of the deceased around him.
Wait.
No. Directly behind him.
It was just barely there.
A void in the corpses.
He sprinted to the opening. The voices told him to stop.
Adrian pushed them aside, focusing on escaping this hell. As he broke through the void, he felt a rush of cold air and he blinked. He was looking at a brick wall, but it wasn't from the building he had been stuck in. No this was... An alley.
Adrian looked behind him, expecting to see the corpse room, but to his surprise, there was nothing. Just another brick wall.
Free.
Finally free.
He hoped.
He sat against the wall and wept, both for joy and in fear.
What would happen to him now?
----------





Thunder shook the windows of a lone white sedan as it puttered to a halt at the side of the road. The sky was black over northern Washington, and the shadows beneath the towering pines cast a forbidding darkness in  all directions. The heaviest rain of the storm had just begun, and the wind rocked the car back and forth like a boat in a hurricane. Each drop of ice cold rain was like a bullet against the car.
Black smoke billowed from under the hood as the car met it's final resting place. From the back seat came a low groan of distress. "Stupid... *******..."
Lilya grimaced as she spoke. She was clutching her chest, covered in a blood soaked blouse. "This was... my favorite shirt..."
Lilya's sapphire eyes were shimmering with tears as she glanced out the window. "I guess we won't be making it to that doctor, huh?"
She was laying across the back seat, her head in the lap of her best friend, Soryn. He was stroking Lilya's raven hair, his fingers trembling. "We'll get there, Lil. It's not far."
Soryn's green eyes met hers and she gripped his hand. Her touch was ice cold. She pushed a lock of his blonde hair out of his face and whispered, "You're... A terrible liar, Ryn. Always were."
The front passenger door opened and Malyk stepped out into the freezing rain. His trimmed black hair was instantly soaked, along with his shirt and jeans. Malyk shivered and opened the hood, letting even more smoke rise into the air. He coughed violently as the stench of melting plastic and warped metal stabbed his lungs and mouth. He slammed the hood shut angrily, returning to his seat and closing the door.
Soryn's looked to him, but Malyk simply shook his head. They turned to see Ruby, the driver, gripping the steering wheel hard, her knuckles turning white.
"This is all my fault." Ruby's voice was shaky, as if she were about to cry. She looked at her bloodied hands and she couldn't hold it back anymore. "IT'S ALL MY FAULT!!" Thunder rocked the car again as she screamed, her firey red hair shaking with her body.
Tears streamed from Ruby's yellow eyes, pattering against her skirt. Malyk put a comforting hand on her shoulder, "You couldn't have known. Stop blaming yourself."
Lilya's breath had become more ragged and her skin was beginning to pale. Soryn whimpered, "We need to find help. Now."
Malyk nodded and his eyes snapped to the rear view mirror, where a glimpse of light shine in the darkness.
"Another car! We have a ride." Malyk scrambled out of the car, tossing his wet shirt to the floor board.
Soryn's eyes widened, "No no no, Malyk don't do what I think you're-...."
He was answered by screeching tires and the shrill screams of the other car's driver. Soryn and Ruby looked out into the darkness but could see no trace of Malyk, only the headlights of the vehicle behind them. Suddenly, Soryn's door opened and a shadowy hand gripped Lilya's, pulling her out of the car gently.
A raspy voice echoed, "Let's not waste time. Come on!" The shadowy figure ran to the stopped vehicle. There was a large blood spatter across its hood. Soryn and Ruby were close behind, being pelted by the icy rain as they ran. Soryn slid into the back seat, and the shadow figure laid Lilya across his lap. Soryn glanced at him, "You shouldn't have used your powers. It's dangerous."
Malyk growled, his face lit by a flash of lightning. A nasty row of fangs were accented by the brief fash, along with a pair of curling horns. His skin was shrouded in armored scales, splashed with blood and smoke. Malyk's forked tongue danced between his fangs as he spoke, "Losing her is even more dangerous. I'd say it's worth the risk."
Ruby revved the engine, "Hurry the **** up!"
Malyk ran to the passenger door, his beastly features already fading away. As soon as the door locked, Ruby floored the gas pedal, squealing the tires as she drove off.
The trees began racing by at breakneck speed, their destination still miles away. Soryn ran his fingers over Lilya's wound and she whimpered, biting back tears.
Soryn frowned, "The cut is really deep, and the infection is already setting in."
Malyk glanced at Ruby, who kept the pedal to the floor. "Two minutes, Soryn."
Lilya coughed, spraying her clothes and Soryn's cheek with more blood. "She may not have two minutes, Malyk."
Lilya smiled and whispered, "You worry too much, Ryn." She reached up to him and forced him to look at her, her eyes now a dim shadow of their former beauty.  "Soryn. I need you to promise me something."
Soryn shook his head, "No. None of this promise ****. You're making it through this."
She shut her eyes and ignored him, "If I don't, I want you to sacrifice me. Free yourselves."
Soryn gripped her hand tight. "No. You're going to make it. I won't let you die."
