As I brush my teeth in the bathroom, a young woman enters- tooth brush and face wash in hand.  I watch her reflection in the large mirror a front the sinks, I put an over-sized glob of tooth paste on my brush.
******* it Danielle, she sees this mistake you’ve made.

I turn the water on and attempt to wash away some of the toothpaste. We start brush at the same time, I smile to myself because these synchronized flukes, such as speaking in unison or laughing simultaneously, make me feel briefly connected to someone. Sounds a little silly, but don’t all ways of relieving loneliness?

My anxiety stirs again as I realize the volume of bristle to tooth.* Can you hear this? Is is disgusting to you? That sound of saliva and paste being ground into my teeth.
I lean forward to spit, inspecting the rusted faucet. I see my face in it’s metal stem, it convoluted my face.

I’d rather be disfigured, so that I’d no longer have to guess and worry about whether people were eying me. I would know. They could clearly see my faults if I had a missing jaw, drooping eye and liver spots mapped across my grey skin. I wouldn’t have to worry about the possibility of being seen in a favorable light.

The possibility of fooling anybody into thinking I’m not repulsive. I would know it.  I stare into the metal, I spit. Blood is all over the sink. I spit again and more blood. Again, blood. It’s pouring out of my mouth. I turn the water on high, panicked that the girl beside me will see. But she leaves, “goodnight” she says as she walks by. I try to say something but I’m choking on the blood. Where the **** is this blood coming from?

I glance up to the mirror, there is no blood in my mouth. Back to the sick- no blood. I am so confused, just moments ago Armageddon was spilling from my mouth; and now it’s vanished?
I stumble back wards into a stall.

“I saw that.”

A voice whispers from within the stall, or was it outside?   I open the door, but nobody is there.
Okay, Danny, calm down. Nobody is here, you’re imagining things.

“No, you heard.”

Confused, the voice, that voice- it’s coming from the stall door. No, doors can’t speak, I open the door but still, I am alone.

I run, bladder still full. Sundries still on the counter, I need to get out of there.
_______________________________
Paranoid Schizophrenia- A mental disorder characterized by a disintegration of the process of thinking and of emotional responsiveness. It most commonly manifests as auditory hallucinations, paranoid or bizarre delusions, or disorganized speech and thinking, and it is accompanied by significant social or occupational dysfunction.*
___________

Within two weeks of my first experience of hallucinations, I was in the Summit Valley Institution for Mental Disorders. Highly medicated, with stitches along my chin and staples in my head.
I’d lost all control, they found me at the bottom of a stairwell after falling 3 stories.

Nurses told me that when I’d been taken in, they found more that one hundred scraps of paper in my pockets, on them were different snipets of conversation I’d heard throughout the day. It was a compulsion, I was told, associated with Schizophrenia.

the irises have passed,
their existence, entirety,
a three week, 21 day, gun salute,
to which I was witness to but an
abbreviated four short generational
days

the Kabbalist among us say Kaddish,
and a-Buddhist chants so-be-it,
both celebrating the brevity cycle
of natural things, both notating,
that death makes room for more

ugly yelloe'd and black now,
these irises are now
misfits on a breezy,
dancing summer lawn

today, shriveled and misshapen,
they compare and contrast
on a normative, glorious,
June Sunday that
picturesque presents
the living and the deceased,
side by side

all comrades,
all summer sundries
on a dancing grass blanket
half-graveyard battlefield,
the half-heaven

oft I have writ of the beach detritus,
the shells, the sun burnt *****,
a recycled funeral rectory where
no one utters prayers for the
no longer alive historical artifacts

what has this to do
with that human construct,
artifice of memory,
a string on the finger
of the mind,
a pausation, a man-made creation
to momentarily recall another of
nature's cycle -
your children

Have children.
Am a father.
Had a father in my youthful days.

this is a boy scout qualification medal,
marker of me as Expert,
permitting me to commentary
with gravitas, now that I’ve graduated
to grandfather status,
I enjoy superstar freedom
to opine inanely on such matters

of my father have I writ,
of my sons, those remain unseen,

likely neither will mark these day
with a telephone call
or an all-I-got-was-this-lousy-t shirt
gift of gall

