entablature archetypal wrangle arguable arraign arrest ascribe arsenal article artificial artisan ascension austere askance obliquely aspire assail assault assay assert diligence obsequious assimilate stigma perspicacious astute asunder atman atrium attrition intrepid autonomous avarice avert avocation azimuth azure abbreviate aberrant abhorrent relinquish loathe abstinence abstention  abysmal accelerate accordance accoutrement accrue exasperate acquaintance baccalaureate bacillus backbite baggage ballistic baluster bandolier banister barrage barranca barrier bartizan basilica bastion batholiths bathyscaphe battalion batten battle bauble ***** beastly ******* beckon beacon bazaar bizarre Bedouin beguile behavior beleaguer belligerent belvedere berserk beseech bewilder bezant bicker bigamy bight bilk billet billiard billow biogenic biscuit bivouac blatancy blizzard bodacious boggle bollix bombardier boudoir bouquet butte boutique bower brassier mesa breach breech brochure brogue brooch broach bruise brusque buccaneer buffoon bureau buttress buxom caffeine cauldron calisthenics calligraphy callous camouflage campaign campanile cannery cannibal canny cantaloupe cantankerous cantilever capacity capillary capricious carbohydrate caricature carnivorous carouse carriage cartography casserole cassette cataclysm catastrophe cache categorical caterwaul cavalier cauliflower celerity alacrity cellophane cellulose cemetery centennial cereal cerebellum ceremonial cesarean cessation chaff challenge champagne chandelier changeable chaparral charade chargeable chassis chateau chauffer chauvinism Cheshire chiaroscuro chicanery chiffon chigger chrysanthemum cipher circuit citadel clairvoyant clastic clique coalesce coercible coincidental colloquial colossal column combustible communicable community commute complacency compulsory comradery conceit conceal concession confetti conglomerate conjugal connive connoisseur consensus constellation consummate continuity contrivance convalesce convenient convertible convolution copasetic copious corduroy coriolis cornucopia corollary corpse corpuscle correlate correspondent corridor corroborate corrosion corrugate corrupt costume counselor countenance counterfeit courageous courier courtesy covert covetous cranny crease credenza credulity crescent ******* criterion crochet crocodile croissant crotchety crucial cruel cryptic cuddle cuisine cul-de-sac culinary culpable culvert cumbrous cummerbund ******* cunning curare curiosity curtilage curtsy curvaceous custody cylindrical cymbal cynicism cyst dabble daffodil daiquiri damsel dastardly dazzle deceit debilitate debonair debris debutant decency decipher decimate deconcentrate decorum decrepit dedicate defamation defendable defensible deference deficient deficit definitive defoliate delectable deliberate delicatessen delinquent delirious demarcate dementia demolish demure denigrate dentil denunciation deplorable depreciate dereliction derisory derrick descent desirable despair desperate despicable despondent destine deterrent detonate deviance devisal devisor devour dexterous diabolicalness diagnosis dialogue diamond diaphragm diarrhea dichondra dawdle differentia difficulty diffuse dilapidate dilate dilemma diligent dilute diminutive dinghy dinosaur director  dirigible disadvantageous disastrous disperse disciplinary discomfiture discordant discotheque discreet discrete discrepancy disgust disguise dishevel dispersal dissect dissention dissertation dissident dissipate dissolve dissonant distillate distortion distraught disturbance divvy docile docket doctrinal dodder ***** eccentric linguistics domical dominate domineer dominion dossier doubloon douse drawl dreary dubious dulcet dungeon duodenum duress dwindle dynamism dynasty ebullition echinoderm eclectic ecliptic economist ecumenism edifice editor educe effervesce efficacious egalitarian elaborate elapsed eerie elegy eligible eliminate elite elixir elongate elucidate elusion eluviation emaciate embarrass embassy embellish embezzle embroidery embryo emissary emollient emphatic enchilada encore encumbrance endeavor endogenous endure engender ensemble enthusiast entourage entrepreneur epaulet epitome erratic erroneous escapade esophagus espionage esplanade etcetera ethereal etiquette eucalyptus eulogy exaggerate exacerbate excellency exhilarate expectant exquisite facetious Fahrenheit fallacy fanion fealty feisty frisky felicitous fenestration ferocious fertile fervent fickle fictitious fiery finesse finial fjord flaccid fledge flippant flirtatious flivver fluctuate follicle forbearance forbiddance forehand forebode forceps forfeit
forgo forlorn formidable foundry foyer fracas fraught frivolous frolic frontier funnel copious furrow fuselage fusillade futile forgone frivolity frolic galaxy galleon galoot galore galoshes gambit gangrene ganglion gargantuan gargoyle gardenia garret garrote gasolier gatling gawky gazebo gazelle gazette geezer geisha gendarme generosity genre genteel gentry genuine geodesic geranium gesticulate ghastly giggle ****** gimmick giraffe gizzard glacier glamour glimmer glimpse glisten glottis gluteus gluttony glyph gnarly gnaw goddess godling gorgeous gorilla gory gossamer gourd gouts gracious gradient granary grandeur granulation grapple gratify gratuitous gregarious grenade committee grievance griffin gristle grotesque gristly grotto grouch groupie grisly grovel grudge gruel gruesome gubernatorial guerrilla guffaw guidable guidon guile guillotine gullet gymnasium gyrate habitable hacienda haggard halibut halitosis hallelujah hallow halyard hammock harangue harass harried hasp hatred haughty hearth hedonism hegira heinous hegemony hemisphere hemophilia hemorrhage herbivorous hereditary heresy heritage heroine hesitate hibiscus hidden hideous hieroglyphic highfalutin high-rise hilarity hippopotamus hoarse holler holocaust holster homicidal horror hosiery hurricane hydrant hydraulic hydronic hyena hygiene hyphen hypnotize hypochondria hypocrisy hypocrite hypotenuse hysteria idiocy igloo ignoramus ignore illicit illiterate illustrate imbecile immaculate immaterial immature immersible immigrant immune impasse impeccable impedance impenetrable impervious imperfect implement implicate implicit important impressible innately inert impression impugn inadequate inanimate inauspicious incandescent incantation incarcerate incentive incinerator inclusion incoercible incompressible incontrovertible controversy indefatigable inconvertible inconvincible incorruptible indices indictment indigent indigestion digestible indignant indiscretion indiscreet indisiplined indiscernible inducible inebriate ineffable inefficacy ineludible inexorable inexpiable inextricable infallible infatuation inferior inflammatory inflexible infuriate inimitable iniquitous infuse infusion ingenuity ingratiate inimical innards innocence innovate innumerable inoculation insatiable insectivorous insincerity insinuation inspection inspirator instability installation insurance insufferable insufficiency insurrection insupportable integrity intellect intelligence intemperance intension interaction interception intercession interdiction interface interference interpolate interrogate interrupt intersperse intervene interstice intractable intergalactic intransigent intravenous intrepid intricate intrigue introductory introject intrude inundate invective invariable invertebrate investigate intuitive invertible investiture inveterate inviable invidious inviolate invigorate invincible invoke invocation invalidate involute invulnerable impregnable ionosphere ipso-facto irascible iridescent eradicable irrational irredeemable irrefragable irrefutable irregular anomalous irrelevant irreproachable irrepressible irresistible irrevocable irreverent irresponsible irritative irrigate irritability isolable isosceles isostasy  issuance isthmus italicize iterative itinerary interjection ******* jackhammer jackknife jackpot jackrabbit jaguar jai alai jalopy jalousie jamboree Japanese jacquerie Jacobin jargonize jaunt javelin jealous jehoshaphat jeopardy jocular jouncy journal jubilant jubilee judgment judicature judicious juggernaut jugular juke julep juncture junta jurisprudence juvenilia juxtaposition kahuna kalpa kamikaze kerf kangaroo karat ken katzenjammer katydid kempt kerosene kewpie khaki kibitz kibosh kilter kimono kinesiology kleptomaniac knell knowledge knuckle kook kowtow kulak kyrie labyrinth laccolith laceration lackadaisical laconic lacunar lacquer lagging laissez-faire lamprey languish lanyard lapidary laputan larceny lariat laryngeal larynx lascivious latent latter lattice latrine launderette lavatory laxity lechery legacy bequeath legend leister lei leisure lemming leniency lentic leopard lethal lethargy lettuce leviathan levitate lexical liable levity liaison libation liberate licentious lieutenant ligament lilac limnetic limousine limpid lineage lynchpin lineolate lingerie lingual liniment linoleum liquefy litany literacy lithesome littoral lizard loath local loiter longevous loquacity lottery louver lucidity lucrative ludicrous luminary lummox lurid luscious lyricism machinator machinelike machismo macrocosm besmirched machiavellian mackerel mademoiselle maelstrom maggoty magisterial magnanimous magnifico maintenance malaprop malarkey malediction malamute malicious malign malinger malleable mandarin maneuver mange maniacal mannequin manure manzanita maquette maraca maraschino marauder marbleize marbly marionette marmalade marquee marquetry marrow marshal marshmallow martyr mascara masochism massacre matriarchy maudlin mausoleum maxillary mayonnaise meager meandrous medial medieval megalith mediocre Mediterranean megalomania melancholy melee membrane memorabilia menagerie mercenary mendacity meritorious mesmeric mesquite metallurgy metaphor meticulous metronome metropolitan mezzanine micrometer midriff mien demeanor millennium minarets minion minuscule minutia misanthropic miscellaneous mistletoe moccasin modus operandi monaural mongrel monotony morgue morose morsel moribund mortgage mosaic mosque mosquito motley mottle mucous membrane mucus mullion multifarious munificent museum musketeer mutable mustache mutineer myopic myrmidon mystique naïve narcissism narcosis narrate nausea navigable Neanderthal necklace needle nefarious negligible nemesis neophyte nertsy  nerve-racking nestle nether newfangled nocturnal nonchalant non sequitur normative Norwegian nostalgic nuisance nullify obedient obeisance obelisk obese objectify oblate oblique obliterate oblivious obsess obsolete obsolescence obstacle obstinate occupy occurrence ocelot odious oedipal officiate ogle ogre oligarchy omelet omnificent omniscient ontological argument oodles oomph opaque operable operative opossum optimal orangutan orchard orchestra ordinance oregano orgiastic oriel oriole ornery orphan osculate ostensive ostrich osteology oust overwhelm overwrought oyster pachyderm pacific pageant painstaking palate palaver libel palette pallet palomino pamphleteer panorama pantheism parapet paradigm papier-mâché paraffin paralyze parishioner parliament parody parquetry parsimonious pasteurize pathogenic payola ******* pediment pendant pendentives penicillin pennant pentathlon perception percussion perennial parameter perimeter peripheral peristalsis permissible pernicious perron perseverance persistent persona persnickety personnel persuasion petite pertinacious pessimistic pestilent pestle petticoat petulant phallus phantasmagoria pharaoh pharmaceutical peasant philander phenomenal philosopher phlegm phoenix phooey phosphoresce physique picayune picturesque piety pilfer finagle pilaster pillage pineapple pinnacle piquant pique piteous pitiful pittance pizzazz placate placenta plagiarism plaintiff plateau platypus plausible plinth plunderous pluvial poinsettia pollutant polygamy pommel ponderous portico portiere portentous prairie precipitous predecessor predicate predilection preeminent preempt preferential premier preparation preposition prerogative presumption pretentious preternatural privilege proclivity prodigious proffer progenitor progeny promissory promontory propellant propensity propound proselyte prospectus protégé protocol protuberant pseudonym  ptomaine pulchritudinous pursuant pygmy pylon python qualm quarrel quarry quash queer quell querulous quibble quitter quixotic rabbet rabbit rabbi radiant rambunctious rancor rankle raspberry rethink rebellion recant recital reconcile redundant referral reglet relevant reluctant remiss reminiscent remnant rendezvous renegade repartee reprieve repertoire repetitious reprehensive reprisal repugnant rescind reservoir resistant resurgence resurrect revelry reverie retaliate reticent retrieve retrograde reveille reverberation reversible reversion rhapsody rhetoric rheumatism rhinoceros rhinoceri rhubarb ribaldry ricochet riddance rigmarole risqué rive rollick Romanesque Rosicrucian rotisserie rotunda rogue roulette rubato ruminate rusticate sabotage sabbat saboteur sacrilege sadomasochist salacious salmon salutatory samurai sapphire sarcasm sarcophagus sardonic sarsaparilla sassafras sassy satiate satirical saturate saunter savoir-faire savvy scabbard scaffold scalawag scarcity scathe scenario scenic schism sciatic nerve ******* scintillate scissor scourge scrawny scrimmage scribble scruffy scrounge scrumptious scrunch scrupulous scrutiny scurry scythe sedition seethe seismic self-applause seltzer semiporcelain seniority sensible sensual separate sepulcher sequel sequin sequoia serape serenade sheaves serendipity  servant settee shabby shackle shanghai shanty shellac shenanigan Sherlock shirk shish kebob shoulder shrapnel shriek shrubbery shtick shush shyster Siamese sibyl significant simile simplicity simultaneous sinewy siphon skeptic skiff skillet skirmish skullduggery slaughter ****** sleeve sleuth slither slough sluice smart aleck  smidgen  smithereens  smolder  smorgasbord snazzy sneer snide snivel snorkel sobriety socioeconomic sojourn solder soldier solemn solicit soluble solvent sombrero somersault soothe soprano sophisticate sophomore sortie soufflé sousaphone ***** spiel souvenir sovereign spaghetti spandrel sparrow spatter sphinx spatula species specific spectacle spectral spelt sphincter spinach spinneret spiritual splatter splitting splurge spry  splutter sporadic sprawl sprinkler spree sprightly squawk spurious sputter  squabble squalor squander squeak squeal squeamish squeeze squiggle squinch squirrel stable squoosh stabilizer stagnant stagnate stalactite stalagmite stammer stampede stationary stationery statue statuesque statute staunch stealthy stein stellar stench stencil stoic steppe sterile stickler stifle stimulant stingy stirrup stolid strafe straggle strangulate stratagem strategy strenuous stretch strident stringent strudel streusel strychnine studious stultify stupe stupefy stupendous special stylus stymie styptic sublimate subliminal submergible substitute submersible subpoena subsequent subsidiary substantiate suburb subversion success succession succinct succor succulent succumb sufferance suffocate suggest suicidal sully sultry sumptuous sundae sundry superfluous superior supersede superstitious surreal supplicate surrender surrogate survey surveillance suspension suspicion sustenance swarthy ******* swath swear sweaty swelter swerve swindle swivel swizzle sycamore syllable symphony symposium symptom syndicate syndrome synonym synonymous synopsis synthetic syphilis syringe syrup suffrage tableau tabloid tacit tambourine tandem tangible tarantula tarot taunt technique telekinesis temperamental temperance thence temporal temporary tenuous tequila terrace terrain terrific terrify tetanus tether thatch thistle thither through though throat throttle thwack thwart ticklish tiffany timbre tirade titillate toboggan tolerant tongue top-notch topography  tortoise trauma tortuous torturous tourist tracery tournament tourniquet trachea traffic tragedy tragic traipse traitor tranquility transcend travesty transcribe treachery treatise trellis trepidation trestle trinket triplicate triumphant trivial troglodyte troubadour  trousers truncate tumultuous tundra turbid turpitude turquoise tutelage twixt twiddle twitter tycoon tyke typhoon tyrannical tyrannize tyranny umbrella unfulfilled unanimous usury undulate unequivocally unguent urethra unprecedented unscrupulous untenable unwieldy utterance vaccinate vagary valance valiant vandal variety vehement veldt veneer vendetta venetian vengeance vernacular versatile version vertebra vicinity victual vigilante villain vincible vinyl violate vitality vivacious volition voluminous voluptuous ****** vulnerable wahine waiver wallaby warble warrant wayfarer weasel wheedle wheezy weird whilst whistle whither whittle whoopee whoopla wistful whither wizen wont worse worst xanadu yowl yucca zephyr zeppelin zucchini extraversion embezzlement euthanasia extortion obscure carousing marauder aptitude ribaldry rigmarole chicanery shenanigans capers antics escapade crafty cunning cleaver connive furtive sneaky stealthy plunderous pillaging usurper pilferous wheedling finagler longevous loquacity derisory deplorable critical decimations tithe cynic frivolity frolic derriere easel emasculate emaciate linguistic depravity berate scold scorn scoff rail rebukeness  brawl vapid hamster spleen sequiter sequacious sequesterous flatulence impressible herbaceous impropriety veneration ignoble fatuous phatic journey acrid pungent fetid fiendness gamut ire irascible graffiti irk tedium diminutive minutia iota iterative reiteration self inductive interpolations objectified interstitial extrapolation trepidation tumultuous tortuous adjunct turpitude salient viable seethe conflagration lexical etymology idolatrous affectionate ****** caress craw swell surge flow flux amorous enamor endear ardent ardor cajole piquant poignant prescient puissant presage apex crux citadel pinnacle vertex vortex matrix ****** peak languishing lurid larcenous licentious lascivious squanderous squaloring wallow in the furrow confluence wretched infelicitous trajectory sordid warp strong raw war resume quirkness ***** tinker **** fink stink ******* eccentric pinky suit idiomatic cognate somatalogy virtuoso concurrent intemperance obsessive habitual addicts psychosomatic