Children, Churches and Daddies

The Unreligious, Non-Family-Oriented Literary and Art Magazine

ISSN 1068-5154

editorial janet kuypers A few years ago, I felt so much pain in my joints that I couldn't walk or pick up a carton of milk in the morning. At age 21, I limped and ached; my right ankle, left knee, and right hand were swollen. I was also sore in my back and shoulders. I cried in pain daily. I went to the first doctor. He x-rayed my hand, told me that I may have a jammed thumb, but that there would be no evidence of it in an x-ray and that the pain and swelling would just go away. Then I went to the second doctor. There may be a stress fracture in my right foot, he said, but it was nothing serious. There were no drugs prescribed for the pain, and he handed me an ace bandage and a pair of crutches and headed me out the door. I went to my third doctor, who happened to be the first female doctor I saw. She put all the symptoms together and thought I may have a form of arthritis. She referred me to a specialist at a nearby hospital. She was the first doctor who listened to me. Every other experience of mine was of a doctor addressing only one of the problems I mentioned, then brushing the problem off as minor. I felt as if I was getting nowhere in discovering the root of my illness. I felt as if no one wanted to help me. A friend and co-worker was recently hospitalized with an ulcer. When she came back, the pain still remained - especially during menstruation. She always had severe menstrual cramps, and with the ulcer present there would be days at the office when she would have to lay down underneath her desk until the pain went away. Sometimes the pain would make her cry at her desk. Once I had to help her walk to her train station in the middle of the day, because she had to be bed-ridden and she didn't know if she could walk the block to her train without collapsing. She didn't want to go back to the hospital after being admitted for days with an ulcer. She told me about how uncomfortable she felt with her male doctor. That the doctors she had never listened to her. That she felt they dismissed her problems as all in her head. I told her to see someone else, and to tell them how she felt, even if she had to be belligerent. She was paying for and had the right to proper treatment. She finally saw a doctor. Then another. A few times it was suggested to her to go on the pill, since hormonal therapy may reduce the cramps. But she took that advice from a doctor years earlier, and she knew the pills made her more violently moody, and often didn't help with the pain. No one suggested other alternatives to her. She followed her doctors orders. My grandmother was a feisty and strong woman in her mid-eighties. Her bowling average hovered around 176. She lived alone in a condominium. Our family had dinner together weekly with her. While I was away at school, I started getting phone calls from my family about how grandma hadn't been feeling well. She went to a doctor complaining of stomach pains, and his diagnosis was that she had a yeast infection. She told him she knew her body well enough at this point in her life to know that she did not have a yeast infection. That a yeast infection wasn't causing this pain. She thought his diagnosis was ludicrous. The doctor brushed her off. She told us this. We told her to get a second opinion. She saw another doctor. The stomach pains persisted, and due to the cold weather her asthma was acting up. She was always out of breath. Tired. In pain. Still no answers from this doctor. He told her it was probably a stomach flu and that she would be fine soon. He gave her a prescription. Within two weeks she was in the hospital with a laceration in her stomach. The laceration was worse because she had it for a while and it wasn't treated. Strong acidic fluids were seeping through her body and infecting other organs. She was admitted to the hospital on a Friday; by Saturday morning, she was dead. I told friends about my grandmother's experience with the doctors. More than one person mentioned that my grandmother's next of kin could probably win a lawsuit against the doctor who misdiagnosed her, especially when she complained to us when she was alive that he didn't listen to her. But the problem was deeper than that. That doctor, like the ones myself and my friend had been to, didn't think he was doing a poor job. If you asked him, he probably would have thought that he was doing a perfectly good job. The problem was as simple as not listening. Those doctors didn't take us seriously. Simply put, they didn't listen to us. Why? Is it that all doctors are callous? No, from my experience alone I knew that the female doctor was helpful and took me seriously. Was it that male doctors didn't listen to anyone and female doctors did? Not from what I knew. Stories like these of doctors ignoring patient's feelings and statements are relatively foreign to men I talked to. In fact, often when I mention stories like these to a woman, she usually has another story like it to add to the list. It almost seems that most women I know don't feel comfortable with a male doctor. But men don't feel that way at all. Most men don't feel that way because they have never had that problem. They have always been listened to. They have had doctors pay attention to them. They have received better treatment, on the whole, than women. I decided since that last bout with the doctors that from now on I would see a female doctor whenever I could. But that doesn't solve the problem either. I should be able to go to a doctor, no matter if the physician is male or female, and feel confident that I will get the medical attention I need. But I don't feel that confidence. Neither do a lot of women. news stories Slothfulness is U.S. National Health Problem By Deborah Zabarenko WASHINGTON (Reuter) - The U.S. Surgeon General's office, which puts warnings on cigarette packs and liquor bottles, offered new advice on exercise: slothfulness can be hazardous to Americans' health. "Physical inactivity is a serious nationwide public health problem,'' Acting Surgeon General Dr. Audrey Manley said in releasing the first report from her office on physical activity and health. "This report is an alarm clock and a road map,'' Vice President Al Gore said at a news conference outside the White House. ``It sounds an urgent wake-up call about the risks of our couch-potato culture, but it also charts a course Americans can follow to happier and healthier lives.'' Not simply a bromide on the benefits of exercise, the report said millions of Americans suffered from ailments that could be prevented or improved through regular physical activity. These included the 13.5 million people with coronary heart disease, the 8 million who have adult-onset diabetes, the 95,000 diagnosed with colon cancer each year, the 50 million who suffer from high blood pressure and the 60 million who are overweight, the report said. Dr. David Satcher, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which produced the report, noted that increased exercise could prevent premature death and unnecessary illness and disability and help control health care costs. The report said 60 percent of American adults do not get the recommended amount of physical activity, and 25 percent are not active at all. Women are more likely to be inactive than men, especially as they age, and poor, less-educated people are more likely to be inactive than rich, well-educated ones. Nearly half of all people aged 12-21 were not vigorously active on a regular basis, and young women were more sedentary then young men. Only one in four high school students took daily physical education classes in 1995, down from 42 percent in 1991, the report said. Health and Human Services Secretary Donna Shalala stressed that even moderate activity can be beneficial. "The good news is - you don't have to train like an Olympic athlete to enjoy the benefits of a healthy lifestyle,'' Shalala said in a statement. "Walking, bicycling or even gardening for at least 30 minutes per day most days of the week is good for your health and good for your future.'' Moderate activity was seen as the goal for most people. This could consist of washing and waxing a car for 45-60 minutes, dancing for 30 minutes, jumping rope for 15 minutes or stairwalking for 15 minutes. The Surgeon General's office, which monitors U.S. health issues, is responsible for health warnings on cigarette packs, warning of health risks from emphysema to lung cancer, and on alcoholic beverages, warning pregnant women not to drink. Models Chase Down Robbery Suspect MIAMI BEACH, Fla (Reuter) - Fashion models who abound in Miami Beach's trendy "South Beach" district are better known for their figures than for crime-fighting skills, but two of them showed they had both, police said. Katina Salafatinos and Andrea Franklin, decked out in spandex and wearing in-line skates, were posing for a women's fitness magazine Tuesday morning when they saw a young man break into Salafatinos's car. Without hesitation, the models, both enthusiastic skaters, chased Merado Velasquez, 19, knocked him down and turned him over to police, who said he was carrying a tool used for burglaries and credit cards in other people's names. "We wrestled him to the ground and sat on him," Franklin told the Miami Herald newspaper. Police charged Velasquez with auto burglary, theft and criminal mischief. Man Faces 40 Years for Toilet Paper Theft MIAMI (Reuter) - A Florida man faced 40 years in prison after a jury found him guilty of trying to steal 22 rolls of toilet paper worth less than $1.00 each. Henry Stepney, 32 and homeless, had been arrested dozens of times for crimes including burglary, cocaine possession and assault but had served little jail time for those crimes, the Miami Herald reported Wednesday. But a jury found him guilty of petty theft and burglary, which prompted prosecutors to seek a severe penalty under a local law that prescribes stiff sentences for repeat offenders. A pre-sentencing hearing has been set. The judge may decide not to stick to the 40-year guideline. Most of the World's Homeless are Women and Children By Vicki Allen WASHINGTON, May 26 (Reuter) - Most of the roughly 100 million homeless people in the world are women and children, and up to 600 million live in inadequate, unhealthy shelters, the United Nations said. In a report prepared for its upcoming conference on the problems of the world's burgeoning cities, the U.N. Centre for Human Settlements said of the estimated 1.3 billion people living in poverty, 70 percent are women and girls. Women and girls also are the most rapidly growing group of impoverished, which the report called "the global feminization of poverty." They make up half the world's population, but own just 1 percent of its wealth. Wally N'Dow, secretary general of the conference - to be held June 3-14 in Istanbul, Turkey - said a major purpose of the meeting will be to promote women's rights to own and inherit property and their need for better wages and living conditions. "There is a tremendous effort... to remove those barriers today," N'Dow said in an interview. "The cultural barriers, for instance, that affect women's right to ownership of homes in some parts of the world, I think will be one of the most debated issues in Istanbul." While he said there is broader acceptance worldwide that the situation of women must be improved, the U.N. report gave a bleak assessment of the current condition. Some 50,000 people - mostly women and children - die daily because of poor shelter, polluted water and bad sanitation, it said. Some 70 million women and children live in homes where smoke from cooking fires damages their health. If housing could be brought to a minimal accepted standard, there would be 5 million fewer deaths and 2 million fewer disabilities annually, the U.N. estimated. Women are relegated to homelessness or squatter-status in many parts of the world where they cannot legally own or inherit land, cannot obtain bank loans, receive much lower wages than men, and often are abandoned to raise children on their own. Women and children also are prime victims of political upheavals, comprising 70-80 percent of the world's 23 million refugees, the U.N. said. Women - who are most likely to work in or near the home - also are most affected by bad planning in housing and settlement projects, the report said, such as failure to include child-care facilities and playgrounds, inappropriate location of water sources, poorly lit streets and public areas, and inadequate transportation. The U.N. said the lack of safe available water is one of the most pressing health problems for women and older girls, who usually are saddled with the chore of fetching water. The report said in some parts of rural Africa, women must use up to 85 percent of their daily energy intake in lugging water. In those regions, 40 percent of non-pregnant women and 63 percent of pregnant women are anaemic because of poor diets and heavy workloads. Postal Worker Accused of Dismembering Prostitutes YAPHANK, N.Y. (Reuter) - A suburban New York postal worker was arrested and accused of bludgeoning several prostitutes to death, hacking up their bodies and dumping their remains in garbage containers. The suspect, Robert Shulman, was a frequent customer of prostitutes in the New York City borough of Queens, and the prostitutes there led police to his apartment in suburban Long Island, Suffolk County police said. Police charged Shulman with killing two women, and while he was being questioned he admitted to three other murders, they said. Shulman would take the prostitutes to buy drugs, especially crack cocaine, and take them back to his home, investigators said. Shulman claimed he would black out and wake up to find the prostitutes dead, they said. He apparently dismembered them in order to dispose of their bodies more easily, police said. When Shulman was escorted past reporters at police headquarters in Yaphank, N.Y., he mumbled, ``I'm sorry,'' when asked what he would say to the victims' families. Asked how he felt, the unkempt and unshaven Shulman said, ''Horrible.'' One of his alleged victims, Kelly Sue Bunting, 28, of New York City, was last seen getting into a blue Cadillac which other prostitutes identified as belonging to Shulman, officials said. Her body was recovered in a garbage dumpster on Long Island. His four other suspected victims, whose remains also were found in garbage receptacles in New York City and its suburbs, remain unidentified. Shulman, 42, has been a mail handler at the Hicksville, N.Y. Post Office for more than 21 years. He faces charges of first- and second-degree murder and faces the possibility of the death penalty. Suburban Long Island also was the home of serial killer Joel Rifkin, who admitted killing 17 women, most of them prostitutes, over several years. He is now in prison. Canada Caught In Seal Slaughter Controversy "Seal" To Be Clubbed to Death at Embassy Protest Washington, DC - In a graphic lunchtime demonstration, a "seal" will be clubbed to death in protest of Canada's plan to increase its seal kill quota this year. Canada aims to bludgeon 250,000 seals this year-70,000 more than last year. Three- to four-week-old seal pups are shot or beaten to death, often in front of their panicked mothers. The Canadian government justifies seal slaughter because of declining cod populations, but biologists report that cod accounts for only the tiniest fraction of seals' diets. The real reason for the increased seal kill is that Canada exports seal penises to the Asian aphrodisiac market for a large profit. Says PETA's Jason Baker, "Canada's problem is not large seal populations -it's overfishing and human greed." March 1 marks the international day of protest against Canada's seal kill. More than 50 protests will occur around the world. From People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. Kevorkian To Stand Trial Again PONTIAC, Mich., Aug 31 (Reuter) - A day after being cleared of murder charges, Dr. Jack Kevorkian was ordered to stand trial next February for violating Michigan's now-expired ban on assisted suicide. Oakland County Circuit Judge Jessica Cooper set a trial date of Feb. 12, 1996 for Kevorkian's involvement in the 1993 deaths of Dr. Ali Khalili, 61, and Merian Frederick, 72 - the 19th and 20th suicides attended by the right-to-die activist. Frederick, of Ann Arbor, Mich., and Khalili, of Oak Brook, Ill., died in Oct. and Nov. 1993 by inhaling carbon monoxide gas in Kevorkian's former apartment in Royal Oak, Mich. The deaths occurred when Michigan's controversial statute banning assisted suicide was still in effect, and Kevorkian was jailed pending trial and staged an 18-day hunger strike. In Dec. 1993 Cooper struck down the law, threw out the charges and freed Kevorkian, but her decision was reversed last year by the Michigan Supreme Court, which reinstated the charges. The felony suicide ban also expired last year, and the state Legislature has not renewed the measure. If convicted, Kevorkian faces up to four years in prison and a $2,000 fine. Kevorkian's attorney, Geoffrey Fieger, said trying the case now would be akin to putting the jury into ``a time machine.'' ``This is the equivalent of trying somebody for rum running under the Prohibition statute if they were running rum across the Detroit River in the '20s and '30s and they just caught them now. It's absurd,'' Fieger said. Fieger also predicted that Kevorkian would easily be acquitted. In May 1994, a jury in Wayne County, Mich., acquitted the retired pathologist of assisted suicide, ruling that he intended to relieve suffering, not to cause death. Oakland County Circuit Judge David Breck threw out murder charges against Kevorkian for his involvement in the 1991 deaths of two women, but said there was ample evidence that Kevorkian assisted the suicides. Prosecutors are expected to bring assisted suicide charges shortly. Although Marjorie Wantz and Sherrie Miller took their lives in a secluded cabin before the suicide ban was in effect, the Michigan Supreme Court has since ruled that assisted suicide is a crime under the state's common laws. Wantz' and Miller's deaths were the second and third suicides that Kevorkian attended. He has witnessed 25 suicides since he began his death-on-demand crusade in 1990. close cover before striking you've been warned. book from janet kuypers. available through scars publications. checks payable to janet kuypers, $10/book. Clinton Backs Bill Protecting Gays From Bias By Steve Holland COLUMBUS, Ohio, Oct 20 (Reuter) - President Bill Clinton signalled support for legislation that would protect homosexuals from discrimination in the workplace, two years after his policy on gays in the military rocked the country. ``Individuals should not be denied a job on the basis of something that has no relationship to their ability to perform their work,'' Clinton said in a letter to Massachusetts Democratic Sen. Edward Kennedy, a chief sponsor of the bill. Clinton, in Columbus for a regional economic conference, got himself into trouble with many Americans early in his presidency with a policy aimed at allowing gays to serve in the military. Now, heading into his re-election campaign, he is still chided in the South and elsewhere for the ``don't ask, don't tell'' policy. In an apparent attempt to shore up his support in the politically active gay community, Clinton threw his weight behind the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, which still faces an uphill battle in the Republican-controlled Congress. Top White House adviser George Stephanopoulos publicly announced Clinton's support for the measure in a speech to the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association. ``The president has announced his explicit support for legislation to protect all Americans from discrimination in the workplace,'' Stephanopoulos told the Washington conference. ``No one should lose their job for reasons that have nothing to do with the job they do,'' he added. Clinton said in his letter, sent to Kennedy on Thursday and later released to reporters, that discrimination in employment on the basis of sexual orientation is currently legal in 41 states. ``Men and women in those states may be fired from their jobs solely because of their sexual orientation, even when it has no bearing on their job performance,'' Clinton said. ``Those who face this kind of job discrimination have no legal recourse in either our state or federal courts. This is wrong,'' he said. He said the proposed legislation is careful to apply some essential exemptions in certain areas - small businesses, the armed forces and religious organisations, including schools and other educational institutions substantially controlled or supported by religious organisations. In addition, he said, the bill specifically prohibits preferential treatment on the basis of sexual orientation, including quotas. It does not require employers to provide special benefits, he said. ``The bill, therefore, appears to answer all the legitimate objections previously raised against it, while ensuring that Americans, regardless of their sexual orientation, can find and keep their jobs based on their ability and the quality of their work,'' Clinton said. ``The Employment Non-Discrimination Act is designed to protect the rights of all Americans to participate in the job market without fear of unfair discrimination. I support it.'' The Human Rights Campaign, the largest national U.S. homosexual political group, applauded Clinton's move. ``People should not be fired from their jobs for a reason that has nothing to do with their abilities,'' the group's executive director, Elizabeth Birch, said in a statement. ``The president stands with the majority of Americans in supporting equal rights in the workplace for lesbian and gay citizens.'' what's new with you? children, churches and daddies. write us for information about any of our new projects. we'd like you to be a part of them. scars publications and design, janet kuypers Pentagon To Probe Homosexual Harrassment Report By Charles Aldinger WASHINGTON (Reuter) - Defense Secretary William Perry ordered an investigation into charges of increasing harassment and ``witch hunts'' by the U.S. military against homosexuals in uniform. "That's a serious allegation. I do not have the evidence to support that allegation, but we take it seriously and will look into it very carefully,'' he said of a new report suggesting a 1994 policy to end such harassment had failed. The "don't ask, don't tell'' policy was developed by the Clinton administration to allow gay men and lesbians to serve quietly in the military so long as they do not openly profess or practice homosexuality. But the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, a private rights group based in Washington, reported Tuesday that 722 men and women had been discharged from the armed forces in fiscal 1995 for homosexuality compared to 597 in 1994. The group, which assists members of the military accused of homosexuality, also charged that many military officers still condoned ``witch hunts'' for homosexuals, including questioning of the families and friends of suspected gays. The report said, for example, that a female Army private in South Korea reported that male soldiers assaulted and threatened to rape her. But the soldiers spread false rumors that she was a lesbian and she, her family and friends were harassed by the Army for 10 months before discharge proceedings against her were dropped last July. "I have asked my staff to investigate that report very carefully,'' Perry told reporters in response to questions about the overall report at the Pentagon. "We do not accept harassment of any individual in the military. But it's very difficult to deal with anecdotal accounts of harassment,'' he said. The secretary denied that figures for the dismissal of homosexuals over the last four years had shown any major statistical differences, and Pentagon spokesman Ken Bacon said the jump in fiscal 1995 was chiefly due to a technical change by the Air Force in how it reported dismissals. "The policy has not failed,'' Bacon told reporters at the Defense Department news briefing. ``The ability to serve (in the military) is based on conduct, nor on orientation.'' Tuesday's report charged that the 722 men and women dismissed last year under the ``don't ask, don't tell'' policy represented a four-year high. The New York Times first reported on the new survey in Tuesday's editions. Under the new rule, members of the military are not supposed to be asked to give their sexual orientation, especially when they enlist in the armed forces. But the legal defense group said the military was not only continuing to ask service members about their sexual orientation but also their parents, friends and therapists. The documents suggested that the administration's effort to help gays in the military was indeed harmful, leading to formal investigations that might have been handled in the past without fuss or punishment. Mom'sFavorite Vase Cassette Tapes Available Acoustic Demos and Live Shows for $5 Write To cc+d For More Details Man Charged with Rape After On Line Seduction of Teen FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (Reuter) - A Florida man has been charged with using a computer to lure a 15-year-old girl to visit him from Maryland, raping her and holding her captive until she used his computer to contact friends who helped her escape, police said. Police said James Latona, 41, a self-employed contractor, was arrested at his home in Fort Lauderdale on Aug. 23 and released two days later on $5,000 bail. They said Latona got in touch with the girl, whose identity was not revealed, through a ``chat room'' on the Prodigy on-line computer service and got her to run away from home and meet him in central Florida, using an airplane ticket he bought her her. ``He basically promised that there would be no sexual contact,'' said a spokesman for the Orange County Sheriff's Department. The girl arrived in Orlando Aug. 14 and the two checked into a motel. Police said the girl told them Latona made and she rejected repeated sexual advances before she ``was finally forced to submit to numerous sexual acts.'' The next day, Latona took the girl to his home in Fort Lauderdale. He allowed her to use his computer and she jumped back online, contacting friends in Maryland who arranged for her return home. Once she got there, friends convinced her to tell her story to police, who investigated and obtained a warrant for Latona's arrest. There have been several recent cases in which computer users have been charged with using the so-called ``information superhighway'' to make sexual advances to juveniles. "Chris P. Carrot" Banned From Little Rock Schools Vegetarian Mascot Greets Kids Just Off School Grounds Little Rock, Ark. - With a basket of buttons that read, "Eat Your Veggies, Not Your Friends," Chris P. Carrot, PETA's 7-foot-tall vegetarian mascot, greeted students outside two Little Rock elementary schools, both on Wednesday, May 8. After banning Chris P. Carrot from giving a presentation to students on vegetarianism inside the school, Linda Jones from the Little Rock school district stated, "This matter is too controversial at this time." Undaunted, Chris P. Carrot will greet children before and after class, promoting vegetarianism and exposing the health hazards and animal cruelty inherent in meat. Headlines everywhere are trumpeting vegetarianism as the new youth trend-even Britain's Prince Harry wants to give beef the boot. Yet, on any given day in the United States, one out of four schoolchildren does not eat any fruit or vegetables. The U.S. National Cholesterol Education Program warns that heart disease begins during childhood and recommends a low-fat, low-cholesterol diet for kids as young as two. In fact, the USDA has doubled the amount of fruit and vegetables in school lunches, acknowledging the fact that "there's no question any longer of the relationship between diet and chronic diseases." Says PETA's Tracy Reiman, "Feeding children meat is child abuse. Meat-eating leads to obesity, heart disease, and cancer. Chris P. Carrot wants to help children stay healthy-health-conscious parents should love him." Chris P. Carrot will also visit kids in Memphis and Nashville. From People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. U.S. Agency Ends "Jogging in a Jug" Case WASHINGTON (Reuter) - The FTC ruled that a drink called "Jogging in a Jug'' provides no health benefits as claimed and can no longer be marketed as a health product. In giving final approval to a consent agreement, the Federal Trade Commission barred sellers from promoting claims that the vinegar and apple and grape juice mix relieves ailments including lethargy and heart disease and provides the same healthy benefits as jogging. The marketers, Third Option Laboratories of Muscle Shoals, Alabama, has made millions of dollars selling the drink for about $6 or $7 a jar in supermarkets and through catalogues nationwide, said a FTC spokeswoman. The company has admitted to no law violations by agreeing to the FTC's ruling, but must pay the government $480,000 to cover possible customer refunds. If the company continues to use the "Jogging in a Jug'' name, it must use a disclaimer that there is no scientific evidence that the drink provides any health benefits. The company has claimed the drink cures or alleviates such ailments as arthritis, lethargy and high cholesterol levels. It has claimed it provides the same benefits of jogging such as reduced risk of heart disease. Debra Purdy Kong, writer, British Columbia, Canada I like the magazine a lot. I like the spacious lay-out and the different coloured pages and the variety of writer's styles. Too many literary magazines read as if everyone graduated from the same course. We need to collect more voices like these and send them everywhere. Dusty Dog Reviews The whole project is hip, anti-academic, the poetry of reluctant grown-ups, picking noses in church. An enjoyable romp! Though also serious. Children, Churches and Daddies. It speaks for itself. Write to Scars Publications to submit poetry, prose and artwork to Children, Churches and Daddies literary magazine, or to inquire about having your own chapbook, and maybe a few reviews like these. "Chris P. Carrot" Banned From Nashville Schools Vegetarian Mascot Greets Kids Just Off School Grounds Nashville, Tenn. - With a basket of buttons reading, "Eat Your Veggies, Not Your Friends," Chris P. Carrot, PETA's 7-foot-tall vegetarian mascot, will greet students outside two Nashville elementary schools, both on Friday, May 10. After banning Chris P. Carrot from giving a presentation to students on vegetarianism inside the school, Lake View Elementary's Peggy Stevens stated that, concerning what kids eat, "younger children don't have a choice." Undaunted, Chris P. Carrot will greet children before and after class, promoting vegetarianism and exposing the health hazards and animal suffering inherent in meat. From People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. Fithian Press, Santa Barbara, CA Indeed, there's a healthy balance here between wit and dark vision, romance and reality, just as there's a good balance between words and graphics. The work shows brave self-exploration, and serves as a reminder of mortality and the fragile beauty of friendship. Mark Blickley, writer The precursor to the magazine title (Children, Churches and Daddies) is very moving. "Scars" is also an excellent prose poem. I never really thought about scars as being a form of nostalgia. But in the poem it also represents courage and warmth. I look forward to finishing her book. You Have to be Published to be Appreciated. Do you want to be heard? Contact Children, Churches and Daddies about book and chapbook publishing. These reviews can be yours. Scars Publications, attention J. Kuypers. You can write for yourself or you can write for an audience. Write to us. More Evidence That Red Wine is Good For You By Maggie Fox BIRMINGHAM, England (Reuter) - Brazilian researchers said Monday they had found more evidence that red wine can reduce the risk of heart disease. Tests on rabbits showed that red wine and, to a slightly lesser extent, alcohol-free red wine stopped fats in the blood from clogging up the arteries. Carlos Vicente Serrano and colleagues at the Instituto de Coracao do Hospital das Clinicas da FMUSP in Sao Paulo took 30 rabbits and gave them a special high-fat diet. One group also got red wine, 10 got alcohol-free red wine and 10 got no extra tipple. After 12 weeks the rabbits were killed and their arteries inspected. The researchers told the European Congress of Cardiology meeting in Birmingham, England that the results showed red wine seems to have some sort of "magic ingredient'' that protects against heart disease. "The results showed that animals treated with diet alone had 60 percent of the surface of their aortas (the main artery leading from the heart) covered by atherosclerotic plaques, while in the wine-treated animals only 38 percent of the aorta was covered by plaques,'' they said in a statement. Rabbits who got the non-alcoholic red wine came in-between, with about 48 percent of their arteries clogged up with fat. All the rabbits had extremely high blood cholesterol levels, which indicated that the red wine was stopping the blood fat from turning into the gummy plaque that typifies atherosclerosis. Serrano's group said this could be because something in the red wine stops the fat from oxidizing, a chemical reaction similar to rusting that turns the fat into plaque. "Probably flavonoids, such as apigen and luteonin - substances that are present in fruits and vegetable of the so-called Mediterranean diet, and that are also present in red wine, may be responsible for some of these effects,'' they said. "It is noteworthy that both red wine and non-alcoholic products of red wine were beneficial, but wine by itself a little more so,'' they concluded. Last year British researchers said a moderate intake of any kind of alcohol seemed to protect against heart disease. They said they found no particular benefit in red wine and said more than about two drinks a day erased the benefits. Police Seeking Killer in Nationwide Manhunt LOS ANGELES, Nov 8 (Reuter) - A nationwide manhunt has been launched for a drifter wanted in the killings of four people in four states, police said. Glen Rogers, 33, described as good looking and debonair, is alleged to have killed a man and three women. The body of his latest alleged victim, a woman, was found in a Florida motel room on Tuesday. He is also believed to have killed a man in Ohio and two other women in California and Mississippi. "This is a nationwide manhunt. This man is a serial killer and he is absolutely likely to kill again,'' said Los Angeles police detective Stephen Fisk. Rogers has been changed in Los Angeles in the Sept. 30 rape and murder of Sandra Gallagher, 33, whose body was found in her burning pickup truck. Police say Rogers raped and strangled her before setting her truck on fire. "We warned after that murder that Rogers would kill again, we just didn't realise it would be so soon,'' Fisk said. Judge Denies Gay Couple in Bankrputcy Decision Gail Appleson, Law Correspondent NEW ORLEANS, Oct 31 (Reuter) - A federal bankruptcy judge has denied two men in a long-term homosexual relatioship the right to file a joint bankruptcy petition in the first reported case of its type. The ruling, issued in Atlanta, was discussed at a meeting of bankruptcy judges here. Although the relationship between the two men has many of the same characteristics as that of a married heterosexual couple, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge A. David Kahn held they could not file jointly because they are not legally married. "Requiring that a debtor and spouse be legally married to file a joint bankruptcy petition is more than a mere technicality. Marriage is a legal relationship,'' Kahn wrote. The two men had filed a Chapter 13 consumer reorganization petition in March. According to court papers, they exchanged vows in a 1993 religious ceremony in Las Vegas and consider themselves to be married, sharing 92 percent of their debts. They acknowleged, however, that they do not have a marriage license and neither Nevada nor Georgia recognises them as legally married. Chapter 13 provides an individual debtor and that debtor's "spouse'' protection from creditors while they reorganize their debts. The bankruptcy code does not define the word "spouse,'' but the two men proposed that it should apply to individuals who cohabitate, have an agreement that is permanent and exclusive of other relationships and share debts and income. But Kahn disagreed, saying this would create a federal standard for marriage. "The court finds nothing in the history of this section to indicate Congress ever contemplated or anticipated that a same sex couple would attempt to file a joint petition,'' Kahn wrote. The judge said that while there are no other reported cases on the question of whether same-sex couples can file jointly, other courts have rejected other attempts to file jointly, such as in the case of a mother and daughter. He also rejected the couple's argument that their case was similiar to a 1992 ruling in which a bankrupcty judge in Washington State allowed creditors to pursue claims against a debtor's Lesbian lover. Such third parties are defined as "insiders'' under the bankruptcy code. The ruling in that case held that Congress intended the definition of insider to be ":expansive'' and "flexibly applied on a case by case basis.'' Kahn said the case before him was different because Congress defined insider providing categories that could include unmarried partners. By contrast, he said, Congress did not define spouse. This would mean that Congress did not intend a broader use of the term. the unreligious, non-family-oriented literary and art magazine is now 8-1/2" x 11", 12 times a year, with subscriptions for $36/year! we're still accepting submissions, too, so send work with a bio and sase (and macintosh disk, if possible) to children, churches and daddies scars publications and design, janet kuypers Women's Health Activists Demanded Genetic Privacy WASHINGTON (Reuter) - An international coalition of women's and health groups urged governments Tuesday to enact policies to protect "genetic privacy," so people did not face discrimination because of their genetic makeup. They said they were concerned about losing medical insurance if they had certain genes predisposing them to certain diseases or being sidetracked professionally if employers got hold of genetic information. In the United States, several lawmakers have introduced bills to deal with some of these issues, particularly access to health insurance, but none has become law. The activists were represented at a news conference in Washington sponsored by the Foundation on Economic Trends, which is campaigning against biotechnology companies' ability to patent genes. Joining them were some women who have taken the test to see if they have the BRCA1 gene, linked to breast and ovarian cancer. "Human genes are not for sale or profit," said noted feminist activist and breast cancer survivor Bella Abzug. "Legislation must be enacted that specifically protects the privacy and confidentiality of a patient's medical record and bars discrimination against any individual who undergoes genetic testing," said Abzug, a former U.S. congresswoman. Foundation president Jeremy Rifkin said in an interview the gathering represented the "birth of the genetic rights movement." He said women should have the option of taking genetic screening tests without having to worry about losing privacy, insurance or employment. The BRCA1 gene, one of two so far linked to breast and ovarian cancer, has posed particular problems in medical ethics. Women carrying a mutation of the gene have an 85 percent chance of developing breast cancer, but scientists do not know what sets apart the 15 percent that do not. Nor is there a proven way of avoiding or preventing breast cancer. Not all women's groups oppose patenting genes. Some believe it will help bring more money in for research and possible cures. Dusty Dog Reviews These poems document a very complicated internal response to the feminine side of social existence. And as the book proceeds the poems become increasingly psychologically complex and, ultimately, fascinating and genuinely rewarding. C Ra McGuirt, Editor, The Penny Dreadful Review cc&d is obviously a labor of love ... I just have to smile when I go through it. (Janet Kuypers) uses her space and her poets to best effect, and the illos attest to her skill as a graphic artist. Dusty Dog Reviews She opens with a poem of her own devising, which has that wintry atmosphere demonstrated in the movie version of Boris Pasternak's Doctor Zhivago. The atmosphere of wintry white and cold, gloriously murderous cold, stark raging cold, numbing and brutalizing cold, appears almost as a character who announces to his audience, "Wisdom occurs only after a laboriously magnificent disappointment." Alas, that our Dusty Dog for mat cannot do justice to Ms. Kuypers' very personal layering of her poem across the page. US Defends Military Policy on Gays By Gail Appleson, Law Correspondent NEW YORK, Jan 16 (Reuter) - A government lawyer denied that the military's "don't ask, don't tell'' policy on homosexuals is aimed at curbing speech, but aims instead to ensure gay service men and women will "play by the rules.'' In arguments before the U.S. Second Circuit Court of Appeals, Edwin Kneedler, a lawyer with the Department of Justice, asked that the three-member panel overturn a judge's ruling that found the policy unconstitutional. The policy allows homosexuals to serve in the military, but continues the long-time ban on homosexual acts and requires gay and lesbian service members to keep their sexual orientation private. Declaring one's homosexuality is considered evidence of an intent to commit homosexual acts and is therefore grounds for a discharge, according to the policy. But Kneedler said that those accused of making such statements are given the right to refute them. When asked by the appeals court whether this was a "chilling'' of free speech, Kneedler argued that the intent of the policy was not to silence gay or lesbian service members. Instead the policy was aimed at determining "is this a person who will be able to play by the rules and not engage in homosexual activity while in the military,'' he said. The arguments stem from a March ruling by U.S. District Judge Eugene Nickerson of Brooklyn overturning the policy saying it was unconstitutional and catered to the fears and prejudices of heterosexual troops. He dismissed the government's argument that morale and discipline would suffer if openly gay men and women were allowed to serve in the military. The judge focused on the "don't tell'' provision of the policy, writing that the Supreme Court has held that the First Amendment "will not countenance the proscription of the expression of an idea because others find that idea repugnant.'' But Kneedler argued the policy was necessary to ensure "unit cohesion.'' He said that if openly gay service members were allowed in the military it could create dangerous "sexual tension'' among personnel of the same sex and thus threaten the ability of a unit to function. He said that while sexual tension between heterosexuals is reduced by separate housing units for men and women, this is not the case with gay service members. Matthew Coles, a lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union, replied that the real reason the policy was enacted was "to prevent communication.'' He said in all other cases where a service person is accused of behaviour that threatens unit cohesion, the military makes a case-by-case decision whether there really is possible harm, but that with homosexuality a blanket ban exists. Coles argued that there was no evidence that homosexuality impedes the functioning of a military unit. Instead, he said the military was only catering to heterosexuals' prejudices. "The only need for it (the policy) that the government is able to articulate is discomfort,'' he said. humor Bloopers from Church Bulletins • Don't let worry kill you- let the church help. • Thursday night - Potluck supper. Prayer and medication to follow. • Remember in prayer the many who are sick of our church and community. • For those of you who have children and didn't know it, we have a nursery downstairs. • The rosebud on the alter this morning is to announce the birth of David Alan Belzer, the sin of Rev. and Mrs. Julius Belzer. • This afternoon there will be a meeting in the South and North ends of the church. Children will be baptized at both ends. • Tuesday at 4:00 pm there will be an ice cream social. All ladies giving milk will please come early. • Wednesday the ladies liturgy will meet. Mrs. Johnson will sing "Put me in my little bed" accompanied by the pastor. • Thursday at 5:00 pm there will be a meeting of the Little Mothers Club. All ladies wishing to be "Little Mothers" will meet with the pastor in his study. • This being Easter Sunday, we will ask Mrs. Lewis to come forward and lay an egg on the alter. • The service will close with "Little Drops of Water". One of the ladies will start quietly and the rest of the congregation will join in. • Next Sunday a special collection will be taken to defray the cost of the new carpet. All those wishing to do something on the new carpet will come forward and do so. • The ladies of the church have cast off clothing of every kind. They can be seen in the church basement Saturday. • A bean supper will be held on Tuesday evening in the church hall. Music will follow. • At the evening service tonight, the sermon topic will be "What is Hell?" Come early and listen to our choir practice. Resume Bloopers -Here are my qualifications for you to overlook. REASONS FOR LEAVING THE LAST JOB: -Responsibility makes me nervous. -They insisted that all employees get to work by 8:45 every morning. Couldn't work under those conditions. -Was met with a string of broken promises and lies, as well as cockroaches. -I was working for my mom until she decided to move. -The company made me a scapegoat - just like my three previous employers. JOB RESPONSIBILITIES: -While I am open to the initial nature of an assignment, I am decidedly disposed that it be so oriented as to at least partially incorporate the experience enjoyed heretofore and that it be configured so as to ultimately lead to the application of more rarefied facets of financial management as the major sphere of responsibility. -I was proud to win the Gregg Typting Award. SPECIAL REQUESTS & JOB OBJECTIVES: -Please call me after 5:30 because I am self-employed and my employer does not know I am looking for another job. -My goal is to be a meteorologist. But since I have no training in meteorology, I suppose I should try stock brokerage. -I procrastinate - especially when the task is unpleasant. PHYSICAL DISABILITIES: -Minor allergies to house cats and Mongolian sheep. PERSONAL INTERESTS: -Donating blood. 14 gallons so far. SMALL TYPOS THAT CAN CHANGE THE MEANING: -Education: College, August 1880-May 1984. -Work Experience: Dealing with customers' conflicts that arouse. -Develop and recommend an annual operating expense fudget. -I'm a rabid typist. -Instrumental in ruining entire operation for a Midwest chain operation. Computer Problems An exasperated caller to Dell Computer Tech Support couldn't get her new Dell Computer to turn on. After ensuring the computer was plugged in, the technician asked her what happened when she pushed the power button. Her response, "I pushed and pushed on this foot pedal and nothing happens." The "foot pedal" turned out to be the computer's mouse. Another customer called Compaq tech support to say her brand-new computer wouldn't work. She said she unpacked the unit, plugged it in, and sat there for 20 minutes waiting for something to happen. When asked what happened when she pressed the power switch, she asked, "What power switch?" Compaq is considering changing the command "Press Any Key" to "Press Return Key" because of the flood of calls asking where the "Any" key is. AST technical support had a caller complaining that her mouse was hard to control with the dust cover on. The cover turned out to be the plastic bag the mouse was packaged in. Another Compaq technician received a call from a man complaining that the system wouldn't read word processing files from his old diskettes. After trouble-shooting for magnets and heat failed to diagnose the problem, it was found that the customer labeled the diskettes then rolled them into the typewriter to type the labels. Another AST customer was asked to send a copy of her defective diskettes. A few days later a letter arrived from the customer along with Xeroxed copies of the floppies. A Dell technician advised his customer to put his troubled floppy back in the drive and close the door. The customer asked the tech to hold on, and was heard putting the phone down, getting up and crossing the room to close the door to his room. Another Dell customer called to say he couldn't get his computer to fax anything. After 40 minutes of trouble-shooting, the technician discovered the man was trying to fax a piece of paper by holding it in front of the monitor screen and hitting the "send" key. Another Dell customer needed help setting up a new program, so a Dell tech referred him to the local Egghead. "Yeah, I got me a couple of friends," the customer replied. When told Egghead was a software store, the man said, "Oh, I thought you meant for me to find a couple of geeks." Yet another Dell customer called to complain that his keyboard no longer worked. He had cleaned it by filling up his tub with soap and water and soaking the keyboard for a day, then removing all the keys and washing them individually. A Dell technician received a call from a customer who was enraged because his computer had told him he was "bad and an invalid". The tech explained that the computer's "bad command" and "invalid" responses shouldn't be taken personally. "Actual Newspaper Headlines" Include your Children when Baking Cookies Something Went Wrong in Jet Crash, Expert Says Police Begin Campaign to Run Down Jaywalkers Safety Experts Say School Bus Passengers Should Be Belted Drunk Gets Nine Months in Violin Case Survivor of Siamese Twins Joins Parents Farmer Bill Dies in House Iraqi Head Seeks Arms Is There a Ring of Debris around Uranus? Stud Tires Out Prostitutes Appeal to Pope Panda Mating Fails; Veterinarian Takes Over Soviet Virgin Lands Short of Goal Again British Left Waffles on Falkland Islands Lung Cancer in Women Mushrooms Eye Drops off Shelf Squad Helps Dog Bite Victim Shot Off Woman's Leg Helps Nicklaus to 66 Enraged Cow Injures Farmer with Ax Plane Too Close to Ground, Crash Probe Told Miners Refuse to Work after Death Juvenile Court to Try Shooting Defendant Two Soviet Ships Collide, One Dies Two Sisters Reunited after 18 Years in Checkout Counter Killer Sentenced to Die for Second Time in 10 Years Never Withhold Herpes Infection from Loved One War Dims Hope for Peace If Strike isn't Settled Quickly, It May Last a While Cold Wave Linked to Temperatures Enfields Couple Slain; Police Suspect Homicide Red Tape Holds Up New Bridge Deer Kill 17,000 Typhoon Rips Through Cemetery; Hundreds Dead Man Struck by Lightning Faces Battery Charge Kids Make Nutritious Snacks Chef Throws His Heart into Helping Feed Needy Arson Suspect is Held in Massachusetts Fire British Union Finds Dwarfs in Short Supply Ban On Soliciting Dead in Trotwood Local High School Dropouts Cut in Half New Vaccine May Contain Rabies Man Minus Ear Waives Hearing Deaf College Opens Doors to Hearing Prosecutor Releases Probe into Undersheriff "Advertisements and Such" Dogs: - Lost: Small apricot poodle - Reward. Neutered, just like one of the family. - Dog For Sale: Great Dames - Dog For Sale: Eats anything; especially fond of children. From the Kitchen: - A superb and inexpensive restaurant. Fine food expertly served by waitresses in appetizing forms. - 7 ounces of choice sirloin steak, broiled to your likeness and smothered with golden fried onion rings - Dinner Special - Chicken or Beef $2.25; Turkey $2.35; Children $2.00 Antiques: - For sale: An antique desk suitable for lady with thick legs and large drawers. - For sale: Four-posted bed, 101 years old, Perfect for antique lover. Vacation: - Vacation Special: have your home exterminated. - Mt. Kilimanjaro, the breathtaking backdrop for the Serena Lodge. Swim in the lovely pool while you drink it all in. - The hotel has bowling alleys, tennis courts, comfortable beds, and other athletic facilities. Wanted: - Wanted: 50 girls for stripping machine operators in factory. - Wanted: Unmarried girls to pick fresh fruit and produce at night. - Wanted: Part-time married girls for soda fountain in sandwich shop. - Wanted: Chambermaid in rectory. Love in, 200 a month; References required. - Wanted: Girl to assist magician in cutting-off-head illusion. Salary and Blue Cross. - Wanted: Mother's helper, peasant working conditions. - Wanted: Widower with school-age children requires a person to assume general housekeeping duties. Must be capable of contributing to growth of family. - Wanted: 3-year-old teacher needed for preschool; Experience preferred. - Wanted: Man to take care of cow that does not smoke or drink. Services: - Our experienced Mom will care for your child. Fenced yard, meals and smacks included. - Ears pierced - while you wait! - Save regularly in our bank. You'll never reget it. - We do not tear your clothing with machinery. We do it carefully by hand. - Tired of cleaning yourself? Let me do it. Miscellaneous: - Now is your chance to have your ears pierced and get an extra pair to take home too. - Have several very old dresses from grandmother in beautiful condition. - Offer expires December 31 or while supplies last. - Stock up and save. Limit: one per customer - See ladies blouses. 50% off! - Sheer stockings. Designed for fancy dress, but so serviceable that lots of women wear nothing else. - Our bikinis are exciting. They are simply the tops! - Used Cars: Why go elsewhere to be cheated? