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Marlow
Sport climber
OSLO
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Oct 31, 2013 - 04:56pm PT
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"Remember when you were young,
You shone like the sun.
Shine on you crazy diamond.
Now there's a look in your eyes,
Like black holes in the sky.
Shine on you crazy diamond.
You were caught on the crossfire
Of childhood and stardom,
Blown on the steel breeze.
Come on you target for faraway laughter,
Come on you stranger, you legend, you martyr, and shine!
You reached for the secret too soon,
You cried for the moon.
Shine on you crazy diamond.
Threatened by shadows at night,
And exposed in the light.
Shine on you crazy diamond.
Well you wore out your welcome
With random precision,
Rode on the steel breeze.
Come on you raver, you seer of visions,
Come on you painter, you piper, you prisoner, and shine!"
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survival
Big Wall climber
Terrapin Station
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Oct 31, 2013 - 05:03pm PT
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When I was just a young boy, I played with swords and guns, and I dreamed of the day I`d become a soldier.
I'd kill all of the enemy, my country`tis of thee, I sing this anthem sadly,won`t you hear me.
I watched the cannons blazing, on the giant silver screen, The swastikas were burning and the hero was me.
The general gave the order, gladly I obeyed.But the movie faded quickly all at once today.
And now I stand alone with the charges made, no where to run, not a place to hide.
We`re sad little children playing grown-up games.
Guess the time has come, the damage has been done.
Stray dogs that live on the highway, walk on three legs. Cause they learn too slow to get the message.
Just like the Indians in the early days, battles lost and won, yet it still goes on. It`s just another ballad for soldier.
I had no understanding `till I saw my mother cry, when they told how many babies I had killed that night.
A dozen color photographs inside of a magazine, told the morbid story like a movie screen.
But I was not the hero I thought myself to be, movies are much different than reality.
The general was convicted to get off of the hook, but the President might free me for the chance I took.
And we all stand alone when the charge is made, sad way to live, what a way to die.
We`re all little children playing grown-up games, can we burn the gun before the next time comes.
Stray dogs that live on the highway walk on three legs, they move to slow to get the message.
Give up and win, that`s all I have to say, we haven't really won till all the fightin's done, and there are no more ballads for the soldiers.
Leon Russell
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Marlow
Sport climber
OSLO
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The Bog Queen - Seamus Heaney
I lay waiting
between turf-face and demesne wall,
between heathery levels
and glass-toothed stone.
My body was braille
for the creeping influences:
dawn suns groped over my head
and cooled at my feet,
through my fabrics and skins
the seeps of winter
digested me,
the illiterate roots
pondered and died
in the cavings
of stomach and socket.
I lay waiting
on the gravel bottom,
my brain darkening.
a jar of spawn
fermenting underground
dreams of Baltic amber.
Bruised berries under my nails,
the vital hoard reducing
in the crock of the pelvis.
My diadem grew carious,
gemstones dropped
in the peat floe
like the bearings of history.
My sash was a black glacier
wrinkling, dyed weaves
and Phoenician stitchwork
retted on my breasts'
soft moraines.
I knew winter cold
like the nuzzle of fjords
at my thighs––
the soaked fledge, the heavy
swaddle of hides.
My skull hibernated
in the wet nest of my hair.
Which they robbed.
I was barbered
and stripped
by a turfcutter's spade
who veiled me again
and packed coomb softly
between the stone jambs
at my head and my feet.
Till a peer's wife bribed him.
The plait of my hair
a slimy birth-cord
of bog, had been cut
and I rose from the dark,
hacked bone, skull-ware,
frayed stitches, tufts,
small gleams on the bank.
http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2013/nov/03/gerry-adams-jean-mcconville
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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SNAP PHOTO
Were you are a poetic soul
And had a roll
Or two
Or three
Of Kodak imagination,
You’ll understand
When I wave my hand:
That feeling of power
As you shot that flower
Was purely Instamatic gratification
That f-stopped way short of digitization.
Snap!
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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Song of the Generator, You Son of A Peach
We Flames were on top of the world:
We looked to have our hair curled.
Generator Crack demanded no rack,
So I said, “Hey, there, slack,” and I began my attack.
My nine-mil Eddy kept going up steady.
I knew I’d been ready ever since good old Freddy
Said we must try to learn to rely
On a belayer’s sharp eye:
It could help bye and bye.
There’s no reason why
You ever have to have died
Before you're ready for wide.
Except for this, that and some other things.
Tra-la.
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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Nov 17, 2013 - 02:14pm PT
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SELF-KNOWLEDGE
I look out on the upper
branches
of a knowing old tree
and realize that I could step
out this window
and walk on top of the
universe
but I prefer flat farmland
and the dry and tedious
for my brief stay
Wilma Elizabeth McDaniel
This one is for Amyjo, a fan of Wilma Elizabeth.
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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Nov 18, 2013 - 07:26pm PT
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TAKING WING IN NOVEMBER AIR
(THEY SAY POETRY IS BEST READ BETWEEN THE LINES)
In the quiet morning twilight
(next to highway 99)
Before dawn and after night
(I tried to shoot the sunrise)
A wing of birds is taking flight
(and the moon set just then, too)
A mundane but extraordinary sight
(I forgot to reset the manual focus again)
Mine eyes beheld the skies
(on the way home on frontage road)
A-flood with Lady Dark’s goodbyes
(a long line of birds appeared)
And here this avian marvel flies
(they were heading southerly)
A balm unto my sleep-filled eyes
(it meant shooting into the sun)
And so I snapped the flying birds
(thinking I had struck gold)
I saw no use supplying words
(when the truth was revealed)
Then I thought those stupid turds
(I had indeed taken gold from the sky)
Might think we’re sitting ducks ?!?!
(I can’t rhyme “turds” in other words)
This poor poetry, if it please, is for the Merry Fossil, Wayne, the naturalest guy I know, the Fossil Climber of ST.
Just paying you back for the inspiration, ya coot.
You're not seeing double, either.
What kinda birds are these, folks?
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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Nov 19, 2013 - 02:56am PT
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A FEW CHORDS OF ALMOND WOOD
--FOR THE CAMPFIRE
based on a cold winter spent working alone in the orchards
Often the quiet distance
tells me come
check me out
Often while piling wood
I tell myself
listen to nature
Often as not
I can’t hear a thing
except logs neatly piled
And the blues on the radio
in the car
or PHC on NPR
Like those crows on wires
the wood produces
visual notes
I can’t hear
any of these sights
except in my mind’s ear
My own work song
has become light blue
as the sun sets
The truck is full
and the moon
is full, too
A minor musty poet
Says “Good night, all,”
To you and you and you
But not to the owl
on that branch over there
beyond the flames.
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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Nov 26, 2013 - 01:45pm PT
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Happy Holidaze, boys, girls, rocks and trees.
Here's an exciting tale, with golf balls and tees.
Hannukah, the Festival of Lights, begins on Thursday, the 28th.
Let the shopping commence, let's go crash the fence
At Target, at Costco, Walmart if you have sense.
A Golfer's Nigh Before Christmas
‘Twas the nigh before Christmas,
with things running fine.
Old Santa decided t
 play a quick nine.
He packed up his sleigh,
His clubs well within reach;
then flew to a good public course
near the beach.
On the back nine, a threesome
called out, “Come and play.
there’s no one behind us.
We’re last here today.”
Santa smile, then teed up,
set his shoulder blades square,
and took a deep breath
from the grass-scented air.
But he swung much too hard
and in spite of himself,
the took up a divot
the size of an elf.
If that pitiful drive
wasn’t lousy enough,
his fairway shot found
a deep spot in the rough.
Muttered he, “Oh, perhaps,
it’s the wrong eve to play.
