"In a U-Haul North of Damascus"

When we first read this poem by David Bottoms, I was moved. Aside from the fact that it works really well as poetry, I connect strongly to religious imagery. Bottoms uses this imagery (and language) well.

The lines,

"And why should I care
so long after everything has fallen
to pain that the woman sleeping there should be sleeping alone?"

do an excellent job of crafting history in the relationship. He doesn't have to tell us that they were married for a while for this sense of time to be conveyed. Just through this one image, he sets up the assumption that the speaker was married long enough that the fall was hard and the empty bed is a strange concept.

Throughout the poem, Bottoms uses physical imagery effectively. The first section illustrates how lost someone can feel after a relationship falls apart, when the tree limbs are said to be slapping against the trailers, like someone lost in a thick forest. A violent argument is portrayed vividly in the second section of the poem, with a description of blood on the floor after being cut by a thrown dish.

The third section calls to mind the smell of pine and fresh air, and connects them to the hopefulness that such a refreshing scent can inspire. It doesn't overdo the hopefulness, however, and leaves the poem with a question: Can someone regain hope after every dream has been shattered?

Bottoms' poem spoke clearly and effectively to me, and that is one of the reasons I think it works so well as poetry.

-Audrey Guire

Commercial for a summer night

I have been anxiously awaiting posting about this poem for quite some time. The first time I read it, it gave me a vision of just what the title says, a commercial for a summer night.
I especially the part when it talked about the bony blondes and lean-jawed guys. Though I'm not interested sexually in them, I envisioned a whole clan of Zach Morris's (from saved by the bell those who don't know). The reason I thought of this was that I remember watching a particular episode where he had to fix up a car however always seemed to keep his hair in a perfect fashion. In addition, after the part when they mention these guys, it is said that the pretty ones are wearing the merchandise is wearing this year which I took as the pretty girls wearing the clothes that were in style which made me think of Lisa Turtle another character from the show. Though, I'm sure this is not what the author had meant by this poem I just thought it was an interesting similarity between a poem and a modern day television show that arguably changed a generation.
Moving on, I loved the description of the setting in the beginning of the poem because it really hooked me in and had my thoughts flowing early. The murmuring blue lights and TV's on the porch with the chairs remind me of a small town area where everybody has their own space and nobody has their space interfered with. The poem has so many subtleties that even if the title did not include the word summer, one would be able to tell that this was a summer poem. When I think of people sitting outside on a porch with sound off on the television off drinking beers to me is just summer in a nutshell.
With so many names being mentioned I felt that it was easy to create a face and a personality. Each of them have lines that you would be able to attribute to somebody else that you know.
I really enjoyed this poem and would recommend it to everybody especially those that are interested in getting their mind off of school and looking forward towards summer a little bit more.

Perry Wertheimer

Rupert Brooke's "The Soldier"

By Sarah C. Portner
I know we didn't read this poem in class, but I had to read it for another class and thought I would post it and discuss it here.

"The Soldier"
If I should die, think only this of me:
That there's some corner of a foreign field
That is forever England. There shall be
In that rich earth a richer dust concealed;
A dust whom England bore, shaped, made aware,
Gave, once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam,
A body of England's, breathing English air,
Washed by the rivers, blest by suns of home.

And think, this heart, all evil shed away,
A pulse in the Eternal mind, no less
Gives somewhere back the thoughts by
England given,
Her sights and sounds; dreams happy as her day;
And laughter, learnt of friends; and gentleness,
In hearts at peace, under and English heaven.
--1915

I like the romantic appeal Brooke has in this poem. He makes dyeing in war seem almost romantic. That somehow the country will obtain a foreign plot of land by their soldier dyeing there. I think that is an interest concept, that that foreign plot of land will somehow also obtain the ideals of the country of that fallen soldier, in this case England. What I also found ironic about this poem was that even though Brooke was enlisted to serve in the English military to fight in WW1 he died before he ever saw combat. He was never able to see the trenches or the brutality that WW1 turned out to be.

Poem for Underdog

So I was looking through the book of poems and was intrigued by the title of this poem by Matthew Rohrer. Just looking at it, I expected some sort of story with the main character(s) being weak or inferior to others.

