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Ralph E Peck Dec 2013
Simone was among the smallest of the small, a flutist of the smallest size,
Who carried herself well, and seemed to be taller than she was, at least in her mind,
Making her among the tallest, among those who could strut their stuff across the marching field.
She was proud, even on these practice days, when the dew of morning would
Make the practice areas so wet, and make her roll her pants up to just below her knees,
And her shoes would be soaked before it was over, and her heart would melt
Inside the flute, so big it seemed, compared to her hundred pounds.

Simone left little to chance, her eyes were forward, yet they moved quickly
From side to side, always checking her position on the field, and her
Position among those with her, and her position in what she perceived to be
The best among them.

One, two, three, four, five, six.  Repeat. One, two, three, four, five, six.  Six to five
They marched, long strident steps for the five foot of her, almost as if she was
Carrying the length of the world upon her shoulders. Her back was straight, her head
High up, toward the southern sky that held not a cloud, and the footsteps of those
Around her, the Flutist, till the turn, then the French horns crossing her path,
And she listened for the cue among them, and realized they carried their instrument
But there was nothing to be heard, as their mouths looked as though they played
Yet only the mouth pieces knew, it was but a scam of time.

She was wrapped in the image, that being here, on this field of one hundred twenty,
There was a leader, if you thought of it, too lead them in their playing,
But the real leader was her, briskly marching; head up, down the field, and hearing
The slides of the trombones, bam bammer, bam bam, up and down, as they never looked,
But kept time, her flute so bright and cheery, and so lost in the mornings lift.
One, two, three, four, five, six.  Six steps to five, six steps to five, six steps to five.  
Other bands, no all bands, marched eight to five, which would seems so much more
Comfortable to march, smaller steps, smaller people, across the field so major in its size
But her band, marched six steps to five, making for cleaner, tighter lines.

Ta da, daaa da, tee dee daa dumple deed ah daa, the trumpets and cornets rang out, loud
And seemingly obnoxious, in their tee dahs and tee daaaas, making for a crashing sound
Of thuno didity thump thump as the drummers passed, all music ringing loose from her head,
And the crashing sound of the drum, and the Thump, Thump, Thump, Thump of the bass,
Keeping time, keeping rhythm, of the John Phillips Sousa march across the field.
Her feet kept time, her flute braced up to her lips, her breath pouring forth,
Blending in perfect time, to make the most pleasant noise, her breath taken in, and her breath out
She flowed with the drums, the trombones, the trumpets, and heard the bass attempts
To play of the baritones, God’s most beautiful instrument, and the caterwauling
Of the clarinets, tooting and playing and attempting to play, some brand of music,
Some portion of a song that must have been heard long ago, that seemed to have
Nothing at all in common with the song at hand, but each looking down to trace
Their finger patterns, to hear the music as it played.

Simone’s flute, for all it was worth in her small tiny hands, in her small tiny arms,
Across this major large field, with these bodies next to hers, with the blats and sickles,
The very intent of each one to make its noise across at one another, seemed
To be a cacophony of sound, a completeness of nothing, and mess of a wreck of instruments.

Then there was the noise.   A complete and un-fractured belt of wonderful musical sound
As it marched toward her, as it seemed to assault, but to pay compliments to her,
As it seemed to worship the very wet, damp ground, upon which she walked, she felt something
In her body, a stirring, a feeling, her stomach turning in a good way, as her eyes lifted
She saw him, marching, One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six times across the field,
One step was starting on the yard line, the last touching the yard line, five yards later.

The sousaphone.  This mass of brass, wrapped three times at the valves, turned
Around his neck, ending in a massive, shiny, bell of a horn, bigger around than her body
Bigger than a freight train coming down the track at her, she saw him.  Felt him.
Could feel the cool timber of his breath and voice and song, played so well upon
That instrument.  He was over six feet tall, no six feet six, and that horn, dear god,
Was two feet and several inches across the bell, putting him eight feet tall,
Compared to her five feet, and her fragile weight, and the mass before her.  That sounded,
So beautiful.  So real, such a part of it all, its tone, its timber, its reality was there and Anthony,
Playing it with intensity, playing it so strong, its notes almost removing her light little
Shoes from the field.  She thought she could float, she thought for a moment, that she
Had died and was no longer walking, but floating across the field.