pathological psychopaths diabolically maniacal dementia panoramic tableau tediously meticulous laboriously beleaguering excruciating exacerbation autonomous avarice oscillating ostracism adrenergic analeptic adumbrate obdurate aberrance genocidal xenophobic prospectus personification of sartorial perfection visage picturesque vision of spectral grace picture of positive prosthesis protractive analysis cyborg ebullition ne plus ultra monad cybernetics prognosis prognostication clambering clamorous clangor hectic mayhem pulverize annihilate pompous bombastic query squash squawk squish squirm sprocket squeal squelch staunch statuesque steadfast steep stench stint strategic logistical tactician stratum stolid stoic stodgy viscid tumult stray streaky stretch strenuous striated strident stringent strive structural strut subjugate subjective substratum substantiate subterfuge subvert sultry sulk sundry superlative superfluous superficial syllogism soliloquy superovulation superfluity superfetation superfecundation suspicion swig superstratum sycophant ingratiating surrogate suspension swindle swallow swanky swath swill sympathetic symbolic synapse synchronous syncopate synoptic synectics syndrome synonym syntax systematic larceny lecher oligarchy ribaldry rigmarole intoxicate tangential tectonics tantamount telepathy tantalize throng tactile taint talisman talesman squabble brash torment temerarious terminus thrall torpid torpor torque tousle  traduce transform transubstantiate transpire transmute transmogrify transport trapezium traverse treason tremulous trendy trivia trifles trounce turgor truculent tuft turf turbid turgid tussle twain twang twinge twerp twit twitch tweak **** procedure vernacular posthumous spasmolytic propagate prolific proliferative profusion profundity proliferate profligate cogent fecund secund secular thick trick quick mystical silhouette sojourn excursion genre engender jaunt pilgrimage prophet trek waver wrought waxy waylay weave weary web wedge ***** wend whang whet whimsical whir whinny whereupon whish whisk whoosh whizbang whoop whorl wield wile wilco wild whence wingspread wiry wiseacre wherewithal rapacity wolf whistle wrath wraith wrack worship wrest wretch wring wriggle wry shyster shylock phone roan tone zone bone hone loan drone known own moan cone done groan koan gnome dream gleam cream seam beam          team serene ravine green gene careen tellurian terrene quaff query quiescent radishes reciprocate raunchy raspy rascal rampant rampage ravage ****** ravish rebuke rebuff rend reave recourse reconnaissance reconnoiter rectify recompense rectitude reconcile regime reintegrate relegate rejuvenate remission remonstrance reparation replication reprieve reprisal nocturnal emission repose remunerate resonant retort revelation revision grandiloquence cleft fissure crevasse rift rill robust rouge niche
crack tromp stomp chasm crevice trudge rostrum rout roust row ruckus sagacious salacious sapient satiric sarcastic sartorial sartorius scalawag screed scrutable contemptible scurvy scuttlebutt seditious seduction sect segregant sequacious psychic reverie subterfuge serenade sequiter serendipity shuck shylock sibilant shush signet simulation siren skeptic sleek slick slinky snare ****** sneeze sneer snide smug intrados loquacity spandrel iambic sonorous spatial spatiotemporal telemetry spectral spry spectrum speculate solicitor sprout spoof specular splendiferous sporadic spurt binge spree ***** squalid forte fortitude Gumby emit war  time raw umbrage ultraism ultimatum unary unbridled uncanny unanimous ambiguous biased unabated uncharted articulate deviating undertow congenial feint feign unity predicate unprecedented paradigm unscrupulous brash dire unfathomable unlimited urchin usurp utmost utilize fluctuate vague vacuous vanity vanquish vantage veer vast advent veracity verbatim vertex vortex vertigo vestige vex vigor vitalize virile vicissitude viscous visceral virtuous virulence vital virago vivacious vivid livid splurgeness stag vituperatively vociferous volition void voracity waft vulturine wacky waifs wainscot waive wallah itinerant wand wane lavish wanton wonderlust warrantee warn warp warlock warren wastrel wastage warranty dicker insidiously sinister flagrant verity maniac pack mendacity abscissa ordinate yacht yearn yaw yare yen yelp yin yonder yoni yore yours yolk zany zest zeal  zenith zingy zooid treatise hyperbolic lingam blasphemous farcical fugueness and estranged ensemble orchestration rendition various assorted forms of related stranger weirdness traveling down this obtusely overt contusion in my vehicular contrivance convection convolution abalone absolute acceptance accurately acquiesce acquire actually adamant additional adequately adherence affiliation affinity against aggressive allegiance although allusions amendable analogous analysis anchor ancient animation annihilation appeared approach appropriately archaic assembler assimilation assuage attain attempts attendant attribute audience aura auspicious authoritarian authoritative barbeque before belligerent binary blazing Buddha bulwark carousel ceaselessly ceremony chaos character charisma Christmas chronological cite classification classify clutter cocoon cognation cognizant comment communal complete conceive conceptual conclusion conducive conquered consciousness constituent construction continuum contrarily convenient corporeal collage creates credibility crystalline culture curious curriculum decadent decide deferred deified deity deliberately delineate deluded delusion demagoguery democratically descriptions desire destroy destructively develop dialectic dictates difficult diffuse disappeared ecstasy ecstatic efficiency elaborate elliptical empathy endeavor engaging equipment escape especially essence eventually evolutionally excellence excitement expectorant expedience experience extraneous extremity façade facet fashions fever flatten forgotten frailty framework gapping glimpse grandiose graphically groan growing hedonistically hierarchy hobby holocaust homogenous hovering ideology imagination immaturity immediate imperative impertinence important inadvertency inapplicable indispensable individually infancy initiate innate interpreters intervene intricacy intrinsic irrelevance jagged kaleidoscope lit literally lose ludicrous macabre minstrel meld mischievous model monstrous mores myriad mystic necessity negativity Newtonian normalcy nuance nullify obnoxious obscure obvious occasional officiate ominous omnipotent oppose optimizes oscillating ostracism paradoxically partially participants pebbles perceive pervasive phenomena portrayal posses preceding pretty prevalent pregnant primitive prism processional progress prominent proprietor psychic psychological purpose pyramid quandary rational receptacle recumbent redemption refused reiterate relatively relativity relevant reminiscent renaissance revere schemes schizophrenia separately sequence serious severe socially spontaneous stalwart stimulus stomach struggle stunned succession superimpose supplement suppose surround swimming switch symmetry sync taubla tapestry tenacious tendency tyrant terrestrial torrential totally tomorrow transient turbulence tyrannical ulterior ultimate universally unwarranted vicious weather yankee whether soliloquy amenity ambivalence ameliorate aggrandize aghast agrapha barnacle gerrymander jasper jasmine obfuscate obdurate castigate metaphysique cyborg appliance intrepid intrigue mystique impetus volition gumption motivation inspiration metaphor parable leprechaun leniency secund hefty endogenous exogenous lozenge irrefragable recalcitrance fecund jaded seal ordinand obdurate aberrance ignominious interface consent imbroglio embroilment lethargy impressionism agitator treacherous lurid allure obstreperously abstruse subconscious squanderous squalid anomalous punitive incendiary infrangible extemporaneous incognito (succubus , incubus) incongruous incredulous indemnify indigenous infernal infidel iniquitous secular funky spunky Rosicrucian epicurean phlegm levity levee lubricious loath loathe frigid **** ******* lick fenestration dire ****** brash crass rash aggrandize tactile acuity bridge rude crude bandy randy monad positive indenture obnoxious obtrusive obtusely overt indemnities annuities cavalier dawdling gallivant bought naught fought caught ought dribble rip zip gig blond entropy catalyst cohort cavort chronological sublime purvey pander meandrous extravagant exorbitance ***** vicarious endear eccentric cognate frolic frivolity fawn agnate aggregate junction function conjunction conjecture conjugation adjunct contiguous constituency cohesive coercion covert maestro maitre d mastoid newel minx murk monad muss muggy mull mirador bartizan musky meager demonstrative anarchy iconoclasm misnomer mimicry minaret mimetic monocracy pungent mordant mnemonics mangle maim mutilate mesomerism morpheme nepotism nurture vexation anxiety vindictiveness vendetta moot void null meringue laconic obliterate papaya proboscis podiatry polemist porcupine palindrome pandemonium presumptive procureness ploy **** paltry pander paphian pummel puny presage felicity parley parturient potpourri partisan peccavi verity goad penumbral platitude platonic proxy photic pharos perdurable preemptory posh perfunctory perilymph phoneme phenetic phantom permeate proximity phantasm phalanstry delusory apparition pietism oviparous expiate vindicate extricate  exonerate absolve posthumous prehensile prerogative presumptive prestissimo preterite retroactive primacy prevaricate equivocate primordium primeval puissance  pristine prescience prompt prodigious protagonist prurient pyre lurid pshaw guffaw purlin purloin quirk pith quark ***** tip put temerarious userp asymptote pirate tiny hat  thief tine slow slide slim hide me effigy infinitesimal slink slick paw
flaw craw claw heuristic swum cuckold climb locuna live **** sly **** sequacious expeditious sequesterous glove glaive glade
don’t dale  otter glue equestrian gog rift cog gone lean had good gold ride ode *** house pine low law earth *** guilty slime negligent torrentially torrid tortuously tempestuous einzeln function truckness presumptive procureness ploy **** off the line cyborg cylon live antonym exogamous dimorphism pry rap gape homogeny gap dudely cruel incredulity ergo apropos ipso-facto pith tip push where keeky geek peek peep glib jive gawk talk dudely cruel off the line but off it !  pit ego colossal incredible fantastic great outrageous amazing fabulous terrific stupendous splendiferous glorious God grandiose orgiastic magnificent ne plus ultra astounding astonishing bodacious marvelous exuberantly ecstatic subliminal nostalgic allusions subordinate ancillary conjectures similar analogous configurations exotically ****** quixotic render proof orchestration rendition unicorn railway mainsail ebullition monad girdle thigh spasmolytic heuristic sartorious sartorial discrepancy amendment rip reave rive tear rend esoteric erudite beleaguer hype synch torque your ringer occipital sync ubiquitous eucharistic oblation obeisance oblate obelisk ubiquitous edifice ******* efficacious salacious lubricious sagacious expeditious grief  orgiastic paroxysmal orthogenesis overture repertoire quagmire quandary poshly plush lushly lustful longevous loquacity hunky-dory harbinger guzzle gyro gyre exult heuristic awkward humph haberdashery hauberk huarache bourgeoisie dichotomy greave zealot goatee cavalier humerus gumption hors d’oeuvres coalescent hysterically delirious coercion nullify correspondence corral coral architrave archaeology ardent ardor arduous awry askew asinine altruistic allure allude alluvium aloof egress effulgence ephemeral apathetic anxiety antonym existential exigency exodus expiate esoteric exacerbate evoke exact exult excerpt exorbitance cajole argent apriori arbitrate appliqué aqueduct presumptuous prestige precocious precursor preempt predilection premises premonition preoccupy preponderance prescient pretentious perineum peristyle perpetuity pervade pertinent portent elicit pursuance putrid quasi queasy quaver quarrel rampart ransack voracious rapport ratchet raucous ravenous reciprocal rectitude emanate imminent perdition erudite erogenous scarp lambent reticent vehement auspicious austere consternation construe contingent convection convolution convenient cocoon coerce collaboration collude vacuum vacillate vestibule vicarious recalcitrant repudiate resend resilient resonance purvey wreak writhe wreath fortuitous fulminate fuscous cudgel futurity gable gallivant gallant embellish gauntlet scavenge scandalous scarify scatter schlieren scholarly scoundrel scowl unmelodious scramble scrabble scraggly craggy cephalic fallacious fallible absurd cutaneous synthesis commission extreme  conscientious adherent proponent subtlety diligent receive interesting abhorred exorbitant arrangement intelligence surprisingly important encompass contributes asymmetrical excellent elliptical collaboration straddled collapsible spanned feasible oriented pervasive artistry instructor precursor innovate adrenergic adumbrate queasy acclimatize accommodate acceptive accordant accrue accusation acrimony actuarial acuity adduce adjective adjunct admonish adroit aerobic aesthetic prosaic affiliate affluence aggravate aggregate agnate agonize airy albeit alchemy allege allegiance allegorical alleviate allocution ambience ambivalence amenity amenable anaclitic analgesia anacrusis analeptic anathema subordinate ancillary anecdotist animism animosity annulet announce anomaly anonymity antagonize antecedent subsequent antefix antenna anterior pathos antipathy antithesis aperture appall adorn pertain appreciate aquifer arbiter arbitrage arboreal frantic pedantic febrile fanatic quixotic hegira to xanadu frenetic zealot zeal eucharistic oblation occipital ubiquitous omnipresence opulent effluent affluence larcenous overture orgiastic paroxysmal ornithology orthogenisis gleam sheen English bird treacherous lecherous asinine dumb foolish stupid inane ignoramus absurd idiotically imbecilic silly unintelligent dense dingy crazy insane quasi slow epos epitomize epochal era gemma schema lemma jargon idiom colloquialism vernaculars peer quay pier pair appearance insipid vapid insidiously insolent pompously bombastic blatant flagrant chaparral epopee pseudopodia actuator militantly mercenary covert adumbrate intimate obfuscate abet abeyance proxy fugue edict advocate détente anticipate angary amentia terse inabsentia expurgation imputation impugn exculpate eugenic euphenics incumbent incipient accidence acoustics acquittance amore malign asperse amok amuck allegorist pervert aspect aorist wrist expiate asylum epigynous anovulant antenatal antidote antiquity antitrust antithetical argufy apartheid apocalyptic apologist apothecary apomixis appreciate aposteriori apostrophe protractive analysis parabola avidity liberty concise tine albeit life still arrogance coherent abandon abate abash abase abdicate abduction abject abominable abominate abomination abound abrogation absolution absorption accentual accession accede accessible accommodate accomplice accomplish accrual accursed acerbity acrimony accredit accustomed actuality actuate addle adamant adjutant adventive adultery adulterate adventure adversity advertent adulteration venturesome advocacy eyrie aerie aerial affix affront aggressive agile acuity tactile nimble agnostic agog agonist aghast avid avarice agrarian curtilage Arian airhead peterbrain alacrity alchemize alibi allegation allegory gorge ally allocate aloof altercation ambition amatory prelude amaze amateur  ambidextrous ambient amble amiable amicable amorist amulet analeptic analgesia analytics anathema android amalgamated anemometry animism annals chronicles annex annul annoy anonymity antecedent arcade armature arson articulate ascension assiduity asperity asynchrony augmentation audible auger aural areola auspice austerity authenticate autonomic astronomical enumeration auxiliary avenge avert economist autonomist autonomy aviatrix axiom avow avouch bifurcate bigamy bend bind bent bisexual berate bereft hype due behave behaviorism ******* behest bereave beholden biologism bureaucratize circumvent conscribe bacchae backslide backswept badland baddy bagnio baize balky ball hawk balmy bambino bamboozle banal bandwagon baneful banishment bankruptcy banter bandy barbarism barbarous barratry base pay bang bash bastardy bawdry lewd obscene ***** bawl beamish beatitude ****** beat beautiful bedlam beggary begrudge befuddle perplex behalf beleaguer beneficiary benevolence benighted bequeath bequest berth betroth bevy birth bitchery bivouac blabber blandish coax blah blither blare blazon bleak blear blighter bliss bloomy blot blunder blotch blooper bludgeon gag blurt blush bluster bonkers bosh boulevard bout brat browse brunt brute buck passer buffet bungle bungalow bunk bunt buoyancy burglarize burnish burp belch burlesque bureaucratize sorrowful lamentation baleful caterwaul
true clench closet queen constitution provocative soap menagerie melee cirrus camorra caboodle cabotage cabriole cacophony