I’ve more meanigful deeds
to accomplish today.”
“Oh, no!” they protested.
“That isn’t the thing.
You just, ever so slightly,
must alter your swing.”
The first man stepped up.
“Change your grip. Look alive.
Swing fast but softer.
Now drive, old man, drive!”
Santa swung at the ball
with an air-splitting THWACK!
But it popped up and gave him
a smack on the back.
The woman said, “Santa,
now here’s what you do—
stand this way, squint hard,
then scream and swing through.”
Spoke the first guy, ”That tactic
went out with the Edsels.
You’ve got him all twisted
like soft, salted pretzels.”
Santa swung, noetheless;
then he cried out in pain.
“My back,” he lamented,
“has gone out again!”
Then a grizzled, old gent
who’d a wisdon like Snead did
gave Santa, too late,
the advice he had needed.
“You’re out here for fun,
and as you grow calmer,
“you’ll find yourself hitting
like young Arnold Palmer.”
But I can’t even move now.”
The thought made him shiver.
“I have all these presents
I have to deliver.”
“Please help me save Christmas.
Please give out these toys.”
Soon the fousome took off
to the good girls and boys.
It was Santa who now
gave out tips to his crew,
as up in the air
past the rooftops they flew.
At each home, the golfers
found just the right packs
and with magic Yule dust
scooted down chimney stacks.
They twisted and stretched
and got scorched by Yule logs,
ate cookies and milk
and got nipped by some dogs.
But they said as they passed
the last fireplace screen,
“This is almost as rousing
as playing eighteen!”
Santa said, “You’ve done well,
and reward you, I shall.
We’ll start at St. Andrews,
Augusta, Doral...
We’ll do lunch in Scottsdale,
try Pebble Beach, then,
Riviera, Sawgrass.
You just tell me when.”
“Then eleven more holes--
what a dream round we’ll play!”
Then he took the three home,
and he soon flew away.
Soon they heard him exclaim
from a sky dark as slate,
“Merry Christmas to all!
May your drives all fly straight!”
--Jody Feldman
FORE!!!!!!
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Norwegian
Trad climber
dancin on the tip of god's middle finger
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a poetry story in the land of non-fiction:
i was recently in Santa Cruz, downtown.
there, lots of street art occurs at the inspiration of
homeless folks and professional fools alike.
i was enjoying a stroll with my family,
and one fella is sitting, while driving
a typewriter. his sign says:
"poetry. donations accepted."
so i step and greet.
he asks me if i'd like a poem.
i say that i've got no money,
which is the absolute truth,
and then ask if he'd trade a poem for a poem.
"sure," he gleams.
so he writes me one, not knowing me from
the deepest man-man hole in the world (a gold mine in africa.)
to be honest i don't remember the specifics of his poem,
and shamefully i utilized it to start our
hobo-beach-fire that evening, but it read
something to the affect of:
.."he who shines brightest
is blinded by his own inflections..."
or something like that.
so i improvise a return:
"since i'll never be a new direction on the compass,
i wanna be the sharp end of cupid's arrow.
or perhaps a new color in the rainbow."
we both conclude that
poetry is stupid and a waste of intellect.
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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sez he
who spits on his gift
and pisses on his mind
and cries lame unto others
in readiculous ways
which unconform like synchlines
on the topo's graphy goodness
don't read my lines
read behind them
and in the end
he's his only friend
a door of missed perception
mist-placed angst
but nothing is ever missed
because it is nothing
so nothing is amiss
it's none of my business
i know
but it's a hobby
and this is mutteruttiness
utter musiness
(were i truly christian
--if sixes were 9 times infinity--
Fletcher might forgive me for that one)
mutinous mice
making not nice
in norwegian
with the man himself
in the mirror
he's never died
and he never will admit it if he does
he has no words for that
so he celebrates his shitty life
and sharpens his ego-paring knife
and cuts the roots of his soul
away from his corporeal being
and becomes less than nothing
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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Who are we?