I say that's ok for what else is there,
certainly not an unthinking, dismissive
whatever

it saddens me some for sure,
but it makes judge myself as human being
on a gradation of one to none

but more than this internal reflection,
I ponder this hallmark'd day,
as life cycle point notarized,
in verse and rhyme,
for that is what I do best

for before,
many father's day
in the priory passed,
most unrecallable,
just another ceremonial checkmark,
habitually acquitted,
but somewhere
in a drawer of shirts,
in a home I store stuff in,
I do believe, there are some cards
from decades past,
that prove nothing,
other than life goes on,
and we best capture
what we can, as best we can...
with small, objet d'art of sorts

Perhaps one will call after all...
in any event,
to honor the dead,
to mark the existing,
the bannered ship's bell rung,
its sonorous sound,
notable and onerous,
fades as well

but man and animal,
plant and tree,
a living fraternal sorority,
who all look over my shoulder
as I compose on
that Adirondack chair you
by now, we’ll acquainted

they know,
for whom the bell tolls this day,
and why as well,
as we all pause and contemplate
where we are on this day,
on our own overlapping cycles

Millionaires in empty boxes
barricaded in bath robes.
Self-righteous sundries
sit still for that sunset they'll
never see, like "Layla" playing
with a gang of good fellas.

The trench took a bit, but
they're not worried. It will be
filled-in still-lifes well before
wives find out. Tough love
rises above the rest; especially
when you're pumping hot lead.

I closed my eyes against the trouble
a window was opened in front of it; I am able
to know you, sundries that are large and small
of the houses, the dead left behind us
The beatles playing on the radio wings
your tired and sweaty horses instantly
the horses waiting saddled to the blues
to which I bridled, on the plain of my heart
You mouths look like the men with clumsy hair
who whipped wind-up toys in childhood in the streets  
your fruits taste like the rapt, sourish friendships
while they are gathering for the morning
They got lost at full gallop with the longing
for their youthfulness days they lost
your horses whose manes were embroidered
with unhappiness, an escapee wind in their pillions
I am pulling you into the shallows of the sea
without hurting, into a minaret of fairy
while the old clowns of our hearts
drowning of happiness in an evening


Koray Feyiz
(Translated from Turkish by Koray Feyiz)

They’re almost gone now a vanishing tribe
Peddlers of fresh sweets honeys from hive
Sellers of fish heads such sundries on head
Toys and bangles and blankets for bed.

Don’t see them around those struggling men
Making the choice of voice trudging the lane
Hoping to sell one piece in dream of gain
Faceless wind ringer in sun’s bite and rain.

Gone are those plaintive cries on summer noon
Raising road’s dust on trail singing the tune
Traders of trinkets girls’ ribbon hairpin
Yoyo and plastic top with endless spin.

Why the times ruined them made them a flop
Sellers travelers with head-full of shop
Sending their song of hope past locked in door
None could now fill that space nothing anymore.

They took you across the home
like an uncharted furniture as the walls lost
gait and stumbled.

       Before I could shatter a word without
compunction, they took you before my eyes laid
lattices – they faltered, officiating over space that
fails infinitely when turning you away before

I could understand, say the day again happens
and my grievous art flails like a ******* child.
a deep dream within
a shallow sleep occurring within sundries –  miscellanea
  collected together, put to question but no answer folded

to be sure in its destination other than where they took you:
  the air minting the world on your face wanting to move
  and remind a fate of decay: to be malleable within clay,

and hunger for a face they stole from me.

I have nary a need  a want a breath
no sundries, none wet,
no bucket or list of
climbing Mt Everest
or skydiving,
not a single wish left,
when they were answered,
all of them, my life became complete,
the day you were born.

Time to Get Serious: In the Poet's Nook
Originally posted here on
June 9th 2013

Yes it is verifiable, just as prior alluded to,
a few frayed and weathered Adirondack chairs,
wizened gray, like occupant, all seen better days,
overlooking the Peconic Bay,
where inspiration glazes over the water

Despite prodigious production o'er past weeks,
ditties, love laughing tributes, silliness aplenty,
these works of dishes washed, Paul Simon,
what to wear to your funeral, knuckle kissing, etcetera...
Though some contained soft shelled, mints of juleps hints,
little sundries, items for sale re suicidal thoughts,

no one takes-tales you serious

Be it tormented rain, intemperate gusts
whipping lashes of sand
excuses real, manufactured and yet,
despite opportunities always existed,
but you answered the question unasked,
you're unready, more likely, fearful.
to pen in the Inner Temple, in the nook.