cadge cahoots cagey cairn calamitous calculate calibrate  caliginous caliper calyx callet cameo campestral canard candid candidacy candelabra candor canker can’t canter canteen canoe capitation captivate capture carapace caribous carnal carnival carny cartomancy casque castellated caste castle catacomb catatonic phonics caustic cavernous celibate censor centric centrifugal centripetal certify cervixes cestus chalet chalice chameleon changling chaperone charlatan chary chaste chastise chastity cheeky cherish chesty chide ***** chintzy chivalrous chinch chomp choose chortle chromatic chronic intrinsic chroma chump chutzpa chute cinch conciliatory ciliary ciliate citadel citation civility clank clammy clang clairaudience taciturn reticent classify inveterate claudication cloven cleft cliché click clinch clement clip clique ******* cloak & dagger clobber clog clone clonk cloth clothe clothier cloture redolent clout cluck clump clumsy clunk coadunate coalition coadjutor coaster brake coax cochlea chronology inundate **** coexist anachronism coercive coitus coincide collinear collateral collegiate collision collusion coma combinatorics comfy  commandeer  commensurate comensal commend commerce commence commodious commotion compatible compensatory competitive compile complexional complicity comply connotation compost composure compunction compulsory concatenate concoct catenary concubinage condolence condemn condescending conducive cavalcade confidant confession confirmatory confiscate conformity confrontation congruence congeal congenial conjure connection connivance connote conquest conscript consequence conservatism consistent console consolidate consort conspire contagium contention continuity controvert conveyor copulative cordial cordon cornucopia coup couth coy crag cranky craven cringe crud culminate cumulate cursive credulity credulous infidel gullible diatonic perturbed derogate edict delict rage tirade irate vehemence denouement denounce tire dervish dictatorial diction proof desolate deontology Kant indenture defray detinue douceur amuse disseminate eustachian daft dainty damnify dapper dastardly dauntless daymare dead heat dead horse debauch debacle decadent debauchee decamp declamatory declension decorticate deductive default defeasance defenestration defunct defrock deformacy degeneracy deft deforce hipster mesmeric deification deist deleterious delimit deltoid delve deluge delusion delirious demimonde demesne demiurge demoniac demonetize demonstrable denizen denegation denigration demur demure despot desperation destine despise detect determinative determinism detersive deterrent detest determinacy detectaphone devout devoid detract desultory detrimental detour deviate deviant devastate devotion devious devisee devolution devolve developer dialectic dharma diagnosis prognosis matriculate diacritical differentia diffraction digenesis dignitize dignitary dilly diligence ***** dilemma dilapidate diminution **** ding diphtheria diphthong dent dirge dirk disaffirm discontinuity disclaim discern discord disconsolate discourteous discredit discontinuance discretion discriminate distain disenfranchise disenchant disencumber disenthrall disembody disgorge disgrace dishonest disguise disengage disinfestant disjunct disillusion disinfectant dislodge dismal disloyal disoblige disobey disparity disparage dismantle dismay dispatch dispel dispersive disproof dispute disrupt dissertation disrepair dissipate distillate distort distract ditto ditty diverge divaricate divert divest divulge dominion doohickey dormer doss dowdy doughty dowry drastic douse drat dray dread drawl dreary drippy drifty drivel droll drown drowsy drudge plan dubious dude dudgeon dulcify duct ductile drakeness ducky duel dull dusky tawny dynamic dwelling dwindle derisive bombastic primordial integumence parenthetically pragmatically prosaically practically protractively portion premise portent pervasive perpitude phenomena hierarchy predicate metaphysique endoskeleton ectomorphic dour droll dismal dank dreary bleak stark Electra complex lore epigone epigraph epsilon epistaxis epilation earnest earthshaker earthward earwitness eclectic ebonize electroacoustics ciphony ebullience eccentricity echelon echoic eddy edgy edify edit educe edition eerie edacious effectuate effeminate effete efficient efflux effrontery effluent effusion ego defense eidetic ejecta elaborate elapse electioneer curtail elocution elucidate elegant eloquence Elysium emancipation manumission detinue osteopathy elucubrate emasculate emaciate embark embargo emanate emblazon emote embellish elusive enhance embracive embouchure emergent emendator embryology emit emissary emitine jacquerie empathy empennage emphasis emphatic emigrant empirical emulate emunctory encephalic enclitic yuck junk funky junkies enchant enchain enclosure encroach encrustation encumber endergonic endorse endowment enduro enfetter enforce energetic enemy enema enervate engender engage propensity preternatural proclivity prestidigitation gesticulation equilibrate equilibrium equilibrist preterite rendition retroactive engross engulf enhance enjoin enlightenment enlist impressed enormous ennoble enrich  ensheathe enshroud ensnare ensnarl entanglement enthrall enthusiasm entice entity enthuse entrap entreat entrance enunciate envoy envy envisage epigynous epigraphy cipher epilogue episodic epitaph epistolary epithet equate equestrian equity equivocal equivocate eradicate erosion eroticism errancy erratic erroneous ersatz erumpent erudition erythron epistemology espalier essentialism progressivism esprit espy estimator estrus estuary etcetera ethnic ethos ethic eternal ethereal eugenic euphenics eustachian tube salpinx euthenics euthanasia evacuate evaluate evasive eventuate evaporate evict evident evil evert evolve exact exaction exult exaggerate exasperate excel excerpt exception exclaim exclude exculpate excursion excuse execration execution exempt exhume exile exhaustive exhibitionism exhilarate exegesis exert exonerate expense expletive explicit exploitation exponent export exposition exserted exposure expound expurgate ubiquitous extemporize extenuate exterminate extensive externalize extinct extort extradition extrasensory extraordinary extol extract exuberate extrude foible fasciculation twitch flinch fenestra Fabian falchion falangist Phillip felly ferro falsie **** fess fink out festinate ***** bustle fourragrere fimbria feduciary fabricant fable fabulist façade facile facilitate facsimile facture faena fain fairing fallopian fallow fascinator fash fatalism fastidious fastuous fatidic fatigue Faustian fatuity faux pas feasible faze ******* facilitate feline feeler ferocity fertile fervid fervor fetor fetus fetology fetish feverish fester fetation fetch fiat fief fiasco feticide obnoxious fiacre figment fickle fictitious fiddling fidelity fidgety fierce fiesta  filch filly filthy finale finesse fingertip finicky fang finite firmament flabbergast fixation flak flashy flagitious ******
flashpoint paroxysmal retrograde flaunt flasher flask flat flap flaw fledge flee fleece fleet fleshy flighty flick flexible flimsy  
flimflam fling flinty florid flora ****** flourish flotsam  flub fluke flurry flush focalize foist footing foray forfeiture forgery foreign
forensic formalize format formica formulate fornication forsooth forswear perjurious fortify forte fortissimo fortuity forum abjure
abnegation fossil fosterling four flush frame up freaky frazzle frenulum fret frigidity frigate frill fringe fritter frontal fructify fruition frump frugal fuel fulcrum fulgurous fulham sable furor furring brazen furtive fustigate future perfect fuchsia find roan gauntlet gamut gatecrasher havoc glass jaw glare glass eye gabber gadzooks gaff gaga gage gaggle gag rule gainful gainsay gait gala gale gall gallery gallivant gallop galvanic gambrel roof gander gammon garb garish garble garnishment garrulous garter gasp **** gaudy gauge gaunt gavel gear fad gee haw gemma gender genealogist geotropism germinate gestation ghost writer ghoul gig gigantic gill gimmick gimp girlish gist gizzard glaive glamorize glance glaze glean glint glitch gloat globe gloomy glitter glom glob glop glorify gloss glower glutton glum slum glue hue gluteal gnash aphorism adage gnosticism gnome goggle gnomic gold digger psychic golem gore gorge gown gossipy gouge grasp greedy frigid gremlin greave grieve grin grime grim grind gripe ***** groom gross grit groin grove grout growl grumpy grunt guck gruntle guide guile guild guilty guise gull gulch gully gunk gushy gust gussy up gulp gusset gush gustatory gung ** gusto gutsy gyne gyre gynecocracy gyve guy  aceimnorsuvwx  bdfhklt  fgjpqyz atheist goblin Godiva grog hang up disinter gamet zygote hunks hunkers haunches black white life death lithe heart rending miserly greedy stingy frugal habitation propinquity habituate hackamore hagride hairbreadth halftrack hallucinosis hamstring handicapper handless hangin hand woven hanker hanky panky haphazardry hari kiri **** harangue harass harbinger harem oviparous residual harmonic harpy harsh hast hassle haggle hasty pudding haugh haunt haversack haversian canal hawk hazard heady heal headway heap hearing hearty heave heathen heavenly heavy duty heft heir heinous heifer heist helix enliven glue hellion helm hemlock hence heredity primitive anachronistic hangover heretical heritage hermit recluse heresy primordial integumence skull hernia hue hex heuristic hirsute hireling ally hint **** hoard hoax hitch hoist hokey hoot horizon hornswoggle horologist hostile hostage housebreak huckster hovel huff humeral hurtle hustle hutz pah homage homogeny exogamy hone honesty honkies hooky hutch hypercritical hypotaxis hysterics incoercible idiosyncrasy impugn idolatry ileum imagism idempotent ides ichor icky icon ics ictus ideational identity crisis matrix idea iffy ignescent illustrious immaterialize imitation inextremis immanentism immolation mollify impeach impedance impecunious impassion immutable retrograde recumbence inabsentia impious impenitence impinge implore impotent paroxysm impressment impute impromptu impoverish improvident imprudent improvise imputation inanely inanimate inauguration incorrigible inappreciative inconsequential irreverence inconsolably disconsolate irreparably irreconcilable incorporeity ideally ideogram inferential illicit incarnate incestuous inch incident converse incipient incite incognita incommodious incompliant incommunicado indagate incursion incus incumbent indecorous indecent exposure indecipherable indefeasible indenture indictable  indicative indignant indiscrete indite indolence indubitable induce indulgent industrious ineffectual inane inert inertia infamy infanticide infest infinitesimal inflect inflict infringe encroach infrastructure inflation influential informant inimical iniquitous innumerable innuendo inquisitor injunction injudicious inkling innocuous insolent insidious insipid inept phatic volatile instigate insinuate instinct intangible interdict intentional interject intimate intimidate intricacy intrigue intrinsic intrepid introspection introvert intrusive intuitive inviolate invade inundate invalid inventive inveigh inure defeasance foist isomorphic isthmus fistula jabber jackal jackleg jag jaunt jeer jerkin jest jetty jettison jiffy jig jilt jive job jack jolt josh jostle joust jovial judicious juggernaut jugglery jumble jumpy junctural jungle junk ****** jurisdiction justice justification jute jutty juvenile delinquency juxtaposition kale kalimba kangaroo court kaput karate karst kayo keel keep kempt kept keynesianism kick in **** kindle kinetic kink kist **** kleenex kismet kirtle kith kithe kitsch klaxon knack knavery **** knout kobold koan kneed king cogent adroit lollygag lummox languorous lanyard limbus lotic loquacious lesbian lam labial lambaste lampoon landmark bilk lang syne languish languid languor larder larky larvicide larynx lascivious lateral latent recumbent lapel laud lavish layette lecher leeward leer leech legacy legate lefty lest lewd avant-garde levant avaricious liaison libido libertarian lien ligature lilt list lisp liturgy livid loiter loom loophole lubricity lubric lucent lugubrious yuck lunkhead dolt lurk luscious luster luxury lynch lysis legerity lemma lickspittle limnetic ankh maverick mare liberum marabou machete machinate machiavelianism magniloquent macroevolution macrogamete Magdalene mantis mantra maniacal manubrium mare’s nest maenad majuscule maladjustive malfeasance maleficent malefactor malevolence mash malm malocclusion manipular manifesto mastectomy maw manacle manifest Manitou mana marrow pith manumission constitution marsupial mare nostrum masseur pervade perpitude quark master plan master race mastoid glitch exiguous skimpy scanty sparse masticate matriarchy matriculate escutcheon nombril mere mathematics matrix matinee impetus maxim axiom meatus minimax mediation mediocre medley metabolic meddle ménage a trios menagerie mendacity meroblastic menial meiosis meliorate memorandum memoir memento mori menace mesne menarche menorrhagia meninx mesh mesomerism mesne lord metal methodical meticulous mettle miasma microcosm militia mingy minion koan mirage mire misnomer modality mockery ****** mongrel monstrance morbid morose mortify mortise martingale motivity musky mushy murky muse mutuality muzzle myopia mystique mesomorphic nabob nadir narcosis nark native natty navaid necking pilaster neigh neuter neutrino nexus ****** nihilism nimbus nimiety nitty gritty noisome nominalism nonconformity non sequiter nooky noose nostalgia nostrum notch notion notorious noumenon nous nuance nubile nymph nympholepsy numinous ***** obliquity oblivion ubiquity eucharistic oblation obligee oasis oath obbligato obligatory obliterate obnoxious obscene obstreperously abstruse exude obviate ochlocracy odium odalisque ominous awesome omnivorous onerous onus opprobrium opprobrious optimal opulence orifice ornate orotund ostensible osteopathy oust outlier overawe overt **** ozone procurator pagan palingenetic pallid pallor paragon pagoda palpitate pander pandemic panhandling paraphrase paternoster pathetic paunch pavilion pawky peachy peculiar pedagog pedal pedantic peart peccant peeve perception intuition peremptory perdition perdurable detinue perfective
perfidy perforce periphery perjure perk permeate permute perorate perpetual perpetrate perpetuity perplexity persecute
perspicacious perspiration pertinent perturb ******* pesky perky pester pestilence petrify petrous phalanges juggernaut              
phenomenal phylogeny phobic phony photosensitize phrenic physicality ***** physicalism pick pictorial pious piety piffle pilgrimage pinion pithy placate placid plaint planetoid plasma platitude platonic plenipotentiary plucky plunderous poach plenary plummet polemic polyphonic postulate pouch polyandry polygamy populist pounce popsicle potentate pout practicable chatter prattle precarious precedence precess precious predetermined predicament preen prelusive premonition prefix preposterous prevail prevalent presumptuous **** prim priority depravation probity prodigious profane promulgate proffered prohibitive projective promiscuity propagandize propagate prophetic prosthetic propinquity prophylaxis protocol proprietous propitious haggard proxemics prosecutor prospectus protensive proximity pummel pundit prejudice piranha punitive purgatorial purificatory putschist kitsch quag quantum jump quarrelsome quarterstaff Quetzalcoatl quickie quirt quoit rescind reverb revile mnemonics retuse rabble rachis raconteur ratification radial radix raffish raft ragamuffin railroad raiment rake ramify ramet ramus rank rancid **** rapper rapt rapture rarefy rarified rave ravel raw raze razzle-dazzle razzmatazz realm ream reap rebuttal rebuff rebuke receptaculum recital recess reconcile recondite recourse recriminate rectilinear rectify rectitude recumbent recuperate recursive redeem redolent refer reek reeve reflective reflex refraction refulgence refuge refuse relativistic reliquiae remedy remorseless remnant repertory replicate reproach reptilian repugnant repulse repulsion rescissory residue resignation resolute restitution retraction restriction restraint resuscitate reticent retentive retinue retreat retribution revel reverberation reversal revert revulsion rhapsodic rhombus rhomboid rictus ridgy rifle riff rigorous ritzy rival roan roam roar rive robust rodent rodeo roguery rollick frolic romp rote rouge rout ******* rubble rubric rumpus rumor rural ruse rustle Ruth sitzkrieg superciliary supercilious surfeit suture bravo bravado seminal vesicle sacerdotalism sacroiliac sagacious saga safari saguaro salpinx salubrious salvo salve sanction sanctify sanguine sashay satchel satiate saucy savory scads scalpel scandalize scapula **** schmaltz schlep schnook scorn scour scoff scowl scow scram scrounge screak scud **** scuz seclude ****** seer selfish seminiferous senility sedition smear sycophant sensitize sensorium sentiment sequester sequential servile sham shindig shoddy singular screech situate skedaddle skew sketchy skittish skivvies slang slight slogan slovenly slouch sneaky snub soffit solvency sophistic spangle spar spawn spew squall squamous steeple logistical tactician strategy stupor subjunctive suborn subvert the clarity of criticism can create credibility comprehension can cause conducive consciousness supremacy surly burly squirrelly schema temporize tai pan tup trochlea ulna taboo taciturn tacit tacky tact talus tamper tang tamp tangible tangential tank tankard tassel tawny ****** telepathic temerity telos tenable tenet ternary terra-cotta testy topos tiercel theocracy tempting thew tizzy trite thirl throng thundering tantrum tonic torso topsy-turvy torus tour de force touristic **** tout tragus tractive trance tranquil traject transcend trample transducer transfix transgress transition transposition transude transpire treasure treason trek trenchant tremendous tributary trigeminal  trollop triumph tropic tropism troth trough tractable tract strumpet trove trump trustless tribunal twang tweeze twinge twirl twaddle tunic typecast tyrannical tyrannosaur traction padness tyrant tympanum twist ukase ultraism ultima ratio ultrastructure uglify umbilicus umbra umbrage unabridged unconditional unambiguous unanimity uncanny unceremonious uninucleat union unique unison unity farce sham unmannered unremitting unspeakable upsurge upstage urchin urbanist usherette usufruct travesty usury utensil ****** utmost ut uvea utter uvula utility uxorious usurp surreptitious vagabond vagarious vagile vagrant vagrancy vale valor validate vampire vanguard vas deferens vast vaunt vector venery venial veranda venture verbalist verboten verdant verdict verge vertebration verve vexatious fierce vigil vigorous vile vilify villainous vindicate violent virtue vitalist ***** vituperative vogue vomitus volunteer vouch vulcanization vulturous vulgarism weld **** volume decimate wahoo waive wangle wee weepy welch whammy war wharfage whereof whereupon wherein wherefore whereon wherewithal whine whopper wild goose chase wishy washy wisp woeful wrathy wrought wrong xenophile ******* fornication phantasmagoria fluent voluble yammer yelp yes man yummy zany zealotry zilch zing zombie zooidal zoom zounds zygomatic contiguous constituency confluence contiguity continuum concurrence conjunction conjugation métier quintessential