She says drama.
I say drama.
She calls her gramma.
I call her momma.
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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WHOA! CAPTAIN, OUR CAPTAIN!
O CAPTAIN! Our Captain! your Citrus Trip is mean;
We two have carried heavy racks, the prize we sought went clean.
The brow is near, the crows we hear, no peeps are likely hanging
To welcome us with bong and stash and porters there next morning?...
O Captain! Our Captain! we climbed you in such style
You'd think there'd be a crowd of dudes stretched out a country mile:
This means no cans and ciggy butts--for you both sh#t and glitter--
I'm glad that it's just you and us cuz Smokey wants no litter...
Our Captain does not dye his hair; his rocks are potent still;
Her wide cracks eat my biggest cams, like Lover's never will.
The pig is anchor'd safe and sound, its contents used and spent.
And this old rock, it's mighty good, but, by God, we've sent...
Ellipses by Victor Shipp
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Marlow
Sport climber
OSLO
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Dec 15, 2013 - 11:41am PT
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Ulysses
It little profits that an idle king,
By this still hearth, among these barren crags,
Match’d with an aged wife, I mete and dole
Unequal laws unto a savage race,
That hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not me.
I cannot rest from travel: I will drink
Life to the lees: All times I have enjoy’d
Greatly, have suffer’d greatly, both with those
That loved me, and alone, on shore, and when
Thro’ scudding drifts the rainy Hyades
Vext the dim sea: I am become a name;
For always roaming with a hungry heart
Much have I seen and known; cities of men
And manners, climates, councils, governments,
Myself not least, but honour’d of them all;
And drunk delight of battle with my peers,
Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy.
I am a part of all that I have met;
Yet all experience is an arch wherethro’
Gleams that untravell’d world whose margin fades
For ever and forever when I move.
How dull it is to pause, to make an end,
To rust unburnish’d, not to shine in use!
As tho’ to breathe were life! Life piled on life
Were all too little, and of one to me
Little remains: but every hour is saved
From that eternal silence, something more,
A bringer of new things; and vile it were
For some three suns to store and hoard myself,
And this gray spirit yearning in desire
To follow knowledge like a sinking star,
Beyond the utmost bound of human thought.
This is my son, mine own Telemachus,
To whom I leave the sceptre and the isle,—
Well-loved of me, discerning to fulfil
This labour, by slow prudence to make mild
A rugged people, and thro’ soft degrees
Subdue them to the useful and the good.
Most blameless is he, centred in the sphere
Of common duties, decent not to fail
In offices of tenderness, and pay
Meet adoration to my household gods,
When I am gone. He works his work, I mine.
There lies the port; the vessel puffs her sail:
There gloom the dark, broad seas. My mariners,
Souls that have toil’d, and wrought, and thought with me—
That ever with a frolic welcome took
The thunder and the sunshine, and opposed
Free hearts, free foreheads—you and I are old;
Old age hath yet his honour and his toil;
Death closes all: but something ere the end,
Some work of noble note, may yet be done,
Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods.
The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks:
The long day wanes: the slow moon climbs: the deep
Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends,
’Tis not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite
The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the western stars, until I die.
It may be that the gulfs will wash us down:
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,
And see the great Achilles, whom we knew.
Tho’ much is taken, much abides; and tho’
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
Alfred Lord Tennyson
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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Dec 15, 2013 - 11:51am PT
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WHOW!
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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Dec 21, 2013 - 11:51am PT
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Recipe for Success in the Ditch
Add a heaping tablespoon of tears
To a bottomless cup of dreams of Hall of Mirrors
Stir in the hopes and fears of all the years
And don’t regret drinking all those beers
Take it to The Outer Limits but there ain’t any
Slow down and die in In the Fast Lane
Keeping your eyes on the Walk of Life is lame
Follow the orders of your wife your dame
Do this do that don’t throw the the softball bat
Or they’ll bench you
Don’t make a big long Soutwest Face
You are a member of the human race
But walk don’t run to First Base
Or you may find yourself in disgrace
With the Valley Christians
--A.F.Terbob
"It is aight, Ma, for I'm on belay."