In the nook, the poems float by, you need only extend arm and
grab them whole, ripened by the delivering breezes,
If you unmask pretense, and wear a seat belt

But here I am, and the welcome I receive is the one
deserved, for one who has joined the ranks of deniers

Favorable prevailing breezes service the sailboats pleasantly,
turn surly and unmanageable from neglect and disuse poetically,
they mock this coward, taunting:

We have waited, fall and spring, for you, our sacrificial lamb.
Your return we smelled, the odor of barbecue and suntan oil,
We observed your beach touring, your eyes upon the moonlight
Highflying, highlighting the path you follow when walking upon the
Water when nobody knows, nobody sees

You scarce provided the deep reveal that is our woeful provenance,
So, having returned, unleash or leave,  expose your La Mancha countenance,
Fulfill your daddy's curse,#
Portray the siren shriek of our gulls insistent,
the blood cold words, as of now, yet unfastened, un-cast,
the forge lit and fired,
Are you ready, self-appointed, poetry smithy, wright-man?%

On knees bent you should have approached,
For the inspiration, years rendered, unpaid, and unacknowledged
But most of all because of these interlopers attached to you,
So many children, green shoots, babes visiting the bay,
New friends hoisted upon us without permission!

Do they understand despite the solemn serenity
of the place you attend,
This is the observatory
where the stars and scars,
undiscovered and unexposed,
become our property to carry-cross the ocean?

Do they comprehend that black is the only color permitted and the
sunshine coverlet is meant to keep the unmotivated, the uninitiated,
who think that writing poetry is easy,
unaware, and far away from us, the truth purveyors

Nothing produced from this place
where routine means the gorge tastes bile,
When surcease is welcome relief,
Where dancing on ice in bare feet
Is step one to ripping your chest open by your own hands,
The toxins thus released rejuvenated by salted air,
Can be finally be transcribed onto paper
And realized.

Warn them once and then begin, you,
Get serious, delve, with hurricane unambiguity,
to torrential words upon the unsuspecting,
let them taste the rawness, only the truth provides,
let them know salt tears so briney,
They will flee this place, n'er to return.


June 9th
2013
Late afternoon.
#What ya do for a living he asks,
A little of this and a little of that,
All of which, ain't no **** good at!
So I spend my cold, hard time
laying down cold hard verse,
Can't stop, cause it's my daddy's dying curse

One day Frick when to the place to buy some stuff
While Frack stayed in the area to do some things
Frack tossed out some junk
He used the the whatchamacallit to clean the thingamajig
Pick up the odds and ends
And he scrubbed a doodad with the thingamabob


Frick purchesed some knickknacks and bric-a-brac
A few sundries
A couple of tchotkes and trinkets
Some whatnot
A gizmo
A gadget
And more miscellaneous paraphernalia

When Frick got home Frack asked "What'd you buy?"
Frick said " Oh, this and that" "What'd you do all day?"
Frack said "Just a hodgepodge of etcetera, etcetera"
       -Tommy Johnson

The old ones seem haunted
even with ole Presidents
making their whistle-stop
campaigns.
Blacks on their exodus from the south,
streaming into them, one can visualize
with their souls and
spirits accompanying them as they seek
a decent life.
Imagine the shoeshine stands with their shoeshine “boys” and black attendants in the restrooms
which was probably as far as some of
them got.
The newsstands with their variety of
newspapers and sundries alerted
the lonely travelers to Wall Street
and elsewhere, businessmen
who would stream in with a sophistication
the common traveler feared.
The smells of leather baggage,
the cleanser that porters used
to keep the coaches clean wafted in.
The smell of cigars and wrinkles
of old men’s skin let us know
that the porters would be appearing
with a bevy of special guests.
History speaks in these stations
as well as some bus stations
around the country with their
dangerous drifters who would serial ****,
and the ambitious young talents off
to the big city to seek success who we would
later never hear of.
The local Union Station in Champaign has been
turned into businesses, but I can
just see Abe Lincoln arriving
speaking from the caboose and making
his way to a horse and buggy
outside to go to the local county courthouse.
Long live ghost-filled train stations
everywhere, and don’t let us forget
the homeless and destitute street people
who need to use their restrooms and
sit down in the waiting area seats
to take a needed load off.
They’re that important in the general
pictures of things, at least to me.