All.

I, All-Creation, sing my song of praise
To God Who made me and vouchsafes my days,
And sends me forth by multitudinous ways.

  Seraph.

I, like my Brethren, burn eternally
With love of Him Who is Love, and loveth me;
The Holy, Holy, Holy Unity.

  Cherub.

I, with my Brethren, gaze eternally
On Him Who is Wisdom, and Who knoweth me;
The Holy, Holy, Holy Trinity.

  All Angels.

We rule, we serve, we work, we store His treasure,
Whose vessels are we, brimmed with strength and pleasure;
Our joys fulfil, yea, overfill our measure.

  Heavens.

We float before the Presence Infinite,
We cluster round the Throne in our delight,
Revolving and rejoicing in God's sight.

  Firmament.

I, blue and beautiful, and framed of air,
At sunrise and at sunset grow most fair;
His glory by my glories I declare.

  Powers.

We Powers are powers because He makes us strong;
Wherefore we roll all rolling orbs along,
We move all moving things, and sing our song.

  Sun.

I blaze to Him in mine engarlanding
Of rays, I flame His whole burnt-offering,
While as a bridegroom I rejoice and sing.

  Moon.

I follow, and am fair, and do His Will;
Through all my changes I am faithful still,
Full-orbed or strait, His mandate to fulfil.

  Stars.

We Star-hosts numerous, innumerous,
Throng space with energy untumultuous,
And work His Will Whose eye beholdeth us.

  Galaxies and Nebulae.

No thing is far or near; and therefore we
Float neither far nor near; but where we be
Weave dances round the Throne perpetually.

  Comets and Meteors.

Our lights dart here and there, whirl to and fro,
We flash and vanish, we die down and glow;
All doing His Will Who bids us do it so.

  Showers.

We give ourselves; and be we great or small,
Thus are we made like Him Who giveth all,
Like Him Whose gracious pleasure bids us fall.

  Dews.

We give ourselves in silent secret ways,
Spending and spent in silence full of grace;
And thus are made like God, and show His praise.

  Winds.

We sift the air and winnow all the earth;
And God Who poised our weights and weighs our worth
Accepts the worship of our solemn mirth.

  Fire.

My power and strength are His Who fashioned me,
Ordained me image of His Jealousy,
Forged me His weapon fierce exceedingly.

  Heat.

I glow unto His glory, and do good:
I glow, and bring to life both bud and brood;
I glow, and ripen harvest-crops for food.

  Winter and Summer.

Our wealth and joys and beauties celebrate
His wealth of beauty Who sustains our state,
Before Whose changelessness we alternate.

  Spring and Autumn.

I hope,--
          And I remember,--

                            We give place
Either to other with contented grace,
Acceptable and lovely all our days.

  Frost.

I make the unstable stable, binding fast
The world of waters prone to ripple past:
Thus praise I God, Whose mercies I forecast.

  Cold.

I rouse and goad the slothful, apt to nod,
I stir and urge the laggards with my rod:
My praise is not of men, yet I praise God.

  Snow.

My whiteness shadoweth Him Who is most fair,
All spotless: yea, my whiteness which I wear
Exalts His Purity beyond compare.

  Vapors.

We darken sun and moon, and blot the day,
The good Will of our Maker to obey:
Till to the glory of God we pass away.

  Night.

Moon and all stars I don for diadem
To make me fair: I cast myself and them
Before His feet, Who knows us gem from gem.

  Day.

I shout before Him in my plenitude
Of light and warmth, of hope and wealth and food;
Ascribing all good to the Only Good.

  Light and Darkness.

I am God's dwelling-place,--
                              And also I
Make His pavilion,--
                      Lo, we bide and fly
Exulting in the Will of God Most High.

  Lightning and Thunder.

We indivisible flash forth His Fame,
We thunder forth the glory of His Name,
In harmony of resonance and flame.

  Clouds.

Sweet is our store, exhaled from sea or river:
We wear a rainbow, praising God the Giver
Because His mercy is for ever and ever.

  Earth.

I rest in Him rejoicing: resting so
And so rejoicing, in that I am low;
Yet known of Him, and following on to know.

  Mountains.

Our heights which laud Him, sink abased before
Him higher than the highest evermore:
God higher than the highest we adore.

  Hills.

We green-tops praise Him, and we fruitful heads,
Whereon the sunshine and the dew He sheds:
We green-tops praise Him, rising from out beds.

  Green Things.

We all green things, we blossoms bright or dim,
Trees, bushes, brushwood, corn and grasses slim,
We lift our many-favored lauds to Him.

  Rose,--Lily,--Violet.

I praise Him on my thorn which I adorn,--
And I, amid my world of thistle and thorn,--
And I, within my veil where I am born.

  Apple,--Citron,--Pomegranate.

We, Apple-blossom, Citron, Pomegranate,
We, clothed of God without our toil and fret,
We offer fatness where His Throne is set.

  Vine,--Cedar,--Palm.

I proffer Him my sweetness, who am sweet,--
I bow my strength in fragrance at His feet,--
I wave myself before His Judgment Seat.

  Medicinal Herbs.

I bring refreshment,--
                      I bring ease and calm,--
I lavish strength and healing,--
                                I am balm,--
We work His pitiful Will and chant our psalm.

  A Spring.

Clear my pure fountain, clear and pure my rill,
My fountain and mine outflow deep and still,
I set His semblance forth and do His Will.

  Sea.

To-day I praise God with a sparkling face,
My thousand thousand waves all uttering praise:
To-morrow I commit me to His Grace.

  Floods.

We spring and swell meandering to and fro,
From height to depth, from depth to depth we flow,
We fertilize the world, and praise Him so.

  Whales and Sea Mammals.

We Whales and Monsters gambol in His sight
Rejoicing every day and every night,
Safe in the tender keeping of His Might.

  Fishes.

Our fashions and our colors and our speeds
Set forth His praise Who framed us and Who feeds,
Who knows our number and regards our needs.

  Birds.

Winged Angels of this visible world, we fly
To sing God's praises in the lofty sky;
We scale the height to praise our Lord most High.

  Eagle and Dove.

I the sun-gazing Eagle,--
                          I the Dove,
With plumes of softness and a note of love,--
We praise by divers gifts One God above.

  Beasts and Cattle.

We forest Beasts,--
                    We Beasts of hill or cave,--
We border-loving Creatures of the wave,--
We praise our King with voices deep and grave.

  Small Animals.

God forms us weak and small, but pours out all
We need, and notes us while we stand or fall:
Wherefore we praise Him, weak and safe and small.

  Lamb.

I praise my loving Lord, Who maketh me
His type by harmless sweet simplicity:
Yet He the Lamb of lambs incomparably.

  Lion.

I praise the Lion of the Royal Race,
Strongest in fight and swiftest in the chase:
With all my might I leap and lavish praise.

  All Men.

All creatures sing around us, and we sing:
We bring our own selves as our offering,
Our very selves we render to our King.

  Israel.

Flock of our Shepherd's pasture and His fold,
Purchased and well-beloved from days of old,
We tell His praise which still remains untold.

  Priests.

We free-will Shepherds tend His sheep, and feed;
We follow Him while caring for their need;
We follow praising Him, and them we lead.

  Servants of God.

We love God, for He loves us; we are free
In serving Him, who serve Him willingly:
As kings we reign, and praise His Majesty.

  Holy and Humble Persons.

All humble souls he calls and sanctifies;
All holy souls He calls to make them wise;
Accepting all, His free-will sacrifice.

  Babes.

He maketh me,--
                And me,--
                          And me,--
                                  To be
His blessed little ones around His knee,
Who praise Him by mere love confidingly.

  Women.

God makes our service love, and makes our wage
Love: so we wend on patient pilgrimage,
Extolling Him by love from age to age.

  Men.

God gives us power to rule: He gives us power
To rule ourselves, and prune the exuberant flower
Of youth, and worship Him hour after hour.

  Spirits and Souls--

Lo, in the hidden world we chant our chant
To Him Who fills us that we nothing want,
To Him Whose bounty leaves our craving scant.

  of Babes--

With milky mouths we praise God, from the breast
Called home betimes to rest the perfect rest,
By love and joy fufilling His behest.

  of Women--

We praise His Will which made us what He would,
His Will which fashioned us and called us good,
His Will our plenary beatitude.

  of Men.

We praise His Will Who bore with us so long,
Who out of weakness wrought us swift and strong,
Champions of right and putters-down of wrong.

  All.

Let everything that hath or hath not breath,
Let days and endless days, let life and death,
Praise God, praise God, praise God, His creature saith.

Think of an imagined orchestra. But there is no resonance hereabouts, so the imagination gives next to nothing for your efforts, and even in surround-sound there’s so little to reflect the dimensions of the space your walking inhabits. Sea hardly counts, having its constant companionship with wind, and sand hills absorb the footfall. A shout dies here before the breath has left the lungs.