Boom. Boom. Boom. Down. The. Scale. Up. The. Scale. Boom. Boom. Boom. Anthony played the music,
And marched, keeping time, and handling the music well……and he heard her soft little notes
This miniature toy before him, this small flutist playing her trills, her melody, her principle
Piece so well, so that it sneaked in and captured his heart in a moment, his breath short,
His feeling of being the only person in the band, suddenly expanded to two, took him hard.

And they played their music, their parts, and the rest of the band tried to keep up.
Shofi Ahmed Jul 2018
Dancing the billow in the sea
the cool one will show up
in no time with love.
Deep down from the deep
with the flute on the lips.

Listen to the flute!
The chorus clouds bang out
floating by the river blue,
singing down the sky as they move.

Popping out of the secret valley
the sun branches in
ambling with the wonder light
as if the punter sun knew it,
knows the flutist's arty
rise from down the sea!

Every planet is a flying bee
twirling around the inner music
nothing ever stops in the solar disc.

The waning and waxing Moon
in silhouette and in the half-light
swings over the sea full of life.

It all starts from the ground;
it was from our sea waterfront
Him the creative sweetheart in the midst
floated the leading light the bumblebee.
All the stars bubble in the galaxy
they know this ancient story!

Since then the brightest bulb
the sun in the solar ring  
leads the bunch’s mindful
butterfly dance on the way home.
Following the enduring haunting melody
of the pre-design command ‘Qun’ be!
A poem from my upcoming book Qun: Love is Unconditional
GR Aug 2017
i count
these shy stars
scattered
in the night sky
like beads on an abacus

little jewels
coalescing
to form shapes
like a fish, boar, turtle and a lion

each cluster
merging into a milky ocean
wherein
the cosmic flutist
plays a tune to which
all the stars dance

© 2017
Carlo C Gomez Jan 2020
Gift me with song
My darling flute-player
Gentle stirrings
Musical stimuli
Rouse the heavens
To extraordinary flight
Take me to the throes
Of immorality and back
The jetstream of which
Will glisten like gold
Upon your sacrificial lips
Wellspring Sep 2018
I stand on this roof,
Gazing upon the twilight world,
The faces of passersby,
Shrouded by veils of stars and night.

I play my song of eerie trills;
The highs,
The lows,
This sickeningly sweet lullaby,
Carrying all into the comforting embrace,
Of midnight slumber.

This swooping melody,
My warm, but shuddering breath
breathes life into the frost covered flute,
Cradled in my ice cold hands.

My breath,
My life,
Heard by all,
But me.
This is kinda about my insomnia? But, make what you will of it.
Beside an ebbing northern sea
While stars awaken one by one,
We walk together, I and he.

He woos me with an easy grace
That proves him only half sincere;
A light smile flickers on his face.

To him love-making is an art,
And as a flutist plays a flute,
So does he play upon his heart

A music varied to his whim.
He has no use for love of mine,
He would not have me answer him.

To hide my eyes within the night
I watch the changeful lighthouse gleam
Alternately with red and white.

My laughter smites upon my ears,
So one who cries and wakes from sleep
Knows not it is himself he hears.

What if my voice should let him know
The mocking words were all a sham,
And lips that laugh could tremble so?

What if I lost the power to lie,
And he should only hear his name
In one low, broken cry?
Snow falls.  The sky is grey, and sullenly glares
With purple lights in the canyoned street.
The fiery sign on the dark tower wreathes and flares . . .
The trodden grass in the park is covered with white,
The streets grow silent beneath our feet . . .
The city dreams, it forgets its past to-night.

And one, from his high bright window looking down
Over the enchanted whiteness of the town,
Seeing through whirls of white the vague grey towers,
Desires like this to forget what will not pass,
The littered papers, the dust, the tarnished grass,
Grey death, stale ugliness, and sodden hours.
Deep in his heart old bells are beaten again,
Slurred bells of grief and pain,
Dull echoes of hideous times and poisonous places.
He desires to drown in a cold white peace of snow.
He desires to forget a million faces . . .

In one room breathes a woman who dies of hunger.
The clock ticks slowly and stops.  And no one winds it.
In one room fade grey violets in a vase.
Snow flakes faintly hiss and melt on the window.
In one room, minute by minute, the flutist plays
The lamplit page of music, the tireless scales.
His hands are trembling, his short breath fails.