step into my shop of horrors
shack of nightmares not yet had
take in the aberrant, appalling aesthetic
i have dead sun flower
sundries that smell
of tangerine
i have the idol of
severed head and
exposed breast
i sell milk moon shell and
amethyst
incantations
ghost scrolls
student loans
buy my dreadful wares
and, please:

come again

wake late on wednesday,

remember your fathers’ mirror.



know that when all is mud and sundries,

it can be washed clean, clean as babies are.



that brings us back to chairs, that hold fear,

secrets, yet we are lucky in that



we have paid work, and he is not in

attendance.



these are old words.



sbm.

Without a doubt
The faith was lost
Below the salt.

Dawn's eyes
Not so much Viridian,
Slightly less...
Herbal.
Dusk swims up its favorite tree
And collapses
Dead as death.

Dragon's Breath
Cascades the mountainside
In
Red fury.

The Sun sweats
U.V. afterbirth,
Drought frenzy,
And carmine fissures.
Flooding eyelids,
And my minds eye.

Ethereal starkness
Sunbathes in the
Sundries
Of a maniac.

I spend the days of the week
Toiling for the man
Working with aluminum and steel
Making a living the best that I can

By the time the weekend rolls around
I've had enough of the concrete and steel
And it's time to get outside
Where at peace I feel

Then I can't help but wonder
How things must have been
For the pioneers of this nation
Those heroic women and men

With just a few sundries
As well as rifle, axe, and knife
They lived off the land
A challenging but satisfying life

Trapping by the river
Hunting in the woods
Gathering with other woodsmen
To buy and trade goods

No cell phone towers
No electrical lines everywhere
Crystal clear waters
And clean fresh air

Then from my reveries
I am jarred back awake
By the sound of man's traffic
And the unnatural noise it does make

Now we are more civilized
Living in city and town
Too civilized to hunt and trap
But adept at gunning one another down

Too civilized to live free
So we let gov't grow
Too civilized for independence
So we let liberty go

Give me a time machine
And I will go back to the past
For I care not for this civilized world
And the very dark shadow it does cast

this  morning they prayed

for those at sea.



the snail has been wandering,

silver trailed the mat

and hallway, escaping rain,

and wondrous sundries.



there is a calmness

a tiny red scooter.



we talked of loss,

they often understood.

sometimes they didn’t

and forgot the apostrophe.



sbm

An ashen late Autumn was upon us,
and in our best worn coats and sundries we--
held steadfast by a masthead of a rotting boat.
Wooden on a shore of the lake we adored.

We held still as soft deer galloped their lanks through strange
lands lifted from grounds with brick built upon brick,
wherein now were filled, not berries, but hunter's saltlick.
We ravaged a place we called our own,
We stole from the savages their home.

But we found a peace amongst their nerves,
and we were fearful of speed and we'd swerve,
if ever we found in our path one that deserved,
to have the freedom to rummage through roughage.

On this solemn lake-side we found pride in the soft light.
Because what the **** else can we do,
but to sit where once grass stood in dew,
and instead of plucking and mucking about,
no, in lieu, we sat and stared and remarked,
instead about how we've done damage we can't undo.

wake late on wednesday,

remember your fathers’ mirror.



know that when all is mud and sundries,

it can be washed clean, clean as babies are.



that brings us back to chairs, that hold fear,

secrets, yet we are lucky in that



we have paid work, and he is not in

attendance.



these are old words.



sbm.

First, we quickly unpacked stuff
and exchanged gifts.
Books, notebooks, finer pens, sundries.
Then we took food
and fed each other by fingers.
I always trick You to eat a bit more.
" It’s a fraud " you say.
Your sandwich is "Mediterranean".
From the quilts we make a tent
And stare at each other.
Embraced.

In the evening we are drinking beer and seek some nose drops.
We would like to see a good sci-fi, or a horror movie
but the program is mostly *******.

"You see, they live in the center of Beverly Hills,
Downtow, in the circle of main City trams
and for half an hour You don’t  realize what is happening.
The industry push them from a young age. "
We turn the TV off.