Listen, there is a vague twittering of wading birds flocked far out on the sand. The sea rolls and breaks a rhythmic swell into surf. There’s a little wind to rustle the ammophila and only the slight undefined noise of our bodies moving in this strip between land and sea. Nowhere here can sound be enclosed except within the self. There’s a kind of breathing going on, and much like our own, it has to be listened for with a keen attention.

There is such a confusion of shapes making detail difficult to gather in, even to focus upon, and to attempt an imagined orchestration – impossible. We’ll have to wait for the camera’s catch, its cargo to be brought to the back-lit screen. Once there it seems hardly a glimmer of what we thought we saw, what we ‘snapped’ in an instant. It’s too detached, too flat. So thankfully you sketch, and I feel the pen draw shapes into your fingers and their moving, willing hand. On your sketchbook’s page the image breathes and lives.

You can’t sketch music this way because the mark made buries itself in a network that seems to defy with its complexity any image set before you. Time’s like that. You end up with a long low pitch, pulsating; a grumbling sound rich in sliding harmonics. You see, landscape does not beget melody or even structure and form, only tiny, pebbled pockets of random sound. Here, there is no belonging of music. Only the built space can adequately house music’s home. We might ****** a few seconds of the sea’s turn and wash, a bird’s cry, the rub and clatter of boot on stone, and later bring it back to a timeline of digital audio and be ‘musical’ with it, or not.

Where we hold music to landscape is something we are told just happens to be so; it is the interpretation’s (and the interpreter’s) will and whim. It is an illusion. The Lark Ascends in a Norfolk field. We hear, but rarely see, this almost stationary bird high in the morning air. We can only imagine the lark’s eye view, but we know the story, the poem, the context, so our imagination learns to supply the rest.

What is taken then to be taken back? On this November beach, on this mild, windless afternoon,. Am I collecting, preparing, and easing the mind, un-complicating mental space, or unravelling past thoughts and former plans? I can then imagine sitting at a table, a table before a window, a window before a garden, and beyond the garden (through the window) there’s a distant vista of the sea where the sun glistens (it is early morning), and there too in the bright sky remains a vestige of a night’s drama of clouds. But today we shall not put music to picture from a camera’s contents, from any flat and lifeless image.

Instead there seem to be present thoughts alive in this ancient coastline, abandoned here the necessary industry of living, the once ceaseless business of daily life. Instead of the hand to mouth existence governed by the herring, the course strip farming below the castle, the herds of dark cattle, the possible pigs, some wandering sheep, seabirds and their eggs for the ***, the gathering of seaweed, the foraging for fuel: there is a closing down for winter because the visitors are few. We need the rest they say, to regroup, paint the ceilings, freshen up the shop, strengthen the fences, have time away from the relentlessness of accommodating and being accommodating. Only the smell of smoking the herring remains from the distant past – but now such kippering is for Fortnums.

We step out across and down and up the coastal strip: an afternoon and its following morning;  a few miles walking, nothing serious, but moving here and there, taking it in, as much as we can. We fill ourselves to the brim with what’s here and now. The past is never far away: in just living memory there was a subsistence life of the herring fishers and the itinerant fisher folk who followed the herring from Aberdeen to Plymouth. Now there are empty holiday lets, retirement properties and most who live here service the visitors. Prime cattle graze, birds are reserved, caravans park next to a floodlit hotel and its gourmet restaurant. There’s even a poet here somewhere - sitting on a rock like a siren with a lovely smile.

Colours: dull greens now, wind-washed-out browns, out and above the sea confusions of grey and black stone, floating skeins of orange sands and the haunting, restless skies. Far distant into the west hills are sculpted by low-flying clouds resting in the mild air. Wind turbines step out across the middle distance, but today their sails are stationary. As the bay curves a settlement of wooden huts, painted chalets then the grey steep roofed houses of stone, grey and hard against the sea.

Does music come out of all this? What appears? What sounds? What is sounding in me? There is nothing stationary here to hang on to because even on this mild day there is constant change. Look up, around, adjust the viewpoint. There’s another highlight from the sky’s palette reflecting in the estuary water, always too various and complex to remember.

Music comes out of nothing but what you build it upon. It holds the potential for going beyond arrangements of notes. Pieces become buildings, layers in thought. My only landscape music to date begins with a formal processional, a march, and a gradually broadening out of tonality the close-knit chromatic to the open-eared pentatonic. There’s a steady stream of pitches that do not repeat or recur or return on themselves, as so much music needs to do to appease our memory.

In this landscape there seem only sharp points of dissonance. I hear lonely, disembodied pitches, uncomfortable sounds that are pinned to the past. The land, its topography as a score grasping the exterior, lies in multi-dimensional space, sound in being, a joining of points where there is no correlation. There’s a map and directions and a flow of time: it starts here and ends there, and so little remains for the memory.

Yet, this location remains. We walked it and saw it fortunately for a brief time in an uninhabited state. We were alone with it. We looked at this land as it meets the sea, and I saw it as a map on which to place complexes of sound, intensities even,. But how to meet the musical utterance that claims connection? It is a layering of complexes between silences, between the steady step, the stop and view. There is perhaps a hierarchy of landscape objects: the curve of the bay, the sandhills’ sweep, the layerings of sand, and in the pools and channels of this slight river that divides this beach flocks of birds.

Music is such an intense structure, so bound together, invested with proportions so exact and yet weighed down by tone, the sounding, vibrating string, the column of air broken by the valve and key, the attack and release of the hammered string. But there is also the voice, and voices are able to sound and carry their own resonance . . .

. . . and he realised that was where these long drawn out thoughts, this short diary of reflection, had been leading. He would sit quietly in contemplation of it all and work towards a web of words. He would let their rhythms and sounds come together in a map, as a map of their precious, shared time moving between the land and the sea, the sea and the land.

--To Elizabeth Robins Pennell


'O mes cheres Mille et Une Nuits!'--Fantasio.

Once on a time
There was a little boy:  a master-mage
By virtue of a Book
Of magic--O, so magical it filled
His life with visionary pomps
Processional!  And Powers
Passed with him where he passed.  And Thrones
And Dominations, glaived and plumed and mailed,
Thronged in the criss-cross streets,
The palaces pell-mell with playing-fields,
Domes, cloisters, dungeons, caverns, tents, arcades,
Of the unseen, silent City, in his soul
Pavilioned jealously, and hid
As in the dusk, profound,
Green stillnesses of some enchanted mere.--

I shut mine eyes . . . And lo!
A flickering ****** of memory that floats
Upon the face of a pool of darkness five
And thirty dead years deep,
Antic in girlish broideries
And skirts and silly shoes with straps
And a broad-ribanded leghorn, he walks
Plain in the shadow of a church
(St. Michael's:  in whose brazen call
To curfew his first wails of wrath were whelmed),
Sedate for all his haste
To be at home; and, nestled in his arm,
Inciting still to quiet and solitude,
Boarded in sober drab,
With small, square, agitating cuts
Let in a-top of the double-columned, close,
Quakerlike print, a Book! . . .
What but that blessed brief
Of what is gallantest and best
In all the full-shelved Libraries of Romance?
The Book of rocs,
Sandalwood, ivory, turbans, ambergris,
Cream-tarts, and lettered apes, and calendars,
And ghouls, and genies--O, so huge
They might have overed the tall Minster Tower
Hands down, as schoolboys take a post!
In truth, the Book of Camaralzaman,
Schemselnihar and Sindbad, Scheherezade
The peerless, Bedreddin, Badroulbadour,
Cairo and Serendib and Candahar,
And Caspian, and the dim, terrific bulk--
Ice-ribbed, fiend-visited, isled in spells and storms--
Of Kaf! . . . That centre of miracles,
The sole, unparalleled Arabian Nights!

Old friends I had a-many--kindly and grim
Familiars, cronies quaint
And goblin!  Never a Wood but housed
Some morrice of dainty dapperlings.  No Brook
But had his nunnery
Of green-haired, silvry-curving sprites,
To cabin in his grots, and pace
His lilied margents.  Every lone Hillside
Might open upon Elf-Land.  Every Stalk
That curled about a Bean-stick was of the breed
Of that live ladder by whose delicate rungs
You climbed beyond the clouds, and found
The Farm-House where the Ogre, gorged
And drowsy, from his great oak chair,
Among the flitches and pewters at the fire,
Called for his Faery Harp.  And in it flew,
And, perching on the kitchen table, sang
Jocund and jubilant, with a sound
Of those gay, golden-vowered madrigals
The shy thrush at mid-May
Flutes from wet orchards flushed with the triumphing dawn;
Or blackbirds rioting as they listened still,
In old-world woodlands rapt with an old-world spring,
For Pan's own whistle, savage and rich and lewd,
And mocked him call for call!

I could not pass
The half-door where the cobbler sat in view
Nor figure me the wizen Leprechaun,
In square-cut, faded reds and buckle-shoes,
Bent at his work in the hedge-side, and know
Just how he tapped his brogue, and twitched
His wax-end this and that way, both with wrists
And elbows.  In the rich June fields,
Where the ripe clover drew the bees,
And the tall quakers trembled, and the West Wind
Lolled his half-holiday away
Beside me lolling and lounging through my own,
'Twas good to follow the Miller's Youngest Son
On his white horse along the leafy lanes;
For at his stirrup linked and ran,
Not cynical and trapesing, as he loped
From wall to wall above the espaliers,
But in the bravest tops
That market-town, a town of tops, could show:
Bold, subtle, adventurous, his tail
A banner flaunted in disdain
Of human stratagems and shifts:
King over All the Catlands, present and past
And future, that moustached
Artificer of fortunes, ****-in-Boots!
Or Bluebeard's Closet, with its plenishing
Of meat-hooks, sawdust, blood,
And wives that hung like fresh-dressed carcases--
Odd-fangled, most a butcher's, part
A faery chamber hazily seen
And hazily figured--on dark afternoons
And windy nights was visiting of the best.
Then, too, the pelt of hoofs
Out in the roaring darkness told
Of Herne the Hunter in his antlered helm
Galloping, as with despatches from the Pit,
Between his hell-born Hounds.
And Rip Van Winkle . . . often I lurked to hear,
Outside the long, low timbered, tarry wall,
The mutter and rumble of the trolling bowls
Down the lean plank, before they fluttered the pins;
For, listening, I could help him play
His wonderful game,
In those blue, booming hills, with Mariners
Refreshed from kegs not coopered in this our world.

But what were these so near,
So neighbourly fancies to the spell that brought
The run of Ali Baba's Cave
Just for the saying 'Open Sesame,'
With gold to measure, peck by peck,
In round, brown wooden stoups
You borrowed at the chandler's? . . . Or one time
Made you Aladdin's friend at school,
Free of his Garden of Jewels, Ring and Lamp
In perfect trim? . . . Or Ladies, fair
For all the embrowning scars in their white *******
Went labouring under some dread ordinance,
Which made them whip, and bitterly cry the while,
Strange Curs that cried as they,
Till there was never a Black ***** of all
Your consorting but might have gone
Spell-driven miserably for crimes
Done in the pride of womanhood and desire . . .
Or at the ghostliest altitudes of night,
While you lay wondering and acold,
Your sense was fearfully purged; and soon
Queen Labe, abominable and dear,
Rose from your side, opened the Box of Doom,
Scattered the yellow powder (which I saw
Like sulphur at the Docks in bulk),
And muttered certain words you could not hear;
And there! a living stream,
The brook you bathed in, with its weeds and flags
And cresses, glittered and sang
Out of the hearthrug over the nakedness,
Fair-scrubbed and decent, of your bedroom floor! . . .

I was--how many a time!--
That Second Calendar, Son of a King,
On whom 'twas vehemently enjoined,
Pausing at one mysterious door,
To pry no closer, but content his soul
With his kind Forty.  Yet I could not rest
For idleness and ungovernable Fate.
And the Black Horse, which fed on sesame
(That wonder-working word!),
Vouchsafed his back to me, and spread his vans,
And soaring, soaring on
From air to air, came charging to the ground
Sheer, like a lark from the midsummer clouds,
And, shaking me out of the saddle, where I sprawled
Flicked at me with his tail,
And left me blinded, miserable, distraught
(Even as I was in deed,
When doctors came, and odious things were done
On my poor tortured eyes
With lancets; or some evil acid stung
And wrung them like hot sand,
And desperately from room to room
Fumble I must my dark, disconsolate way),
To get to Bagdad how I might.  But there
I met with Merry Ladies.  O you three--
Safie, Amine, Zobeide--when my heart
Forgets you all shall be forgot!
And so we supped, we and the rest,
On wine and roasted lamb, rose-water, dates,
Almonds, pistachios, citrons.  And Haroun
Laughed out of his lordly beard
On Giaffar and Mesrour (I knew the Three
For all their Mossoul habits).  And outside
The Tigris, flowing swift
Like Severn bend for bend, twinkled and gleamed
With broken and wavering shapes of stranger stars;
The vast, blue night
Was murmurous with peris' plumes
And the leathern wings of genies; words of power
Were whispering; and old fishermen,
Casting their nets with prayer, might draw to shore
Dead loveliness:  or a prodigy in scales
Worth in the Caliph's Kitchen pieces of gold:
Or copper vessels, stopped with lead,
Wherein some Squire of Eblis watched and railed,
In durance under potent charactry
Graven by the seal of Solomon the King . . .

Then, as the Book was glassed
In Life as in some olden mirror's quaint,
Bewildering angles, so would Life
Flash light on light back on the Book; and both
Were changed.  Once in a house decayed
From better days, harbouring an errant show
(For all its stories of dry-rot
Were filled with gruesome visitants in wax,
Inhuman, hushed, ghastly with Painted Eyes),
I wandered; and no living soul
Was nearer than the pay-box; and I stared
Upon them staring--staring.  Till at last,
Three sets of rafters from the streets,
I strayed upon a mildewed, rat-run room,
With the two Dancers, horrible and obscene,
Guarding the door:  and there, in a bedroom-set,
Behind a fence of faded crimson cords,
With an aspect of frills
And dimities and dishonoured privacy
That made you hanker and hesitate to look,
A Woman with her litter of Babes--all slain,
All in their nightgowns, all with Painted Eyes
Staring--still staring; so that I turned and ran
As for my neck, but in the street
Took breath.  The same, it seemed,
And yet not all the same, I was to find,
As I went up!  For afterwards,
Whenas I went my round alone--
All day alone--in long, stern, silent streets,
Where I might stretch my hand and take
Whatever I would:  still there were Shapes of Stone,
Motionless, lifelike, frightening--for the Wrath
Had smitten them; but they watched,
This by her melons and figs, that by his rings
And chains and watches, with the hideous gaze,
The Painted Eyes insufferable,
Now, of those grisly images; and I
Pursued my best-beloved quest,
Thrilled with a novel and delicious fear.
So the night fell--with never a lamplighter;
And through the Palace of the King
I groped among the echoes, and I felt
That they were there,
Dreadfully there, the Painted staring Eyes,
Hall after hall . . . Till lo! from far
A Voice!  And in a little while
Two tapers burning!  And the Voice,
Heard in the wondrous Word of God, was--whose?
Whose but Zobeide's,
The lady of my heart, like me
A True Believer, and like me
An outcast thousands of leagues beyond the pale! . . .

Or, sailing to the Isles
Of Khaledan, I spied one evenfall
A black blotch in the sunset; and it grew
Swiftly . . . and grew.  Tearing their beards,
The sailors wept and prayed; but the grave ship,
Deep laden with spiceries and pearls, went mad,
Wrenched the long tiller out of the steersman's hand,
And, turning broadside on,
As the most iron would, was haled and ******
Nearer, and nearer yet;
And, all awash, with horrible lurching leaps
Rushed at that Portent, casting a shadow now
That swallowed sea and sky; and then,
Anchors and nails and bolts
Flew screaming out of her, and with clang on clang,
A noise of fifty stithies, caught at the sides
Of the Magnetic Mountain; and she lay,
A broken bundle of firewood, strown piecemeal
About the waters; and her crew
Passed shrieking, one by one; and I was left
To drown.  All the long night I swam;
But in the morning, O, the smiling coast
Tufted with date-trees, meadowlike,
Skirted with shelving sands!  And a great wave
Cast me ashore; and I was saved alive.
So, giving thanks to God, I dried my clothes,
And, faring inland, in a desert place
I stumbled on an iron ring--
The fellow of fifty built into the Quays:
When, scenting a trap-door,
I dug, and dug; until my biggest blade
Stuck into wood.  And then,
The flight of smooth-hewn, easy-falling stairs,
Sunk in the naked rock!  The cool, clean vault,
So neat with niche on niche it might have been
Our beer-cellar but for the rows
Of brazen urns (like monstrous chemist's jars)
Full to the wide, squat throats
With gold-dust, but a-top
A layer of pickled-walnut-looking things
I knew for olives!  And far, O, far away,
The Princess of China languished!  Far away
Was marriage, with a Vizier and a Chief
Of Eunuchs and the privilege
Of going out at night
To play--unkenned, majestical, secure--
Where the old, brown, friendly river shaped
Like Tigris shore for shore!  Haply a Ghoul
Sat in the churchyard under a frightened moon,
A thighbone in his fist, and glared
At supper with a Lady:  she who took
Her rice with tweezers grain by grain.
Or you might stumble--there by the iron gates
Of the Pump Room--underneath the limes--
Upon Bedreddin in his shirt and drawers,
Just as the civil Genie laid him down.
Or those red-curtained panes,
Whence a tame cornet tenored it throatily
Of beer-pots and spittoons and new long pipes,
Might turn a caravansery's, wherein
You found Noureddin Ali, loftily drunk,
And that fair Persian, bathed in tears,
You'd not have given away
For all the diamonds in the Vale Perilous
You had that dark and disleaved afternoon
Escaped on a roc's claw,
Disguised like Sindbad--but in Christmas beef!
And all the blissful while
The schoolboy satchel at your hip
Was such a bulse of gems as should amaze
Grey-whiskered chapmen drawn
From over Caspian:  yea, the Chief Jewellers
Of Tartary and the bazaars,
Seething with traffic, of enormous Ind.--

Thus cried, thus called aloud, to the child heart
The magian East:  thus the child eyes
Spelled out the wizard message by the light
Of the sober, workaday hours
They saw, week in week out, pass, and still pass
In the sleepy Minster City, folded kind
In ancient Severn's arm,
Amongst her water-meadows and her docks,
Whose floating populace of ships--
Galliots and luggers, light-heeled brigantines,
Bluff barques and rake-hell fore-and-afters--brought
To her very doorsteps and geraniums
The scents of the World's End; the calls
That may not be gainsaid to rise and ride
Like fire on some high errand of the race;
The irresistible appeals
For comradeship that sound
Steadily from the irresistible sea.
Thus the East laughed and whispered, and the tale,
Telling itself anew
In terms of living, labouring life,
Took on the colours, busked it in the wear
Of life that lived and laboured; and Romance,
The Angel-Playmate, raining down
His golden influences
On all I saw, and all I dreamed and did,
Walked with me arm in arm,
Or left me, as one bediademed with straws
And bits of glass, to gladden at my heart
Who had the gift to seek and feel and find
His fiery-hearted presence everywhere.
Even so dear Hesper, bringer of all good things,
Sends the same silver dews
Of happiness down her dim, delighted skies
On some poor collier-hamlet--(mound on mound
Of sifted squalor; here a soot-throated stalk
Sullenly smoking over a row
Of flat-faced hovels; black in the gritty air
A web of rails and wheels and beams; with strings
Of hurtling, tipping trams)--
As on the amorous nightingales
And roses of Shiraz, or the walls and towers
Of Samarcand--the Ineffable--whence you espy
The splendour of Ginnistan's embattled spears,
Like listed lightnings.
Samarcand!
That name of names!  That star-vaned belvedere
Builded against the Chambers of the South!
That outpost on the Infinite!
And behold!
Questing therefrom, you knew not what wild tide
Might overtake you:  for one fringe,
One suburb, is stablished on firm earth; but one
Floats founded vague
In lubberlands delectable--isles of palm
And lotus, fortunate mains, far-shimmering seas,
The promise of wistful hills--
The shining, shifting Sovranties of Dream.

SECRETS OF THE STONEHENGE IN VERSE
Dear Readers, I present a simplified version of the true story of the Stonehenge, on the Salisbury plains of Southern England, with over a million visitors every year. Declared as a World Heritage Site since 1986.Left out many technical details to curb the Length!
Hope you find this interesting to read.  Thanks, - Raj

SECRETS OF THE STONEHENGE IN VERSE
                     BY RAJ NANDY
                
                     INTRODUCTION
Shrouded in ancient legend, rituals and mystery,
Forming a part of ancient History, in the County of
Wiltshire on the rolling Salisbury plains,
Thirty miles north of the English Channel, stands the
megalithic structure  - The Stonehenge.
Dating back to some 3000 BC during the Neolithic Age,
Long before the Egyptian pyramids got made!
Some of its secrets have finally been unraveled by
Archeologists of our time and age.
It was a period when early humans changed over
from being nomadic hunter- gatherers,
To cultivate land and domesticate animals, to
become settled farmers.
This ushered in a new social change in the history
of Human progression,
Which got reflected in huge stone structures to
mark this advancement and occasion.
For these megalithic structures were bigger than
the tribes of men or the community;
Marked burial mounds and places for performing
sacred rites and magical healing rituals, for the
entire community.
Stonehenge was aligned to the mid-Summer and
mid-Winter Solstice, with the rising and the setting
Sun.
Served as an astronomical calendar for the turning
of Seasons, when crop cycles also begun.
Some scholars opine that it was used as a Lunar
Calendar as well,
Since Moon worship predates Sun worship by
Pre-historic men!
It was long before the invention of the wheel,
written script, and even metal implements.
This monumental structure speak of Stone Age
Briton’s greatest achievement!
(Period covered is from Late Stone Age to the brink of
Bronze Age.)

BRIEF LAYOUT OF THE STONEHENGE
Cutting across myths and legends archeologists
and geologists have tried to piece together the
Stonehenge Story,
Which stood like an enigmatic puzzle for the
last Five Thousand Centuries!
Scholars say construction commenced around
3000 BC, but progressed only in stages spread
over the next fifteen centuries.
Initially, a large earthwork or a ‘Henge’ with a
circular ditch and a bank was made,
With 56 timber posts around the inner perimeter
on the windy Salisbury plains.
Used by primitive man as a burial place, but for
rituals later got linked to other smaller sites.
With processional avenues leading to River Avon,
to honor dead ancestors with sacred rites!
Entrance to the ‘Henge’ was marked by a pair of
upright Slaughter Stones weighing 28 tones, and
6.6 meters tall.
But only one remains today lying flat on the ground
after its fall!
Some 256 feet from center of the ‘Henge’ on the NE
Avenue once stood the Heel Stones 7.6 meters high!
As a marker for the Summer Solstice showing the
position of the rising Sun in the Midsummer sky!

          BLUE STONES FROM WALES:
Some 1000 years later, 82 Blue Stones were brought
from the Prescelli Mountains of Southern Wales;
And the earlier timber posts with these Blue stones
was replaced.
Each stone weighing around 4 tones, was brought
over a distance of some 250 miles to the plains of
Salisbury,
Loaded on hollowed out log boats fashioned like a
mini barge, to sail during high tide into the Bristol
Estuary!
Pulled over land on greased wooden rollers, and
loaded again on mini barges down the River Avon.
Since Avon flowed closer to the ‘Henge’ site in those
ancient days, which is now known!
(Some Scholars feel that the Blue Stones were swept down
closer to the Salisbury plain, during the close of the last Ice
Age! These Stones were believed to have powers of magical
cure too!)

              THE SARSAN STONES
During its final phase of development came the larger
23 ft tall Sarsan Stones, weighing some 44 tones.
From 20 miles north of the ‘Henge’ area dragged on
sledges and rollers from Marlborough Downs.
These stones now formed the outer ring capped with
stone lintels, replacing the Blue Stones;
And the Blues Stones were moved inwards and
rearranged in the horseshoe and circle shape, as
presently seen and known!
(NOTE: Sheer muscle power used to drag the stones with ropes
made from plant fiber of the indigenous lime bark soaked in
water for weeks. Stone lintels were sculpted in the shape of an
arc to cap the SARSAN Stones to form the outer circle. Wooden
scaffolding & ramps were used to hoist and position the heavy
stone lintels horizontally on top of upright stones! Sarsan Stones
were hard sandstones tougher than granite! However many of the
stones of this Ancient Ruin are missing, leaving some unanswered
questions behind.)

        CONCLUDING THIS TRUE STORY
Archeologists and scholars using radiocarbon dating
have tried to recreate the Stonehenge Story.
This ancient ruin with many unanswered questions,
now remain protected as an Iconic Monument of
British History!
It stands as an astronomical time clock and is also of
spiritual significance;
It also symbolizes the ingenuity of Human Mind, its
power, and endurance.
I conclude with a an extract from a poem by TS Salmon
about the STONEHENGE here below:-
“Warpt in veils of time’s unbroken gloom,
Obscure as death and silent as the tomb.
Where cold oblivion holds her dusky reign,
Frowns the dark pile on Sarum’s lonely plain.
Yet think not here with classic eye to trace,
Corinthian beauty or Ionian grace.
No pillored lines with sculptured foliage crowned,
No fluted remnants deck the hallowed ground.
Firm, as implanted by some Titan’s might,
Each rugged stone up rears its giant height.
Whence the poised fragment tottering seems to throw,
A trembling shadow on the plain below.”
(*Sarum = old name for Salisbury.)
Thanks dear Readers for your kind attention span ,
I have simplified by cutting short many details the
best as I can!
ALL COPYRIGHTS WITH RAJ NANDY OF NEW DELHI
E-mail: rajnandy21@yahoo.in

Umbrage ultraism infrangible extemporaneous incognito edition
Penumbral platitude platonic proxy photics rendition
Interface fenestration imbroglio pandemonium inducement sedition
Wretched infelicitous extant trajectory sordid intuition
Scandalous scavenger squalid anomalous punitive condition
Panacea chiaroscuro parallax emanate imminent perdition

Equilibrist revision exertion suborn temerity imbues
Indulgent zealous discrepancy apparentness cogitation accrues
Heuristic noumenal psychokinesis extrapolation incursion construes
Aura auspicious primitive prism processional reviews
Obstinate tenacious preeminent edificatory omnipotence eschews
Equivocal gumption ratification constitutional manumission ensues  
  
Delusory apparition extravagance peccavi verity tempestuous
Obtrusive obtusely overt indemnities sagaciously obliquitous
Ephemeral anxiety antonym existential exigency alacritous
Fortuitous emendation phantasm ontological ontogeny acuitous
Indemnify veracious infernal infidel impunities iniquitous
Meritorious fulham presumptive extrication expiation indigenous

Fragments 91, 92, 99, 106, 104, 103, 100, 105, 101, 102, 96, 109, 93, 94, 97, 95, and 133 combined.

Raise high the beams of the raftered hall,
(Sing the *****-refrain!)
Ye builders, of the bridal-dwelling!
(Sing the *****-refrain!)
Lo, the bridegroom comes, as the War-god tall —
(Sing the *****-refrain!)
Now nay — yet our tallest in stature excelling;
(Sing the *****-refrain!)
For stately he towers above all the throng
As the Lesbian singer towers among
All alien poets, a prince of song.

O happy bridegroom! it cometh to-day,
The bridal thine heart hith longed for aye!
At last shall she be thine own, the maid
For whom thou hast sighed, for whom thou hast prayed.
For none other maiden beneath the skies,
O bridegroom, was like unto her in thine eyes.
Whereunto may I liken thee, bridegroom dear?
To a green vine-shoot in the spring of the year.
Now, now let the bridegroom rejoice, for the bride
Into the hall cometh joyful-eyed.
Ethereal-pale is her lovely face.
Hail, bridegroom! Hail, bride, queenly in grace!
How goodly to see thy lord stands there!
And his goodness will keep him for thee ever fair.
Ah, doth she, ah doth she regretfully brood? —
Does her heart still yearn after maidenhood?
Nay, not in this hour she cries:
'Maidenhood, maidenhood, whither away
Forsaking me?'
While maidenhood replies:
'Not again unto thee shall I come for aye,
Not again unto thee!'
No more, no more doth she chant
Proud young virginity's vaunt:
'As the sweet-apple flames on the tip of a spray against the sky,
At its uttermost point, which the gleaners forgat, and passed it by —
O nay, they forgat it not, but they could not attain so high.'
But she thinks of the fate, an evil thing,
That the years fast-fleeting to fair maids bring.
When the roses are faded, the gold turns grey.
And the smoothness is furrowed, as singeth the lay —
'As the hyacinth-flower on the mountain-side that the shepherds tread
Underfoot, and low on the earth its bloom dark-splendid is shed.'
Lo, her hand into thine hath her father given.
And thou leadest her home 'neath the Star of Even;
To thy portal the bridal-train draws near.
And the Chant Processional rings out clear:
'Hail, Hesper, who bringest home all
That radiant Dawn scattered wide,
Bringest back unto fold and stall
The sheep and the goat, and thy call
Brings the child to the mother's side.
Let the rose-ringed Star of the Evenfall
Usher thee on, love's willing thrall,
Bride, garden of loves like roses blowing.
Bride, loveliest image of Paphos' Queen!
So pass to the bride-bower, pass within
To the nuptial couch, for the sweet bestowing
On the bridegroom, whose measure is overflowing.
Of the bliss, wherein honoured is Hera: 'tis owned
Of the Marriage-goddess, the silver-throned.'

A prose poem*

It’s all boarded up now, abandoned in the triangle of downtown Roy, New Mexico, but like a lost island named Capronea two-hundred forgotten years ago, I find myself back in the summer of 1977, seven-years old in the balcony of a second-run, small town movie house watching *The Land That Time Forgot in that small-town, movie-timeline kind of way: two years after everyone else. Popcorn brides, my cousins and I walked the movie processional during opening credits, almost missing the proverbial plummeting message thrown out to sea in a water cask. Candy-bored through all the world-war-submarine scenes, I perked up with innocent horror at the spreading circle of blood in the river, rifles shooting into a gaping dinosaur mouth. And the thunk of its neck hitting the deck. Years later I come back to the epic on classic TV. This time I notice the wobbly love story, German metaphysics arguing with British empiricism that lasts only one flirty scene. Now I’m shocked and a little dismayed over how little screen time the dinosaurs actually get, their three Shakespearean scenes, how I still feel all the same heartache as they enact their long and dramatic death throes. Doug McClure is alright, I guess, except that his hair is always blown out to an impossible feathered confection, just like the German Captain who keeps his hat on way past when this is necessary or useful. We laugh with ironic smugness at the stiff Jurassic puppets and the blood on rubber, the convolution of the island’s evolutionary biology. Those river amoebas are a hoot! Oh, the ironic wink that double-crosses itself in the end, an irony that is really homesickness longing for sincerity, simplicity. My husband says he prefers this movie to those Spielberg ones. I give him hell about this but later come around to see his point. Let’s take the movie’s basic premise: we are at the end of history presumably. So even if we could forget all that history, wipe the slate clean as it were, we still wouldn’t get along with our rivals. At least not enough to fashion an oil refinery from sticks and stones, pack up all that oil in barrels, and roll on outa this nightmare.

None of us will get off this island alive. At the end we’re left crossing a mountain of ice with two people whose only hope is to simplify things down to survival and ***—and *** in those impossible furs no less (in dinosaur leather maybe). We can’t help but trip over the metaphors here. They're everywhere. Only back in 1977, we believed them.

Wedding bells
The heart swells
A couple of people teary
Nobody here is leery
When it is two guys
Marrying after so many years.
Not an occasion for tears
They walk hand in hand
Toward a more grand
Joining together
Wedding each other
Now that some in society
See it is propriety;
Now that love is love
And over half the people
Know that couples
Are those who marry
And cease to carry
Their old angry baggage
Like stinking luggage
Into a loving occasion.

There is no reason.
Everyone here knows
That is how love goes.
It is between two hearts
No cart before the horse.
It’s a matter of course.
And, of course, family and friends
Not just kith, but kin
Are happy and celebrating
For the long awaited mating
Of two that fought the tides
And made it here where abides
That rosy day of knowing each other
Part of a couple officially;
Equally exciting and peacefully
Into a new morning of a new day.
What better way is there to say
I love you, a phrase not new
But this time said for two?
And certifiably, legally too.

The geese
Form a procession
in their northern formal dress.
Single file they march down
The hill
Coming from deep out of
the tree line and through
A courtyard of grass and sedge,
Their solemn walk
An act of unison metered by
webbed feet.
And an overdone elegance.

At shore of the pond
They prostrate themselves,
Head bowed to the water.
As if encountering an old
priestess among the
church pews.
Solemnly they shake their
Necks like human hands-
A time honored ritual.
Then, an unknown cue,
Their heads
turn up to the blue sky
launching themselves Into
the water
splash-less, like
Floating clouds blown on
The breeze.
Now moving independently,
leaving ripple paths
across the pond.
The ritual has ended.

Umbrage ultraism infrangible extemporaneous incognito edition
Penumbral platitude platonic proxy photics rendition
Interface fenestration imbroglio pandemonium inducement sedition
Wretched infelicitous extant trajectory sordid intuition
Scandalous scavenger squalid anomalous punitive condition
Panacea chiaroscuro parallax emanate imminent perdition

Equilibrist revision exertion suborn temerity imbues
Indulgent zealous discrepancy apparentness cogitation accrues
Heuristic noumenal psychokinesis extrapolation incursion construes
Aura auspicious primitive prism processional reviews
Obstinate tenacious preeminent edificatory omnipotence eschews
Equivocal gumption ratification constitutional manumission ensues  
  
Delusory apparition extravagance peccavi verity tempestuous
Obtrusive obtusely overt indemnities sagaciously obliquitous
Ephemeral anxiety antonym existential exigency alacritous
Fortuitous emendation phantasm ontological ontogeny acuitous
Indemnify veracious infernal infidel impunities iniquitous
Meritorious fulham presumptive extrication expiation indigenous

A Processional with MePhones

From an idea suggested by Anthony Germain,
The Duke of Suffix after the Order of Scrabble©™

In greeting students on their way to class
One speaks only to the tops of their heads
As they process in ‘tudes of ‘umble prayer
In silence each bowing to her small god

(Or “his” as the gendered pronoun might be)
Speaking to no one, detached from the world
Navigating as does the sightless bat
By strange sensations known only to them

One ‘phone, one soul – that is the ratio
And each dull brain stilled ever in statio

<!>

Four Irises tall & gallant, looking though
slighted worn out, a tad bedraggled
they are springtime survivor stragglers
of the Great Spring Weather Battle.

living in an open trench, battle conditions,
wind-whipped by constant strong breezes,
raked by intermittent machine gun rain,
familiar weapons of the “handover” season

loyal guardians of their pinpoint position,
remaining on duty, standing at attention,
dignified amidst the serene, nearly summer, now,
accepting quietude & gratitude of surround soundings

arrow-straight, in dress uniforms of royally purple,
four lead a cohort of unbloomed green fellows,
protecting their charge, an ancient marker of time,
rusted-green bronze sundial, symbol of continuity

these four, boon companions to human and animal,
shall persist long after I cease to dabble in this art,
they greet their admirers in full regalia, every year,
long, long may they live, die and be yet reborn!

here, in place, when we arrived four decades ago, a tiny forever,
changelings heading a processional of the summer season,
greeting all with a simple story of constance of change, of beauty,
leading our Summertime Commencement Exercises

May 26 ~ 27, 2023

Autumn,
a coffin closing.

Winter,
a coffin buried.

Spring
violets on a grave.

Summer,
the season of amnesia...

when we forget
all other seasons
and begin again
because we must.

As your lips
trail slowly
down my stomach,

Lady,

I care nothing
about war, death,
scandal or even
climate change.

I am focused on
your touch and
your destination,

your wanton progress,

but mostly

on this flesh
we share so gently.
   ~mce

On Elephanta, we traipsed from our tottery tour boats onto venerable dust. Led single file up hardened clay trail to Hindu temples buried beyond time and grime, the temporal length of an entity's existence. Jungle encroaching, we were warned, "Do not feed the monkeys." We had no plans to, but we soon learned the monkeys had their own plans. Pronto, ******, and Scratch very quickly pinched, plundered and ransacked the box lunches we brought. Cheeky monkeys, ha! Toothy fanged gang-bangers more like it. Still, we escaped without the drawing of any blood, so we were grateful for that. Though my friend had lost her scarf in the tussle, and she kept telling me to ****** it back. "Sure," I thought, giggling with no chivalrous intention of taking on any ruffian primate.

Further on we became enthralled by the alluring architecture. Cave temples carved into basalt rock with Gods and Goddesses moved us deeply with their artistic and spiritual integrity. Natural light pouring in through vantage points illuminate sculptures at different times through the day, so the tour becomes processional. Devotion is seen as many offer prayers and flower garlands to the idols. Learning the history of Portuguese sailors using the temples as target practice is saddening and evident in the pitted carvings and reliefs.

We had been graced with a brilliant bright day to take in the sights, but this was not to last. It was monsoon season and scuttles of rain came dowsing our boat. Upon our return to the Gateway of India, we were blown off course, forcing us to land in an unfamiliar area in Mumbai where tourists were not seen regularly. We had to leap frog a dozen or more vessels all blown to port at once trying to escape the storm. There was a huge panic of tour boats and fishermen. The disgusting quagmire splashing in our faces from the harbor was mix of gas and oil spilled from boats, dead fish and likely other unnameable mammalian debris, plus general ******* of full gamut. All in all, we survived only to be encircled by knife wielding street urchins when we lost our way back to Whorli Seaface where we were staying.

"Street urchins," was the local term of endearment for the orphaned adolescent gangs known for robbing tourists. No one told us about the knives though, so we were taken a bit off guard. In any case, feeling less threatened than by the band of monkeys we just encountered on Elephanta, my chivalry kicked in. I picked one up, dangling him over the dockside. This show of brute force seemed enough to convince the others to withdrawal and I immediately freed my runty captive ****. He seemed grateful, though a language barrier was not resolved. I gave him some rupees for the newly acquired souvenir, namely the knife. He skipped off quickly with his bitty buddies. They turned and waved goodbye with bright beautiful smiles.

This story has no moral other than, when traveling without a compass, always keep a moral one.

The truth is turning plastic
And politicians spastic
As they dream up fantastic
Ways to be bombastic.
The anti-intellectuals,
Their rhetoric effectual,
Demand a perpetual
And lucrative processional
To a place they know the score
Where they can amass more
Of money and stores
In disregarding the mores
They were elected for
And continue waging war
Like high-priced political ******.

The truth has no chance
In this genocidal dance
Of unfortunate circumstance
Created to enhance
Resultant happenstance
When, by the seat of his pants
When we happened to glance
Away for a particular moment
And were swamped by the foment
Of eight long years of torment;
Freedoms arteries turned to cement
And any chance of sanity
For American humanity
Got buried in some inanity
About hanging chads and counts
Giving a fool a chance to pounce;
To squeeze the last pure ounce
Of dignity out of the Presidency
By merely taking up residency.

This is neither history nor theology;
this is Romance:

                                       A Liturgy for the Emperor

In memory of
Patrick Joseph Donovan,
Stratiotis

Processional

How, then, will we find death?  With rifle in hand,
Perhaps, or flowing with the warm, worn prayers
That slip with beads through one's fingers and soul.
Rifle or Rosary, either will do.
One's death might rise in the boldness of youth,
Or in the wearied wisdom of old age,
In wild combat against ancient evils,
Or softly, while planting a red-apple tree
For grandchildren to summer-celebrate,
In wild red martyrdom, or obscure white.

The nights still whisper how the Emperor fell,
Fell with a faithful few upon the walls,
The old land walls of Constantinople.
But we are not to speak of martyrs whose
Transcendent beauty reproaches our times,
Our drifting dark age, drab, dreary, and dim
Our tomb-like lives cluttered with small darkness,
Our talk all common, colourless, and cold:
The thoughts assigned programmed into our souls,
Daymares programmed into us for our good,
Pitiful, pattering, prosthetic prose,
Cacophonies of casual cruelties --
No brave iambic lines for golden dreams.

But dare we also whisper truths, and speak
Of what a wind-wild people once we were,
And we will want our syllables to sing
In honour of the Martyr-Emperor
And those who followed him into his death,
And in this knowing of him we can live
Among those souls who are forever young.

Introit

In Nomine Partis, et Filli, et Spiritus Sancti

We will go to the Altar of God
To God, Who gives joy to our youth
We will go to the Altar of God
We will go to Byzantium

Kyrie

Lord have mercy -- when the shadows surround us
Christ have mercy -- when we forget the Three Romes
Lord have mercy -- when we forget You

Gloria

Glory to God in the highest
And peace to His Byzantine people
And all His peoples
Lord God, Heavenly King
who once blessed us with Emperors
Send us another
Send Your waiting people their Emperor

The First Reading

As Constantine his walls he watched, he wept,
Lost in the Gethsemane of his soul
His tears they fell upon the ancient bricks
Warm with centuries of sun, saintliness,
And the passions of a glorious race

The City!  Long reigning on the Golden Horn
The Summer Country of our childhood dreams
There playing, praying, working, selling, and,
Yes, sinning too.  Passionate *Romanoi --
What a magnificent people we were.

(fast)

When armies marched to the Byzantine beat
Sophia ruled from her Byzantine seat  
When Byzantine sails sheltered Odysseus' sea
The wave-roads of trade were open and free  
When Romanoi feasted, blood mixed with wine
Daggers drawn over a dancing concubine
A newer Helen who provoked desire,
She seared men's eyes with her own Greek Fire
When Blues and Greens howled in the Hippodrome --
Such rowdy citizens in Second Rome! --
Then even Emperors in purple shoes
Feared stoning by Greens or hanging by Blues
The rough, loud democracy of the street --
Mobs also marched to the Byzantine beat

The Second Reading

(slowly)

But –

Above all rose Justinian's gem
The holy place where God called us to Him
The Mother Church of dawn-lit Christendom
Sophia -- the Queen of Byzantium
Where Patriarch, patrician, people, and priest
Gave worship.  Then the greatest and the least
Abandoned sin to hear the sweet bells ring,
Stood penitent before our God, our King:
In consecrated hands, through wine and bread

Christos Pantocrater fed us Himself

And then all hearts were cleansed, all souls were fed

(Very slowly)

But centuries passed, and this City of God
Heart of the Empire, became the Empire,
As lands and peoples were lost forever
to the creeping new age.  When Constantine,
The last Constantine, was called to the Throne,
All that was left was The City herself,
The Morea, and islands, and memories.
The fleet whose sails had shaded the Inner Sea
Was but a few hopeless hulks in the Horn

From the dust, dark shadows metastasized,
Shadows who stole and slew their way to power
And swept the land bare of free folk and fields
And more and more the shadows grasped and held,
A dead world of slaves whose backs were bloodied
Beneath the whips of masters, slaves whose eyes
Were cast carefully, cautiously to the ground
Lest demeanour manly and bearing proud
Attract the executioners' busy blades.

Finally, after devouring lands and souls,
The shadows coveted Constantinople,
The Red-Apple Tree where continents meet,
The City they could never build for themselves
And nothing stood between them and their lust
But one bold man: Constantine Dragases.
The faithful few who stood the walls with him,
Gathered around proud, stubborn Constantine:
Workers and monks and nuns, beggars, merchants,
Proud, arrogant Byzantines, and the few
Wild Latins From the barbarian West
Whose Greek was in their hearts, not on their lips,
Who gave their loyalty late to their liege lord,
The Emperor, who could have safely lain
A shadow's golden-caged slave, obedient,
Well-fed, well-bedded from the shadows'
Catalogues of pretty girls and prettier boys,
A memory of what had been a man.

But Constantine stood proudly on his walls,
Defiantly, bravely, sadly there on
His crumbling ancient walls, and gave his faith
To God and the City, to his people,
Even to the faithless ones, even to his death.

And others came, From Rome and Spain and France,
From Germany, and even from the Turks,
Brave, lonely men with reasons of their own
For ending their lives there on the Land Walls.

But they were not enough.  And late that night,
After the last Mass in Hagia Sophia,
The Emperor knew that his was the blood,
The blood of sacrifice that would be shed
In remembrance of ****** Golgotha,
For the people he was given to rule,
For the people for whom he chose to die,
Sheltering, protecting, until his end.