In one room, silently, lover looks upon lover,
And thinks the air is fire.
The drunkard swears and touches the harlot's heartstrings
With the sudden hand of desire.

And one goes late in the streets, and thinks of ******;
And one lies staring, and thinks of death.
And one, who has suffered, clenches her hands despairing,
And holds her breath . . .

Who are all these, who flow in the veins of the city,
Coil and revolve and dream,
Vanish or gleam?
Some mount up to the brain and flower in fire.
Some are destroyed; some die; some slowly stream.

And the new are born who desire to destroy the old;
And fires are kindled and quenched; and dreams are broken,
And walls flung down . . .
And the slow night whirls in snow over towers of dreamers,
And whiteness hushes the town.
Michael Siebert Jan 2013
Mom
The sky is dead today,
but it looks a whole lot prettier
when you pump it full of formaldehyde
and slap some lipstick on it.
Its hair has fallen out,
but they make wigs for a reason.
Though Christ was once
the  world's most skilled coroner
the job has been left to the Children
of the city of God.
America is the last reservoir,
a stoic Indian
with a single tear
bleeding onto a deserted strip of highway.
We are the carbs we inhale.
We **** parasites,
choke down antibiotics
and anger our parents
for coming home fifteen minutes after curfew.

As mother earth lies
dying in a hospital bed,
(s)he listens to the sound of her
heart monitor,
looks at her dying flesh,
and says
"My God
how I've gotten old."
And us,
we,
the people,
all but cells
in this planet's ravaged body
reflect on what has changed.

Me?

The parking garage where
my friends and I
used to make believe
ain't gonna be around much longer.
The schools I visit
on weekends during the winter
feel shallow,
my victories easily won.
My nana lost the ability
to pick up the phone
and dial seven digits,
and the flutist
started drinking again.

I play the same seven songs
every Sunday,
and I try to believe that something
is out there,
and that there's a reason
for my eternal sense of boredom,
and yet I can't help but think I'm stuck.

My eyes are tired,
but her body is warm,
and the only time I find solace
is when I'm running my fingers across
her tattoo.
People change,
I changed,
hell,
Mother changed.
When I look at her high school photos,
I think,
"How did we go from Pangaea to
pieces?
We really let her go."

Yeah, it's our fault that Mom
isn't feeling well these days.
And we all feel real bad about that.
And we feel real bad about ourselves.

Up in the heavens,
the heart monitor spits out its last ding
and the line begins to flatten.
The sky ignites
and as this happens
we all come to the same realization.

Our victories are not hard-won.
We are not the sum of our parts.
All accomplishments are
only the result of circumstance.
We are nothing without our rifles.
We once had meaning,
but we gave it away
at lunch for a
Snack Pack.

All at once,
the continents collide.
The doctors in the sky
burst into Mom's room
and attempt to resuscitate her.
Earthquakes   shatter our spines,
volcanoes erupt,
the world burns in a flash.

For a moment, she awakes.
"I love you,"
she says.
"Always remember that."
Then all is silent.
The hospital
shuts off,
all lightbulbs burst
all patients dead.
No life supported.

God smiles.
I didn't proofread this prior to posting. Wrote it in one big burst. Feedback appreciated, as always.
vircapio gale Jun 2012
lost beyond thoughts of consequence,
bouncing taxis blur the streets of my wanderings,
crowds released from roadside governance
and the stillness gauges frantic adverts splayed.
readiness surges toward academe
in the guile of non-influence;
inspiration settles into future springs
while the flutist pleas for calm;
and systems drag emotively to better corners.
friendships diverge with wiser makings worn.
in living returns the united self.
aside turgid dregs of failure’s learned balm
the written strength of former minds
bead their voices into soulful vestibules
and I crouch gayly in the tent of my desire
viewing unmet worlds swept behind,
saving other time-intended growth
for lissome moments drawing on.
Late this moonlit  night
I am sitting at the sill
of the window opened
dreaming of the past.
Oh, unknown flutist,
of the day long gone
now play your flute
to the charming tune
once I heard
in such a night.
Robert C Howard Sep 2015
MUSICA ANTIQUA

I - Time Keeper

Prize of a difficult hunt
fresh meat seared in the fire pit:

The ****-clothed victor
severed pieces with his flint
to feed his mate and son
then idly stroked a hollow log
with his crimson tinted club.