Ruby gripped the steering wheel tight, "Hold on!" She whipped the wheel around to the right, swinging the car wide down a muddy path. Soryn protected Lilya's as the car bucked and swerved.
Malyk swore as he hit his head on the door. "****, Ruby!"
Ruby snarled and ignored him, speeding down the driveway, blaring her horn as she saw a house atop a wooded hill. "There it is! The doctor should be inside."
The lights in the house came on as the commotion was heard. Ruby slammed on the brakes and brought the car skidding to a halt at the front door. Soryn lifted Lilya effortlessly, cradling her like a child. Lilya weakly clung to Soryn's shirt, panting softly. She looked absentmindedly at the house, laughing softly. "This place... I remember this place."
Lilya's body began to shake as she fought for control of her own mind. Her eyes dilated and the whites of her eyes turned a deep onyx color. "**** me... Please **** me... Don't let it out."
Her body was ice cold against Soryn's and he started to panic. She closed her eyes and he could see her reeling from an unseen battle raging in her mind.
Soryn walked up the creaking wooden steps and onto the covered porch. The door swung open and Soryn was greeted by a gun barrel swinging up towards his head. He flinched but held his ground. The gun wielder was a young woman, in her late twenties, clad only in her silk robe. She had the eyes of someone without fear. Soryn cleared his throat, "We need help. Our friend..."
He glanced down at Lilya, who was barely holding on to him. "Our friend is dying."
The woman glanced at Lilya, a spark of recognition in her eyes. She lowered her gun to her side and gestured for Soryn to bring Lilya inside. Malyk and Ruby remained outside out of respect for the stranger's privacy. Ruby sat next to the door while Malyk paced back and forth along the porch.
The decor inside was quaint, but the furnishings had a modern functionality, like two worlds lived in this one house. Soryn had no time to admire the scene as he clutched the seemingly lifeless form of his friend. The woman walked to the basement door, flipping the light switch to the dark stairway. The tungsten lights buzzed to life, casting a blinding glare on everything. Soryn  blinked and let his eyes adjust before continuing  down the flight of stairs. The cold stone bit into his heels, but he couldn't worry about that. Soryn followed the silk-clad woman down to a large room that looked extremely out of place, like it should have been in a  hospital instead of a basement. Once inside, Soryn saw a polished operating table and surgical tools beneath a bright dome light. Soryn swallowed hard and lay Lilya on the table gently. The woman tied her blonde hair back in a ponytail and shrugged her shoulders, letting her robe fall to the floor. Soryn's heart skipped a beat as he looked at her exposed form. Her body was supple and each curve was exquisitely defined, with symmetrical tattoos like tiger stripes on either side of her stomach, legs, and arms.
Something about her confidence and finesse intrigued him. She was the kind of girl that most men would **** to have one night with.
Then it dawned on him. She looked exactly like Lilya. He could feel his cheeks flush at the thought of them. The woman glanced at him and he looked down at the table, flushing completely. She smirked, "If you want to stare at my **** go ahead. If I wasn't okay with it I wouldn't have you down here."
Soryn cleared his throat, his gaze automatically drifting towards her chest before he shook himself. "Sorry, doc. It's just, you remind me of someone else."
He thought he could hear her mutter, "I wonder who."
Whatever insecurity she had was hidden, as she went straight to work on Lilya. Soryn stood at one side of the table, while the woman stood on the other.
Her hands moved swiftly, expertly, focused on mending the dying girl. The woman's hand slid under the table, only  to return with a pair of surgical shears. Starting at the collar of the blouse, the doctor began cutting away. Soon the fabric fell away, followed by Lilya's bra, shorts and *******.
Lilya's clothes were now non-existent, and Soryn blushed as he looked at his naked friend, feeling an all too familiar urge. How many times had he wished to caress her most intimate parts, to feel her warm cleft around him.
Lilya's body was covered in serpentine tattoos, the ink scales winding over her limbs and torso. Soryn's favorite part was a scaly tail that wrapped around her leg. Oh how he had longed to trace the tail up to it's base.
His mind drifted to his fantasies of making love to her and his heart started racing. He bit his tongue. No. Now was not the time to be ogling her. He berated himself for being so selfish. She was near death and all he could think of in the moment was how he wanted to **** her.
The doctor broke the silence with two accusatory words, "What happened?"
Soryn's heart sank, "Lilya and Ruby were looking for someone, and when they tried to sum-..." He trailed off, suddenly feeling more naked than she was. How did he know he could trust her? Ruby obviously knew about her but not much.
The woman rolled her eyes. Her voice was sultry, airy even, as she retorted, "Yes, she tried to summon a Seeker. What happened?"
Soryn's mouth moved to form words, but he couldn't force them out. This doctor knew of his kind. Well enough to know that Lilya was a Bound Soul.
The woman slammed a fist into the table, jarring him, "Spit it out, ******, I need to know so I don't e