The first line really caught my interest because it reminded me of the activity that we did in class where we had to write about a moment where we were better than everybody else. It gave the sense that the narrator saw something god-like that was heart wrenching and dramatic. I also loved the two lines where consecutively he mentions seeing an illicit mushroom's activities that are happening on the moon and also seeing panda's in a darkened park. Especially the part about the mushroom, it makes me envision a drug trip where somebody feels on top of the world and is seeing this magnificent image.

The other part that caught my interest was where he mentions the cashier at Sears who was not wearing a bra. One, I find it hilarious that while somebody would be in a work environment like that, that they wouldn't be dressed fully and that it would visible enough for others to see. It's just like from a movie where this is the girl that everybody wants to see and here this person(I assume to be a male) has seen the beautiful girl and part of her undergarments.

Right after this, the author breaks into a completely different mood and tone where he is talking about a yellow and brown cloud. I believe this reaffirmed my belief that this man is intoxicated with some sort of drugs because I have never heard of a cloud that is anything like either of those colors. I would like to know where the grandparents' house that the reader mentioned is in relation to country/state. I feel this could really enhance the poem and make it even more enjoyable for the reader.

The end of the poem also clarified my prediction about this person being cocky about how he stairs in the mirror sees two pools of humility as the others just dream of getting to look into the mirror.

I enjoyed reading this poem and would recommend it. It is a short, but fun read and has a sense of adventure. In addition it has great imagery and a cool feel of accomplishment.

By: Perry Wertheimer

"Good Poetry" Comment

I agree with a lot of what Donya is saying but I also disagree with some of it too. I’ll start with what I agree with. I agree that many times a “Poet” will publish material that is hardly considered stimulating and thoughtful. Like that guy that Matt said retyped liked a year’s worth of New York Times and published it. To me, that is just a year’s worth of New York Times retyped, not anything special. But then again, if it was published, someone must have bought it, or maybe not.
To find whether a piece of work is “poetry worthy” you have to refer to the definition of poetry. According to Princeton, poetry is “any communication resembling poetry in beauty or the evocation of feeling.” This is a pretty broad and general definition. This means that poetry could be any small piece of information that evokes emotion, and it doesn’t specify who the piece evokes emotion for. Something I have realized that I didn’t realize before taking this class is that poetry is mainly for the author’s satisfaction. Like music, when I am completely content with a song I have created, it doesn’t truly matter what everyone else thinks. I think, to many authors, the same is true. Unfortunately, when supporting yourself solely from works you have created you have to take the consumer into account, if they don’t like it then you don’t eat.
I disagreed that True/False was thoughtless and emotionless. To me, when I read any works of poetry I may not necessarily “get” the big picture but what I might “get” is a slight emotion from a phrase or even a word that I have read. I may find one phrase or word that reminds me of a childhood memory, or feeling I once had. This is what poetry is all about. I refer to the movie “Barfly” as a demonstration of my point. Barfly (if you haven’t seen it) is about a routine bar drunk that is also a part time genius poet. (Not to say this is a true story but it could be.) How can a man who so easily dismisses formal poetry education write so well? I don’t think you have to know about great works of Shakespeare, or Poe to be a great writer. Some people are just born with the ease of words and the ability to communicate emotion to the audience. In conclusion, most poetry is not for everyone, but that’s why there is a lot of it, you have a lot to choose from.

-Jay Woodward

Check out my music and other pirate ships and unicorns at www.jaywoodward.com

My New Neighbor

I found the poem, My New Neighbor by Bob Hicok, to be both unique and strange in more ways than one. The poem starts out with the voice of the poem coming in contact with a nearby cow, where he focuses all of his attention on “the congregation of flies on the eye of the cow.” After reading the first eight to ten lines, the image of a cow’s eye surrounded by hundreds of tiny fly eyeballs staring at the speaker promptly jumped in my head. I could not figure out the significance of the “flies,” possibly Hicok wanted to choose an image/bug/animal that forced the reader to think of eyes and nothing else. And when I think of the words “eyes” and “staring” I feel as though the author was trying to show that all attention was being placed on the main character of the poem. But it may have no significance at all.

In general, this poem has a very captivating use of language. Phrases such as “I want to touch the cow---and the cow seemed to ask to be touched” are very odd and do a great job of adding to the strange nature of the speaker. This strange character seems to be on a personal level with this cow, throwing around assumptions that he knew this cow’s entire life story. He was talking to the animal as if he were a person; calling him “42” as the tag on his ear denoted. Seems like a strange form of personification; considering the cow is a living thing but has few characteristics of a human being. Then he goes on about how the tag will help the cow become cheeseburgers which is the “calling of cows in these parts.”