He picked up the pace
when the child began
to laugh and whirl
about the flames -
his mother' contented smile
telling, that for a spell at least,
serenity ruled the glade.

II - Found Flutes

In a time too early for telling.
one of our kind unearthed
a dry hollow bone and blew.

Its tones were pleasing
but many more could be found
by scoring several holes in its side.

Though carbon dating may tell
to a millennium or so, when,
no one can ever say why.

III - To Build a Lyre

A Grecian soldier on a cyprus stump
cut holes in a bow too lax for arrows
and gently swept his weathered fingers
across the new strung cords
then composed a lyric to Pan's amors
and a second to brave Alexander.

The soldier, well pleased
resolved to fashion a nobler frame
for his dulcet strings
and raised worthy songs
to Apollo and Terpsichore.

MUSICA MODERNA

IV – The Music Press

In his modest shop in Venice
Ottaviano Petrucci turned the wheel
and pressed notes to paper
for music's first edition.

Squares and diamonds peppered the staves
and tunes of Obrecht and Josquin des Prez
soon graced the salons
of Europe‘s most elegant palaces.

V - Sonata Pian e Forte

From a desk at St. Mark’s in Venice
Gabrieli pondered a question,
“How can an echo’s diminishing sound
be shown in a music score
so that one group of brass
can reflect the other
across the cathedral's nave? '

With two simple words he shifted forever
the course of music’s stream.
For the leaders he marked down “forte, ”
and their its echo marked down, “pian.”

VI - The Master of Cremona

Stradivarius extracted a maple sheet
From his curing vat in Cremona
and hung it to dry with the others -

Then taking his carving knives
He sculpted a cello's scroll
while a golden sheened violin
awaited his finishing cloth.

His secrets expired
when his time was fulfilled
but his magic sings on forever.

VII - Theodore Boehm, designer - flutist*

A gifted precious metal smith
desiring a more supple flute
applied all his art and skill
to its maze of rods and keys.

Each trial was scored
by his ears and fingers
until the door was unlatched.
to euphonious efficiency.
Clarinetists then coaxed him
to fashion their keys as well.

So behind every dixie licorice stick
or Debussy’s pastel faun
stands a persistent man
with a silver flute and
a jeweler's patient hands.

December, 2007
The chances of being
a regular chap in education
I have failed to avail,
I have missed I must say
But there was no sign
in my life of any success
Anything good
would have been happened...

Now a days, I am suffering
with super frustration
What really would
I do in my future,
All the potential
of my learning & gaining
To be a standalone fellow
is going to be reduced one by one!

No one is at my side
and nothing productive
happens around me...
It’s quite dark everywhere,
wall and wall so high
I’m almost finished
and it’s hard to capture
The gone wind but
I am trying my best to recover...

To rediscover the gap
I have created by myself
I am super lonely
in my way of life,
perhaps I am cynic...
And the people I am engaged with
are not so helpful and friendly
All the way they act
so competitively, thinking of their own only...

I am in vain my lord
and I know not what’s
in my store really...
I wish If I could get
any fair chance in my country!
But my lord, there are so many
unfair means in social or political dealings,
It’s quite ridiculous
and I realize it a way out system of our society...

One major thing
I feel inside that I must bring myself
Out from the darkness now
I am bearing with me
The most lashing thing
is the loneliness & friendless
environment all around
My parents are still alive
but they can’t help me as I need...

Then all I do have effectively
is me only, my dear roadrunners  
The growing myself in me
whom I did never try to find
I have no one for myself
except me,
I was blindfolded  
I start now depending on myself,
better late than never...

All the dreams and high hopes
will reduce to dust uselessly
If I leave myself
if I misunderstand myself,
if I underestimate myself
So many occasions
I did the mistakes feeling helpless ,
Oh me...!
But in the most next minute
I get the power of myself in me to live like a man

Critical reality has taught me
to speak to myself, it’s a chance
Like a human in the world
full chances to live with rice & respect
I am no more helpless
for I am now with myself and precisely
An invisible flutist is everywhere
with me as well watching me ...