Awakening slowly in morning shadows,
Céline senses what might now ripen and
grow within her. The earth is ringing out.

By obscure transitions, affirming visions in
the girl’s self-determining mind are revealing
new depths to her evolving character.

The nameless hour has arrived, that
mesmerizing, eternal hour, when children
cease to look vaguely at the sky.

What was previously dreaming confusedly
in her eyes now takes on a more determined
glint; her resolute grin also declares it.

While still half asleep, a single delightful
odour communicates itself, returning the
nine-year-old to an autumn lived long ago.

Unaware that the Madeleine returned Proust
to his childhood, she suspects memories will
awaken and breathe when odours are good.  

The bitter, sticky fragrance of rice cakes
cooking on the breakfast fire has returned
Céline to her to grandmother’s kitchen.

She shakes herself awake, blaming the sweet
odour on a dream, but she has bounced off
the intimate memory of grandmother’s cakes.  

Her sense of it is sleepy, but she’s aware
that this odour is beginning to introduce
her to visions of a life she has not yet lived.

Then, unaccountably, a series of echoing
sounds accompany the scented reverie and
her potential universe unravels further.

It’s no vague hint; it will sleep in her heart
forever, or until she is rocking her worn,
old body in a warm rocking chair.

Attuned to the fountain’s sweet harmony,
she imagines the multi-layered sounds are
multiplying with endless new variations.

The gathering vision washes over her in
soothing waves of strange calm, mixing
a taste of knowledge with hints of mirth.

She discovers these sounds to be edible and
having feasted on her memories, she now lifts
her head to facilitate her feeding on the future.

She can smell all there is to know
roasting in the sky. No words come
but she vocalises the amiable sounds.

Breathing rhythmically, it is no surprise to
her that life can be sensitised in this fashion;
she has played reverie like this before.

Céline knows how to curl away, go
deep within, sing in her head and
rejoice in opportunities of solitude.

She bids her sleep-filled body to stir,
re-affirm who she is and discover what
the welcoming sounds have in store.

No answer comes, but fortified and grateful
for the magical reveries she surrenders to a
forest that will be wild beyond her knowing.

Drinking in the dawn like a cup of spring
water, she prepares to enter the heart of this
forest by vowing to stay close to her heart.

I mingle sometimes
and sometimes subside also
lost too, and wave too
sometimes; but here and there
there and then
washed up on shore, I am
glancing confusedly around, and I am
pecked and poked and
picked and tossed and turned roundround

and then, then
blue comes
and within it, glittery dust
and as I am slowly buried alright
and as I am alright almost
a tiding comes
from winds’ thick gossips
of a tiding bog
that will claim me again
and then falls, and pulls and it claims me, yes

and so the nights drip down on dawn
and I mingle, mingle almost, sometimes

It’s 2:00 a.m.
and I’m still not the person I want to be.

Confusedly used and choosing to cycle
a doozy of a beut be abusing the noodle
a noose for the loose lies and snoozed eye libel
chewing glue ‘til you blew new bubbles in trouble

I taunt me,
like a ripcord to a jumper.

Am I toiling or roiling? Or, do I even need to be foiled?
It leads me to believe I’m receiving the peace
by impeaching the keenness of leaderless feet
indeed defeating the most royal of boyles

Safety always seconds away.
But never close enough to be chosen.

Bite-sized incisors to rise from within
riptides to ride side-saddle or be straddled with a grin
paddle again, battle a jinn: the sin-bin win-win for adolescent kids
the spirit can hear it, dinned in tinnitus