The poem then takes a very interesting turn. The speaker notices that “42” lives in the vicinity of a Presbyterian Church and orders the other cows around. After realizing this, the speaker assumes 42 must be an atheist. He then tries to discuss metaphysical theory with the cow by explaining that agnosticism is more plausible, considering it is too hard to think of our existence without a beginning. This part of the poem seems to reassure the reader of how “confused/ill/out-there” the speaker actually is. And after this whole explanation, the cow simply looks up at the speaker and blinks (which is quite a funny image to think about). And finally, the poem ends with an interesting use of repetition; the last phrase being, “It is comforting to talk to large animals, whether they listen or not.” The line is then repeated once more, but starts with the phrase “I said”---a phrase usually used because someone, or in this case something, did did not hear the first time. He may have used "I said" because he did not hear a response the first time and said it once more as if the cow had not heard him. Basically he confuses a cows lack of attention with their inability to speak english.

---Albert Sementa

The Sweeping Scope of Modest Mouse’s "3rd Planet"

Yes, Modest Mouse’s “3rd Planet” is a song– but what are songs other than poetry put to music? This song reads more like a poem to me than most poems. It illustrates nature’s cycles through unique images like the moment of conception, death, and the shape of the universe.

Most of the song rhymes, which I think enriches its sound and provides more of a challenge to write than free verse. The rhymes also fit logically into the natural flow of a sentence, like the line “…another had been found, another ocean on the planet/Given that our blood is just like the Atlantic.” They don’t sound forced or rearranged to fit the scheme to me.

Nature’s cycles are the major theme: birth and death, beginning and end, start and finish. “3rd Planet” first illustrates this theme through first the creation and then the death of a child. The first hint we get of this theme is in the chorus: “Baby cum angels fly around you/Reminding you we used to be three and not two.”

Society associates angels with people who die, although that isn’t necessarily accurate. According to Christianity, God created humans and angels separately, so angels were never humans to begin with. But the symbolism remains, so angels could also mean souls. “Cum” is slang for semen, and its key component is sperm which fertilizes the egg to produce a baby – new life. “Baby cum angels” could refer to a baby that was once fertilized but died. “Three and not two” would then refer to the death of the baby reducing the size of the family.

The next lines are just interesting: “Your heart felt good/It was drippin' pitch and made of wood.” According to the Encarta dictionary, pitch is resin derived from pine tree sap. This image compares a lover’s heart to the core of a tree where the sap, its lifeblood, is carried. The image of dripping pitch suggests bleeding to me, so the lover may be hurting emotionally – a possibility considering the theme of losing a child. Yet this happened at the moment of conception long before they lost the baby, so I don’t quite understand the image.

The next series of lines give a beautiful description of making love outside at night:

“And your hands and knees
felt cold and wet on the grass to me.
We’re outside naked, shiverin', looking blue
from the cold sunlight that's reflected off the moon”

Cold sunlight reflected off the moon is moonlight, although I think of it as white instead of blue. The beautiful imagery brings this scene alive and makes me think of being in a field where grass grows below and the moon shines above, where its light isn’t blocked by a forest’s canopy.

The cycle of life and death continues into an image that blends conception with the origin of life: “Well, a 3rd had just been made and we were swimming in the water/Didn't know then was it a son was it a daughter.” Scientists believe that the origin of life began when cells evolved in the ocean, when the planet was all water. This image could refer to said concept as well as a baby created in the “ocean” of the womb. The third just created is a reference to a baby since the narrator doesn’t know if it’s a son or a daughter.

Next, conception merges with the universe: “It occurred to me that the animals are swimming/Around in the water in the oceans in our bodies/And another had been found another ocean on the planet/Given that our blood is just like the Atlantic.” Size is relative to the organism. A zygote drifting into the expanse of the uterus might consider our bloodstream a universe. Perhaps the universe we know is just a growing cell in the bloodstream of another organism. These exponential proportions could go on forever.

Life and the universe are revealed to be cycles as well. The lines “That’s how the world began/and that’s how the world will end” suggest the world began with life and will end with the loss of life. This corresponds with the cycle of life and death as well as beginning and end.