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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Dec 24, 2013 - 06:37am PT
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NOT A CREATURE WAS STIRRING!:
A Late Christmas Eve Phone Call
Well it's a hard night to go to sleep
I was in slumber, fast and deep
Eh, what's that, the phone says beep
And it's my little sister
Being a big pest
On the phone
Late at night
Like she did
As a kid
It's Christmas Eve
And by your leave
I'll sit right here
And try to cheer
This midnight drear
And make it clear
The woman's dear
I chewed her out
I was a lout
I let it get out
Of hand, no doubt
Hung up a with a shout
You don't want to hear about
She had to know
If I would show
Be there or no
Way up in the snow
Her melt is slow
My car can't go
Vern's going to Fresno
She'd invited me
I couldn't see?
No RSVP
Well, ex-CUUUUUUUUUse me
MY F-G MEMORY!
Forgive, my plea
Amy's coming
I'm not
Adam's here
Sorry
Tim, too
Can't, thanks
Why not?
I'm a-told you
I'm a tumbler
I'm a docent Wednesday and Thursday
The Courthouse Museum
All Christmas tree-um
Kids should come here not there
Visit me not watch TV
Nor play in mucky melt
Much better you
Come down too
Too late to plan for next year?
That is what I should have said
I'm so bad my face is red
Like Santa's
Now back to bed
Enough's been said
Poor Lenna
I'll have to call her this morning
At five thirty no prior warning
It's not that I am scorning
Vern and Dawn want me adorning
Their Yule table Tuesday morning
I have no real problems this Christmas
I'll have to remember that next Thanksgiving
At Lenna's
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Marlow
Sport climber
OSLO
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Dec 28, 2013 - 02:01pm PT
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"A Tennessean named Webster had been watching him and he asked the judge what he aimed to do with those notes and sketches and the judge smiled and said that it was his intention to expunge them from the memory of man. .....
Webster: Well you've been a draftsman somewhere and them pictures is like enough the things themselves. But no man can put all the world in a book. No more than everthing drawed in a book is so.
Well said, Marcus, spoke the judge.
But don't draw me, said Webster. For I don't want in your book.
My book or some other book said the judge. What is to be deviates no jot from the book wherein it's writ. How could it? It would be a false book and a false book is no book at all.
You're a formidable riddler and I'll not match words with ye. Only save my crusted mug from out your ledger there for I'd not have it shown about perhaps to strangers."
BM, p. 140-141
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Leggs
Sport climber
Tucson, AZ
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Jan 16, 2014 - 02:17am PT
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"Poetry" by Pablo Neruda ....
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10152019123094673&l=8164732249065183966
"Poetry
And it was at that age ... Poetry arrived
in search of me. I don't know, I don't know where
it came from, from winter or a river.
I don't know how or when,
no they were not voices, they were not
words, nor silence,
but from a street I was summoned,
from the branches of night,
abruptly from the others,
among violent fires
or returning alone,
there I was without a face
and it touched me.
I did not know what to say, my mouth
had no way
with names,
my eyes were blind,
and something started in my soul,
fever or forgotten wings,
and I made my own way,
deciphering
that fire,
and I wrote the first faint line,
faint, without substance, pure
nonsense,
pure wisdom
of someone who knows nothing,
and suddenly I saw
the heavens
unfastened
and open,
planets,
palpitating plantations,
shadow perforated,
riddled
with arrows, fire and flowers,
the winding night, the universe.
And I, infinitesimal being,
drunk with the great starry
void,
likeness, image of
mystery,
felt myself a pure part
of the abyss,
I wheeled with the stars,
my heart broke loose on the wind."
~Pablo Neruda
EDIT: Sullly... love what you shared. ~xx
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