A Gospel

No angel appeared to the Emperor,
No voice of God from a burning bush
He parted himself from his followers
And for a few minutes grieved alone

And this was given Constantine to know:

The eternal Constantinople is
Never to be lost, never defeated --
In every Christian flows Dragases' blood
Every village is the Holy City
Every church is Hagia Sophia
Every prayer is a Mass for the Emperor
Every children's foot-race the Hippodrome
Every poor family's poor supper
A banquet under the Red-Apple Tree.
Constantinople will live forever.
Know that, and, laughing, give your last earth-hour,
And your joyful eternity, to God.

Credo

We believe in God's holy empire too,
Byzantium, eternally golden
The Red-Apple Tree in the eastern sun
The City that echoes with laughing light
Through memory and history and beyond.
We believe in God and His Emperor,
And we believe that in the absence of
The Emperor, even then we must be
The Emperor's subjects, stubborn and true,
Wherever God has chosen to send us.
We then must rule our passions and our hearts,
Tend our gardens as if they were Eden --
Because they are -- and care for our children
As if angels were visiting tonight,
Until our God restores our Emperor,
Restores His City where the Earth-halves meet,
And finally, some day, some happy day,
Returns Himself to sit and rule enthroned
In His Three Romes, and in Jerusalem.


Communion

Constantine shook himself, and gave commands,
Commending all to duty and to God.
Above him the dome of Hagia Sophia
Glowed eerily on that last, wild night
While lightning slashed among the sliding clouds
Byzantium rose again for one glorious hour
And the world marveled that such things could be,
That Christ and Rome and Constantinople
Could be found in one man at the end of an age.

Blood, *****, screams, and death;
blood, *****, death
Blood, *****, screams, and death;
blood, *****, screams
Blood, *****, screams, and death;
blood, *****, death
Blood, *****, screams, and death;
blood, *****, screams
The glory is that there is no glory.
Chaos.  Horror.  Stench.  Sweat.  Pain.  *****.  Death.
Hi­s -- His -- body broken again for us.

On that dark morning of a dark new age,
Constantine turned and faced its slithering shadows
With a Byzantine end to his ruler's art,
With the peace of Christ and a hero's heart.

DISMISSAL

The Mass is ended.  Byzantium is ended.  
Escape, if you can -- make Byzantium live.
Escape to live in some peace, if you can.
Escape in peace to love and serve in exile.
Escape in peace to love and serve the Lord.

"O Lord save Thy people and bless Thine inheritance;
And to Thy Faithful king grant victory over the barbarians.
And by the power of Thy Cross, protect all those who follow  
          Thee"1

Not an End at All

1Troparion for the Sunday of the Elevation of the Cross, Divine Prayers and Serves of the Catholic Orthodox Church of Christ, copyright 1938.

Many thanks to Mr. Tod Mixson and others of St. Michael's Orthodox Church for assistance at many points, both liturgical and artistic, to Dr. Dan Bailey, of happy memory, and Dr. John Dahmus of Stephen F. Austin State University.

I pulled myself through the lecherous carpet,
used the torn, stuffing-spilled, arm of the couch
to hoist myself to the door.

I opened it, only to find Wayne.
"Why didn't you answer your phone, *******?"

I rubbed my red eyes,
cleared my throat, stutter-stepped
with my speech, finally finding my
footing, I asked,
"What are you talking about, man?"

"I called you last night, like 6-or-7 times."

"I had a time of it."

"Yeah, I can see that by the aura of class you are emitting."

"Oh, *******. Why are you so dressed up?"

"That's why I called, you ******* hermit.
Samantha's mom died, on...uh, Wednesday, I think. The funeral is in an hour."

"Gloria's buddy, Sam?"

"Yeah, man."

"****. Okay, well let me at least change clothes, spray on some cologne."

I went to my closet, all the clothes were half-*****,
engaging in an **** on the floor, all the hangers watching, naked,
lonely.

Dug through the mess,
until I uncovered a tie, a white shirt, and some pin-striped pants.
I draped myself in the clothes,
grabbed a pair of sunglasses,
parted my hair,
took a stick of deodorant to my pits, three sprays of cologne,
out the door.

"Where is the funeral?"

"It's off of Sherman Boulevard, not far from Beanie's Coffee."

I got in his passenger seat.
He was listening to Nick Drake's first cut,
which somehow seemed to fit the mood I was in.
"Do you mind if I smoke?"
He didn't.
I had made sure to grab my pack of cigarettes
before we left.
Last night's mistakes were still blaring their siren
in my echo chamber of a head,
so anything with a chemical
function to dull the noise,
was a welcome friend.

The funeral was outside,
behind some strangely styled funeral parlor,
circa 1978.
When we made the corner,
the first people we saw were Gloria's parents.
Her dad, stoic, distant like always,
her mom, crying her eyes out, body already
shaking, and all the sentiment was still to be spewed.

They cast stones from afar with their eyes,
I nodded,
shifted my focus onto anything my gaze could find.
Which ended up being Gloria,
such has always been my luck.
She was in a long black skirt,
and a light jacket.
The wind lifted her black hair
in a sweeping, yet uniform movement.
Her lips were painted a deep maroon.
I sat down a couple rows behind,
stared at the back of her head,
while some puppet in a tie
talked about how Sam's mom
is kicking it in heaven.

I heard very little,
I was pretty hungry,
so I leaned over to Wayne,
"Are there any places around here to eat?"

He just stared at me like I was an absolute idiot.
**** him.
People started to walk toward the casket one row at a time.
It was one of those funerals.
Open caskets have always ****** me off.
It's horribly disrespectful to put the recently deceased
on display so everyone can stare with fascination,
as if it's some sideshow attraction at a carnival.

That thought aside,
I looked at Sam's mom as I walked by,
and you know how people always
say **** like, "Aw, well they did a good job,
it looks just like her," they did a rather ****-poor
job with this one.

Her face was a series of unusual lumps,
scattered like the foothills of northern Arkansas.
Her mascara was everywhere,
her cheeks rosier than Santa's *** cheeks,
and the whole spectacle spiraled me into an awful mood.

As everyone was standing around waiting for the processional,
I asked Wayne, "Where is Sam?"

"Dude, they got in a car wreck. Sam's still in the hospital.
She ain't doing too hot. How did you not know that?
They even said it during the service."

"I was really hungry, man."

Some kind of craftsman is working at his bench
Peeling ribbons of soft wood under a dim lamp
He watches the growing pile of discarded strips.

The timecard is now an electronic monitor
An old woman at the factory wishes
That it were instead a thick piece of yellowing cardstock
So that she could use a hole punch.

Somebody’s daughter is dancing naked in the yard
A business man drives by and hopes that somebody will photograph her.
He is remembering the blush on his lover’s face
When he first saw the photo of her and her sisters
Flat chested, unclothed, and splashing together in the bath.

The waitress from town has left for school.
Somebody there is brushing the hair away from her eyes
And wondering whether or not it is a good moment to kiss her.
Meanwhile there is a young man sitting in his regular spot in her diner
Wondering if her eyes really were the color of the winter grass
He is contemplating joining the army.

A wiry beggar is sitting outside of a convenience store
He asks for a cigarette and gets not even a sideward glance
Later he asks a thin, young thing for a few dollars
Once she is gone he goes inside to buy a pack
And smokes them immediately.

There is a funeral processional going through town.
There is a woman at the end driving with clenched hands
She feels guilty because of her anger
But the traffic is making her late for work.

You may now kiss the bride.
And he does.
The older women are crying.

Without any of these things
It seems we would be left with nothing,

but an insatiable thirst for punctuation.

“Travesty,” those orange words spilled across the highway lines
Came on swathes of a stilled
And perfect evening time,
‘Tween buffeting air and screaming music
It seems but a step in a cyclic progression,
Or the lines that commence
This processional of cars
That follows, to the site, trails of incense,
Tears of mourn and memoirs.
Towards the hills canvassed in reluctant ennui
Jutting in the shadows the bleached ribs and pearly jaw lines
That, at times, may have looked alive, yet now
They rest static as the dead ought to be.
I sense I’m getting close, the ***** surges its triumph
As it does the sanctuary,
My head swells with deep booming sound,
The lyric of the preacher without need to expound,
Too late as the ***** shan’t stop or abate
As I pass through churchyard admonished “Hell,
Is truth realized only too late.”
Though I am soothed by that song of my youth,
Lyric’d by many-a familiar cadence and tune
Vestiges of naïveté play on the lips
But, “Hell is truth only realized too soon.”
I wait at its back and reminisce
The coming great years were something to fight for
With life, defend,
But I now see that I spent those last seconds
Waiting for them to end,
Whilst prayers of hollow wind abound
Escaped to show something holds on, at least
Pretends,
Will remain after me, aft’ I’ve settled in the ground,
To be as a sunset and come back around.
I feel like a sun, burning in fury,
Not simply a shimmer in the vastness afar,
Or the muddy face of fetid puddle
Simply rippling like a star.
Keep driving! Don’t cease my tiny hearse!
Just now do I hear the mourners’ verse,
It sounds so golden and couldn’t get worse!
But the ***** has ceased,
The daylight, it rots
(Never mind that, I’ll charge it with haught!)
And the processional laughs as they go to their plots
Their verses fall too coward to brave
The ice and the snow that is to come, mine fall stricken
With every sense of the word ‘dumb,’
But the sun reassuring with it warmth-giving rays
Will be sure to put flowers next to our graves.

On The Great Lawn of my mind,
The city's biggest dance floor,
Upon its cushions, stepping lightly,
The spring breeze, feeling its way,
Making, reawakening, a thousand acquaintances,
Absent parent kissing each long-lost babe-blade of grass

Breeze takes each blade of spring grass:

Cajoles, asks not,
With windy hands, guided missiles,
gentle/firm
push/pull
engage/ disengages,
open/closes

Breeze makes each one
Neck, caress their neighbor,
A thousand pas de deuces of  
fresh faced green children.
All in all a triumphant processional,
Cloaked in robes of sky blue velvet,
Crowned by the sun's burnt orange kisses.

At the middle school dance,
The walls are portrait painted  
with the shy ones,  
The ones-who-don't-know-how-to-ask.
Passover's children
Needy for a Moses.

Student of the spring breezes,
This silly earnest teacher/chaperone,
Grand-pa-rent will:


Cajole, ask not,
With hands, guided missiles,
gentle/firm
push/pull
engage/ disengages,
open/closes

Under his tutelage,
Every boy and girl
A dancer, a blade,  
Each a Passenger on the fuselage
Of his Spring Ballroom breeze.

These are my spring rites  
imagined,
Visions of my sight  
unimpaired,
Present and future  
clarified.

Soon we will teach our own  
Little Princes and Princesses,
The shelter of dancing,
Feel the embrace of nature,
Under the mantle of an  
A Capella choir of tree leaves,
We will lie side by side,  
Skyward pointing,
Sharing our spring-sprung imaginings,
Performing each and all  
Upon the breeze to carry away,
For all to gleeful applaud!

"I hate you now as much as I will ever hate you."
Our fingers laced with strained prose and my blooming heart.
There's only so many ways to tell you this without us both realizing we might have not yet learned our lesson.

The truth is, there's no way for me to know how much this really hurts. I've cast myself numb to the touches of future lovers and to be honest I've said too many times that I would cast this out of my mind but, baby, if you loved me, would you leave me?
Could we bury this romance in a candlelight processional and a chorus of holy reverence, how long could we hold each other till our arms crumbled to dust under the six feet of people we once were?
Would our kisses turn to ash so close to new flames we might light?... could either of us stand the flames?
We'll be okay, I know in time this too shall fade but once, I had high hopes. Once I was left confused crying to a plane window and you couldn't tell me anything to ease the chaos in my mind. Why would you offer yourself to me like that if you didn't want me too?
I'm so stressed, pressing on for answers but, maybe there's nothing to find.
I'll move forward.
One day.

CONTINUING WITH THE SPIRIT OF CHRISTMAS
HERE IS THE STORY BEHIND THE ENGLISH HYMN:
          “ONWARD  CHRISTIAN  SOLDIERS”

"Onward, Christian Soldiers" is a 19th-century English hymn. The words were written by Sabine Baring-Gould in 1865, and the music was composed by Arthur Sullivan in 1871. Sullivan named the tune "St Gertrude," after the wife of his friend Ernest Clay Ker Seymer, at whose country home he composed the tune. The Salvation Army adopted the hymn as its favoured processional. This piece became Sullivan's most popular hymn. The hymn's theme is taken from references in the New Testament to the Christian being a soldier for Christ, for example II Timothy 2:3 (KJV ) :  "Thou therefore endure hardness, as a good soldier of Jesus Christ."

Now Arthur Sullivan was the son of a military bandmaster, who composed his first anthem at the age of eight, and was later a soloist in the boys' choir of the Chapel Royal. ... To supplement the income from his concert works he wrote hymns, parlour ballads, and other light pieces, and worked as a church organist and music teacher.

    LYRICS OF THE FAMOUS HYMN
“Onward, Christian soldiers, marching as to war,
With the cross of Jesus going on before.
Christ, the royal Master, leads against the foe;
Forward into battle see His banners go!
o Refrain:
Onward, Christian soldiers, marching as to war,
With the cross of Jesus going on before.
At the sign of triumph Satan’s host doth flee;
On then, Christian soldiers, on to victory!
Hell’s foundations quiver at the shout of praise;
Brothers, lift your voices, loud your anthems raise.
Like a mighty army moves the church of God;
Brothers, we are treading where the saints have trod.
We are not divided, all one body we,
One in hope and doctrine, one in charity.
Crowns and thrones may perish, kingdoms rise and wane,
But the church of Jesus constant will remain.
Gates of hell can never ’gainst that church prevail;
We have Christ’s own promise, and that cannot fail.
Onward then, ye people, join our happy throng,
Blend with ours your voices in the triumph song.
Glory, laud, and honor unto Christ the King,
This through countless ages men and angels sing.”
……Posted by Raj Nandy of New Delhi.……

Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com  
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

              When the Last Catholic Church is Seized and Sold

When at the Last Supper Jesus lifted Himself
Someone at table criticized the servers
For not getting some detail right (“Kids these days…”)

When the last Catholic church is seized and sold
When the bailiffs and deputies are given the keys
(The judges and lawyers will be laughing over single-malt at the country club)
When the vessels of the Altar are sold for scrap
When the windows are stacked at a re-sale shop
When the last Mass is ended and the people dispersed

When the processional cross is taken from the last altar server
Grumpy old Catholics will fault the poor child
For not holding it right (“Kids these days…”)

Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com  
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

                                  The Narthex as a Barricade

I have become a greeter in my old age
(Why is that pickup truck circling the parking lot?)
How good to see you! What happy children you have!
(Any bulges in that unknown man’s pockets?)

The Altar servers are in place for the processional
(Why is that man just sitting in that car?)
The lector gives everyone a word of welcome
(Pssst – do you know that guy sitting in the back?)

I open doors and hand out bulletins
And watch