I’m going to go off on a philosophical tangent to delve further into this concept. According to the song, the world would end with the loss of life because no beings would exist to perceive it. But just because we aren’t aware of something doesn’t mean it ceases to exist. The opposite isn’t true either: imagining a cheeseburger will not make it pop into existence right before your eyes. Reality exists beyond our individual perceptions.

One of the simplest, clearest examples of a cycle is the comparison between the universe and the earth in the line “Well, the universe is shaped exactly like the earth/If you go straight long enough you'll end up where you were.” A planet is a sphere with no beginning or end, and Earth is a planet. If the universe is shaped like it, then it too would be a sphere: infinite.

One last interesting thing I noticed is the repetition of threes. Earth is the third planet and a baby is a third person. The concept of exponential proportions can also make the two interchangeable. Earth, our solar system, and even the universe could just be a baby in the bloodstream of another organism. A baby, in turn, can be considered a planet because other life forms reproduce and grow in it like bacteria and cells. Three is the magic number because it is the creation of life.

Modest Mouse’s song “3rd Planet” is one of the deepest poems I’ve read. The image of a baby’s conception and death are tragic but beautiful, and the concepts about the universe are fascinating. Poems can be great, but song lyrics often go unnoticed despite incredible themes like the ones here.

--Jessica Murphy

re: Good Poetry

I would have to disagree.
whether or not True/False is a good poem is a matter of opinion, so i won’t try to defend it. but it needs to exist and does because it is unlike other poems; the poet took a chance.

Why does no one anymore write like Shakespeare or Dickinson or Poe? Because they already did. those poems have been read and their style written to death. I hope i never read another poet like Shakespeare or Ginsberg or Dean Young. how terribly boring would that be.

to wish for old trends to reemerge is like praying against progress. yes, the poems already written should be studies and learned from. but then, after a writer has salvaged what they deem worthy from those words, they should throw the rest away. forget it. sometimes, they should even forget those rules that they hold dear. cause if anything worthwhile is going to be written the poet needs to look at all those who came before them and say ‘this is what you did wrong, this is why your words are not mine.’

in closing:
any sort of ‘standards’ that require a writer to possess a degree, or statement of credibility or any previous knowledge of literature whatsoever in order to be published (i think recognition is really what is being discussed here actually) is something i hope is never seen. for someone to be a writer, they must do one thing only: write.

(on a related note:
(i heard once that Prince only listens to his own music. On one hand this is kind of commendable: If he is truly writing exactly what he wants to hear, what he thinks needs to be written, then it should follow that he wouldn’t find any more enjoyment from anyone else’s music then he would his own. However, Prince hasn’t really been topping the charts as of late.) living in a world were only work that is deemed to be ‘worthwhile’ is paid any attention leaves little room for something worthwhile to come about. )

-wes edmond

"Good Poetry"

After reading the poem “True/False” by Dean Young, I can’t help but feel worried about future literature and the advancing poetry of the modern day. Reading “True/False” was a concrete example that anyone can write anything, and if the publisher likes what you have written then they will publish it in hopes that others will enjoy it just as much as they did. There is no “standard” that someone who is going to be published must follow. In other words, someone who wants to be published doesn’t have to have a certain degree from college or have any kind of credibility beforehand. The poem, “True/False” is a simple list of statements that the reader must deem as either as true or false. There is not much more to that. Sure anyone can read it and think that there is a “deeper psychological” meaning hidden in the words. But for some reason I don’t feel like that at all about this poem. It is more likely that this poet had been previously published and wondered if he just wrote random thoughts down, would he be able to get published. And he got what he wanted. He wrote down random facts that he thought was clever, numbered them, and called it a poem. And behold! A poem is born. But in all honesty can we call this poetry? Is this real skill? Hell, I could write a list of things I did in a day and call it “My Day,” and say it’s a poem. If the publisher likes it, then he’ll do his thing. But if he doesn’t then it dies there. But really why aren’t more people writing like Shakespeare, or Dickinson, or Poe? Because it’s hard and takes true talent, which unfortunately not everyone has. It’s good to write because you enjoy writing. It is however ridiculous to think that everything you write is an amazing piece of work that will affect society. Just because you have a pen in your hand it doesn’t mean that you are a good writer. The sooner people realize that, the sooner we’ll get less of what people deem “poetry” and get real works of literature.