© 2015 Mohammad Anwar Parvez Shishir
Rama Krsna May 2020
inside that inner cave
shines an effulgent flame,
complexioned like camphor
bearing a crescent moon
he’s pure as white jasmine
sole terminator
of the veil of illusion
cast by the lilting tunes of
that captivating flutist

© 2020
Hinata Jan 2015
There she stood playing a melody,
Her fingers positioned and ready.
She's such a tease as she trilled her passionate notes,
Playing songs that someone else wrote.
Her flute gleaming in the spotlight,
I love the way her lips were positioned on that pipe.
Her eyes sparkled as she ran through scales with such ease,
Her melody still haunts my dreams.
The way she blew steady air into her flute was ******,
And she continued to play notes that were chaotic.
Her fingers danced with passion over the keys,
Making me get down on my knees.
I imagined her fingers dancing upon me,
Imagining us in perfect harmony.
She gave me such a thrill,
My body is tingling with chills.
Her lips firm as she played,
Manipulating her mouth to make volume rise and finally fade.
Be mine, you free little bird,
Your song is the only one I heard.
Unleash your melody into me,
Let's make sweet harmony.
I love the way you tease me,
I love the way you play me.
I want my heart to be your flute,
Playing it to your wicked tune.
I love the way you fly,
I want to keep you as my own sweet lullaby.
Be mine, my beloved teasing flutist,
Let your melody and my background tune become sweet bliss.
Anyways, I decided to continue it. It's not as good as the first but I did the best I could with it. I like it, it came out better than I expected. Let me know what you think.
Micah Alex Oct 2017
I haven't written at length for a long time now and my maelstorms are worse. I haven't written for my heart and the protest inside has reached a crescendo of violence. The dam is at its limit and I am the explosion waiting inside. My conductor has quit and the orchestra has lost its sanity, timbral destruction and cymbal apocalypse. I watch helplessly the drowning flutist and the bleeding pianist. Whale song rings in my ear all the time, and I am tired of this dismembering dissonance. My nostrils flare in the polluted river and the acid water has reached my lungs. They burn with the intensity of jealous stars and pull me in like black holes. Sometimes the heat is too much and the cold offers nightmarish dreams of death. So I bear the burden of two jackets soaked in ice water. My teeth, eyes and nails feel like they might fall into my food and I won't have the energy to even care for self-cannibalism. The church has fallen on our heads and my life is frothing at the mouth. The madness is finally settling in, violently setting up camp in my soul. My veins pulse rhythmically like the drums in a System of a Down song.

Father why have you forsaken me?

In your eyes forsaken me.

In your thoughts forsaken me.

In
your
heart
forsaken
me.
streaming
Merry Feb 2018
I cherish the music
Phantasms in the audio
The smell and the touch
When it comes to you
Dear Music Man
You leave me with a musical mania

Come on, Music Man
Take me by the hand
Honey, you’re so electric
You should come with a warning
Danger: high voltage

When we’re together
It feels like forever
We’ve got a live-wire energy
An electric sort of synergy
You’re the melody
I’m the lyrics
Melding together
The perfect composition

Good music on the score
Vibrations coming up through the floor
Our ***** touches will leave us sore
And wanting more

When your hands are on your guitar
I want them on my back
I want them on my hips
And I want your lips on my lips
And I want your voice in my bones
Shaking me
Shaking me
Shaking me

Men like you
Are admittedly a dime a dozen
But like a jukebox
I’d put a dime in you
Because I love listening
To your voice
It’s like a smooth, sustained cello line
A bass line dripping with warmth
Dropping in my heart

I was lying on my bed
Thoughts of you stuck in my head
When it’s heavy as lead
I know what you’ve said

And what you’ve sung
Will get me through
The nights
And the mornings
Where dreams
Thicken the loneliness
Of when you aren’t there
Or when anyone ain’t there
Just the slowly strangulating air
Dealt by hands
Belonging to a flutist
With the deeds of a duellist
Who makes me battle

Against the song I sing
Against the song I want to sing
Against the musical mania
Against the sing you sing
Against the song you want to sing
Against the Music Man
Jacob Thomas Oct 2018
Waning scion
encroaching
a course

An Isolated course;
coarse is its skin
blind-sight is its eye
with flutist wind
whistling its mind