½ tucked
¾ tucked.
Utterly tucked.
Cocooned.

wake late on wednesday,

remember your fathers’ mirror.



know that when all is mud and sundries,

it can be washed clean, clean as babies are.



that brings us back to chairs, that hold fear,

secrets, yet we are lucky in that



we have paid work, and he is not in

attendance.



these are old words.



sbm.

On the counter sat a faded black and white photograph
a young woman’s face smiled bright with hope for the future
a future that included me and my brother, a husband,
and one lover only she really liked.
A cough caught my attention and I looked at her wrinkled face
it had been days since any eye contact
since food had passed those dry, cracked, and peeling lips,
instead a small pink swab attached to a plastic white stick
brought dabs of moisture to a shriveling tongue.
Candles burned around her high school graduation picture
dark wisps of ashy smoke braided itself and disappeared
I took a cold unresponsive hand in my own
and thought about how many more times I would be able to touch her.
Each room in the facility held the same story
though none of us spoke to each other during those days
aside from an overly friendly care giver trying to delicately
flop a body around to change sheets or clean soiled sundries.
Mom’s breath stopped…
just at the moment when fear of being an orphan
had locked my chest in God’s own vice grip
she exhaled.
I laid my head against a cold steel bar
there to protect her from falling out of bed, but also
to  keep me from crawling in and wrapping my arms around her body
in an effort to keep her warm.  /

The old ones seem haunted
even with ole Presidents
making their whistle-stop campaigns.
Blacks on their exodus from the south,
streaming into them, one can visualize
with their souls and
spirits accompanying them as they seek
a decent life.
Imagine the shoeshine stands with their shoeshine “boys” and black attendants in the restrooms
which was probably as far as some of
them got.
The newsstands with their variety of
newspapers and sundries alerted
the lonely travelers to Wall Street
and elsewhere, businessmen
who would stream in with a sophistication
the common traveler feared.
The smells of leather baggage,
the cleanser that porters used
to keep the coaches clean wafted in.
The smell of cigars and wrinkles
of old men’s skin let us know
that the porters would be appearing
with a bevy of special guests.
History speaks in these stations
as well as some bus stations
around the country with their
dangerous drifters who would serial ****,
and the ambitious young talents off
to the big city to seek success who we would
later never hear of.
The local Union Station in Champaign has been
turned into businesses, but I can
just see Abe Lincoln arriving
speaking from the caboose and making
his way to a horse and buggy
outside to go to the local county courthouse.
Long live ghost-filled train stations
everywhere, and don’t let us forget
the homeless and destitute street people
who need to use their restrooms and
sit down in the waiting area seats
to take a needed load off.
They’re that important in the general
pictures of things, at least to me.

wake late on wednesday,

remember your fathers’ mirror.



know that when all is mud and sundries,

it can be washed clean, clean as babies are.



that brings us back to chairs, that hold fear,

secrets, yet we are lucky in that



we have paid work, and he is not in

attendance.



these are old words.



sbm.

Today isn't my day

It's those days
Where the pool doesn't
Get shade

The sundries
The water out

And I'm having trouble
Staying
Below the water

I get so dizzy
And weird feeling
As if I need
To Choke

It's a day
Where I just float

My back facing the sky
And I'm staring
Into the
Deep pool floor

bubbling,
babbling,
brookling,
i'm charting a course
for your sundries.
take it upon me --
no --
take it upon yourself
to watch me glide,
and fall,
and smack into a tree-
Ow! (watch out, George!)
that jungle stung,
but a tree's like
a ladder rung
as a tambourine
is just a drum.
now by my preaching
don't get irate;
we're not supposed
to gyrate.

Stored in my grandmother's back room
Storage held shelves and shelves of cotton covered trinkets
and odds
and ends
Sundries that held old funny stories
and cans and old flyers that held little more history
than the **** I took this morning

But upended, on side
collided with time
was a heap of old wicker bough baskets
stacked in heaps and heaps
but guarded and carefully covered
Covered in cotton lace.
Tatted in tantalizing
waves of rings of knots, holes, and wide open spaces
The treasures I found measured in yards of cotton lace.

ur art is the words of the hopeful
basking and bathing in pools of eternal meaningless sundries
thrashing and skulking nailing hammers and throwing axes all over ur skull least of all importances- enter the subconscious, ur mind speak, and ur mouth steep- mountains of hanging ropes and jaded hopes

ur ****** mind convoluted, cracking open that is-

and ripped that fountain of colors and burst that bleeding artistry out like an ultimate tranquil fondue dripping on that empty sockets

might be someday be someone swimming on it.