Now I’m not saying all poets have write in flowery English but they should at least have the training of what is universally considered “good” poetry and be trained in the classics before they develop their own style. Once you have the fundamentals, you have the building blocks to make your own work good.

*Donya Botkan*

Response to Random Symmetries by Tom Andrews By Perry Wertheimer

After reading this poem I am still extremely confused and don't really understand it. Not that I dislike it, I just don't see what the message is or why the shots of this film are significant within themselves.

When first reading the title I thought that it would be like eighteen steps or ways in which your life changes. Some of the things that were mentioned I felt were extremely similar to those in which people experience in everyday life and we all seem to come across at one time or another. In addition, while reading through I felt the occurrences that the author was mentioning tended to become more and more singular where they involved thoughts going on within your brain as you they are happening.
My favorite line in the poem was when he says on line 9 that "The eighth shot is like the color orange". It is so vague where it leaves so much imagery in ones mind. At first I thought of an orange (the fruit) sitting blankly on a brown wooden table and the second time I read through the poem I envisioned an orange goldfish cracker that was filled in a bag with other goldfish crackers, but for some reason this one cracker stuck out compared to the rest. I also enjoyed the fourteenth shot where he mentions how it is like sleep. One can clearly see in a film where this is just a person lying there sleeping. After reading this it made me think more of an older movie because when I think of sleeping in a movie I feel more inclined to think of a middle aged mother or father that is sleeping after a long day of work.

Even though these shots of the film were rather clear they didn't really tie in to one another and also did not end well. I thought that each line and shot was much different than all the others especially the ones before and after it so how could they flow together? The last line is also about looking at yourself first glance after getting a haircut. Yes, that happens with everybody, but what makes this haircut so interesting? Did he/she cut a lot of hair? Get a type of haircut that would stick out? I didn't particularly understand this, but like the rest of the poem it was vague and left for my imagination which I did enjoy.

Overall, I did like this poem I just found it to be unclear. However, this could have been intentional by the poet because he wants the reader to imagine what they want. If I could change anything, I would just change the end to make it a little bit more dramatic or something that is more descriptive.

BY: Perry Wertheimer

Exquisite Corpse

Oranges are better than Apples
Fruit that ate itself
Dreams come to me like a nightmare
That I really despise
My Mind
Blocked from all my ideas
and dreams feel silk, sliding along an endless slope
They say sleep lasts forever, but once I dreamed I never woke
The colors that appear seriously weird me out.

But I'm OK with...

Poetry with riddles,

Look for more

and mystery makes us look for more
This mystery will continue forever
Within the minds of our children


`Brian Michael Dunar

ps. A bunch of posts I've been stocking up in my notebook and haven't translated to my PC will be coming in this week.

True/ False

I was especially intrigued by the poem True/ False we talked about in class. When I first read this piece of work, I thought, what I figured a lot of other people might have thought, that it was just a random numbered group of statements. I found myself flying past intriguing statements like "Sometimes I get feelings of deja vu," and "There's a number missing," because I was waiting for the give away at the end. You know, that profound statement that kind of draws everything together in conclusion. Well, I clearly did not give this poem enough consideration as I quickly moved on to the next one. When we discussed it in class I went back and read it a few more times and finally felt a connection to the author. I don't know if anyone else out there is like me but I constantly have to read portions of papers sometimes two or 5 times before I get the answer. I'm that guy that usually takes the whole time allotted to finish a test because it takes me so long to understand the questions. Maybe I have dyslexia or something, I don't know but there has to be a reason I can only read at a third grade level. Anyways, when I truly understood this piece of work I found that the author came to life through its words. I guess what I'm trying to say, and I'll use another example to explain it- Have you ever watched the travel channel series Anthony Bordain's No Reservations? Well, I watch him quite frequently and I love his use of words when he describes his feelings and environments of the places he visits. Without to much further digression I'll get to the point. If I were to read any material he wrote, I would be able to recognize his characterization even if his name weren't written at the top of the work. True/False embodies this characterization of the author with phrases like "A woman eating a banana..." and "I wet the bed" in its generated perversion. Also, the way he messes with your mind in #23 and #70; (the deja vu lines) show a sense of humor. Sooo many poems I read lack multiple feelings and characterization so when I finish True/False and realized it didn't have a definitive conclusion I feel like I discovered its meaning. To me, some poems have stories, and some poems evoke thought through characterizations. This poem was the latter.