Sly stars dripping
under fogged
horizons
the moon shuttering
light,
fleeing from the
gaunt wood
where I reside

Night,
shroud of
razor black
oozing pustules
of defect and blight,
mind snaking through
bowels--
grisly bowels kept in
swamps
kept in dark and damp
kept underground--
stone underground

Sprouting
out splintered
atonement,
slumped on a
broken wall

Gray above,
light humming
under feet,
through scabrous
stone and sodden clay

One hope lingers:
plunge worrisome
hands into the
viscous floor

Tugging fingernails,
bartering
screams with the wind,
grounded pain arises through the dirt,
latching to my veins

Injecting the soil and stone into my
twitching heart, feeding the cells with
native essence

Purging the human from
the silken skin; spraying it into
the sediment home

Bedrock welcomes my sight
and my trench
shapes my stale body.

           Becoming soil and rock
           and worms and root
           offers a listing breeze
           to the now formless thought

The dirt is in me
The rock is in me
The qualm is without
Ilene Bauer Jul 2017
The tix are free so people wait
For hours, sitting on the grass,
But we are old; to compensate
There is a bench to plop one’s ***.

By half-past eight, the benches filled,
The ticket-seekers settle in
While late arrivals, not too thrilled,
Allow the side-show to begin.

They make us move so they can squeeze
Their bodies on a proper seat,
Without the courtesy of “Please”
(Ticked-off, no doubt, at their defeat).

A flutist sets his stand and plays;
A grouchy woman bids him cease.
He grumbles when nobody pays,
His music, though, a sweet release.

The conversations ebb and flow.
We people watch (the pickings fine).
I bond with folks I do not know;
That happens on the senior line.

The hours pass; we get our tix.
We’ll meet again when it gets dark
To share in summer’s yearly fix
Of seeing Shakespeare in the Park.
Lawrence Hall Apr 2022
Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com  
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

                               Flute Solo Through a Scratchy Record

From a tiny speaker in a tiny radio
From a broadcast fifty miles away
From a scratchy record some fifty years old
From the lips of a flutist no longer alive

An artist whose parents and teachers long ago
Spoke of embouchures and possibilities
Of lessons for however many dollars each
Saved from a job down at the shop or mill

And from the people, hardworking and strong
Someone worked those lives into a song
july hearne Jul 2017
i used to post poetry and short stories
and long, meandering journals
written while ******
on another website,

but quit because membership has gone down
from several thousand to four members over the years.

the same few people log in every day,
they are all retired, so they have a lot of spare time.

the kids aren't coming back, and everyone just keeps on getting
older and older.

one of these four people has been a member there since 1999,
so almost a generation.

he has 3,852 works on file.
basically, he is the only person
still posting on that website.

many of these were written in the 70's, 80's, 90's,
but are posted daily in comic sans font, along with a comment
and the date the poem was originally written. he keeps archives.

i hope he doesn't read the poetry here because i don't want to hurt his feelings.
he has the same birthday as my dad,
so i sort of felt sorry for him when his girlfriend who listed her occupation as "professional clown, potter, and jazz flutist" started ignoring him and left him and the website that he has loved for 18 years.

she has 999 works on file
and all of them are really long and typed in all capital letters. most of them have no paragraph breaks.
it's always impressive to me when someone can write a fairly long poem with no line breaks and still have it keep the reader's attention.
poetryaccident Jun 2018
My life resolved around the last
premise sought in precipice
when the end decides my fate
by the drink or the dance

what came before was the lead
flutist calling those who hear
presenting options as I proceed
following blindly as instrument

spinning gears in the machine
for the goal at the last ticks
clicking down as if in a dream
what’s beyond an interim course

these are the avenues I’m bequeathed
walking miles until that time
marking what comes in between
as the space before the end

a star shining in darkened sky
pointing downward as if to say
finality seeks to resolve
dearest wishes from the heart

now the last becomes the first
defined by my will to endure
passage sought to survive
until finality has arrived.

© 2018. Sean Green. All Rights Reserved. 20180616.
The poem “Until Finality” was inspired by a mention in an audit book.  The author shared that people have their favorite “lasts”, be they drinks, dances, or partners.  This prompt became the metaphorical foundation for my poem.

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