1.
Pink carnations bloom
in stenciled flower boxes,
looking down on Bruges'
grand canal. Locals say they
live in the Venice of the north.

Tourists speed by on guided
boat trips, rigid, peering straight
ahead. The carnations sigh:
They could die from such
indifference. The boat leaves

a white, frothy wake, which
whisks away all the passengers'
woes until the next hour of
ennui sets in, restless for
distraction. I see no need

for speed as I wander the cobbled
lanes laid from the 13th century
to the present age, signs of Bruges'
vast prosperity and pride as the
exquisite lace capital of the world.

Luxurious wares for a luxurious price,
more valuable than the goods
the city once traded as the bustling,
commercial hub of northwestern Europe.
Sundries bought and sold at bargain rates.

I have not come here for
commerce, but for Bruges' late
medieval beauty, for its religious
miracles, for the marvelous making
magic of Belgian lace. All legendary,

all fine, all the subject of tall
tales, of tattling to history about
what can be found and what
can be lost. All draped in gold leaf,
expertly pressed into regal crowns.

2.
After a hurried and forced
lunch break, I scamper to the
Basilica of the Holy Blood
in search of a glimpse of the vial
of, well, said blood with its cloth

that Joseph of Arimathea used to wipe the
blood from the body of Christ. Preserved
for centuries, the vial and cloth made their way
to Bruges from the Holy Land during one
of the unholy wars of the cruel Crusaders.

I have to push my way through throngs
of the faithful to reach the room with the
relic that has mesmerized travelers for
centuries after centuries since the Crucifixion.
Like so many vessels of the supernatural,

the vial disappoints. How can one verify
the holy, the sacred, the miraculous?
The divine element eludes us, remains
hidden, designed to try our faith, to test it,
to measure it against the rule of genuine

devotion. Satisfied that my presuppositions
have proven sound, I squeeze back onto
the streets of the main square and head past
the edge of town toward the windmills and ****,
holding back the sea and its myriad mysteries.

3.
The windmills whisper, "Holland," while the
****, stoic and stolid, remains mute. Sails
whoosh above me, ready to fly from the
Earth, ready to slice the wind into pieces
before it swoops past the city tower and onto

the square. The breeze bears a message that
I can barely decipher. Written in code, it declares
something about the efficacy of the Holy
Blood as a salvific force to bring peace
to the true believer, as open as the windmills

to the wooing of the Spirit. My antennae rise up,
although nothing more seems said. That is
not possible. So I hike the **** of the ****
toward the gray, billowing clouds that herald
their own message of rain, of storm, of baptism.

Such struggles sting more severely than
ennui: Conflicts lack resolution. Resolve leans
on the arms of faith. Arms carry the weight
of the world. The world whimpers in a
whirlwind stirred up by muscular clouds

of doom. These dark thoughts hound me
as I make my way back to the cobbled
streets and the security of the familiar city.
Soon I stumble onto a paint-peeling
open door boldly illuminated by a long

rectangle of light that washes over a group
of older women, their bobbins and
thread and rapid-fire fingers flashing
in a blur across their velvet pillows,
creating magic with skill and aplomb:

the confidence of hard-earned experience.
There are no presuppositions against such art.
Lace making resounds with the spirit of
blessed endurance, with a sanctity of
purpose, a sanity of mind that only

the vial of Holy Blood provides for those
who believe, who see the divine in the failures
of the mundane, who worship a vulnerable deity.
"Only a suffering God can help," Bonhoeffer proclaimed.
The carnations grimly nod, hang their heads and sigh.

By Jennifersoter Ezewi

The powerful village
Who looks deserted
And accommodates more.

This village has more children
Outside her province
Toiling for survival each day.

She keeps calm and expectant
Wishing to see them at the end
of the year.

Some pays homage to her
While some calls her evil
And still denies the fact that they ever came in contact with her
Thereby calling a civilized soil
Sweet mother.

This powerful village produces
the best anywhere
And still looks timid in some places.

The powerful village where all
and sundries comes from
Who still accommodates them
at the point of retirement

Even when she had been neglected
She still welcomes them at the
point of exit
Giving them a comfortable
Portion of farewell.