Jay Woodward

Spirituality and Compassion in Bob Hicok's "My new neighbor"

In Bob Hicok’s poem “My new neighbor,” Hicok describes a cow living in a field beside a small Presbyterian church which he therefore assumes later to be “a God-fearing cow” (26). He explains how this cow has a tag that reads “42” and is destined to be slaughtered, processed, and turned into hamburger for his own consumption. Throughout the poem, I see themes of the poet’s conflict between compassion and desire, as well as divinity’s mystery.

In the first half of the poem, Hicok expresses concern for the cow. He “confessed to 42” that he eats cheeseburgers and reflects: “I had never addressed my food/before it had reached the plate” (19-21) A confession implies guilt or shame, so he feels bad for eating the meat of another being but also takes great pleasure in it.

Hicok then continues in the next lines to wonder what he would say “to chicken teriyaki/by way of lessening the blow or making it feel welcome?” (22-23) Hicok acknowledges that the act of eating meat can be considered a “blow” by an animal whose flesh will be eaten, and he gives an example of a chicken before it is turned into chicken teriyaki. He feels he needs to comfort or assuage his “victims” before they die to show some kind of remorse or appreciation. Yet while he feels guilty for enjoying the meat of these slaughtered animals, he also enjoys it and therefore feels a conflict of interest.

I also see themes of divinity in this poem, including an awareness of higher powers and even using the cow as a metaphor. Hicok wonders “if the congregation of flies/on the eye of the cow/stared at the eye of the cow/with their compound eyes” (2-5). He entertains the possibility that flies, typically considered to be tiny and insignificant, have enough of a consciousness to be aware of the cow. Their host is a vast, complex organism and its eye “must be/their home planet” (36-37). Hicok wonders if they are sentient enough to conceive the solar system of this cow’s body and the even greater universe like the field in which the cow grazes.

Hicok also uses the cow as a metaphor for a higher power or god. He asks it if agnosticism is “the most reasonable position” because he believes “the mind cannot dispense with the notion/of a first cause” (32-35). Agnosticism is a neutral spiritual position in which agnostics (such as myself) believe it is impossible to know whether or not a higher power exists. After all, it would be supernatural and therefore have no natural evidence to confirm (or refute) its existence.

Agnosticism neither confirms nor denies the existence of a god, which is exactly what Hicok is debating in his poem. In this passage, he seems to struggle with the concept of god. He asks 42 – who he will probably eat later –whether or not agnosticism is the most reasonable position because he can’t put aside the concept of a fundamental origin. He can’t find any proof for the existence of a higher power but can’t dismiss it either because he doesn’t know any natural causes that could’ve created the universe, such as the Big Bang theory.

Hicok ends by stating how comforting it is “to talk/to large animals, whether they listen or not” (37-38), then repeats this line to emphasize its deeper meaning. Large animals like the cow could represent higher beings, as the cow does to the flies. Talking is a form of communication so this line could imply that Hicok is trying to communicate with a higher power. He finds it comforting to talk to the cow even without knowing if the animal understands or cares what he has to say. My interpretation of this metaphor is that Hicok finds comfort in having hope in a higher power regardless of whether or not it exists.

--Jessica Murphy

My head feels like clay

My head feels like clay
my cheeks are red with freezer burn
i wonder what time the day ends so i can sleep
a little bird told me
that you always bear in mind
fur tickling your cerebellum
your head hurts your soul says no,
but your mind says "Aye"
And we walk through nights
long after she was asleep
I waited by the window
Tears fell from my eyes

Daniel Pilla

Imagination

By Perry Wertheimer(and english 213 class)

The stairs were a waterfall

spilling in a downward cycle

There are smiles spilling out of a phonebooth as I watch
the astronauts about to take off
gazing into the starry sky, wishing for
God to help me with my swollen heart
How could I!?
WHY WOULD I
do that? Of all things...that?
Did I?
I wonder
who cares if its raining out,
I love the rain
being wet
being cold
but it isn't worth the price I pay




I'd rather
dance with you one more time than writing an essay
a hyperbole of a statement
that will never surface my life again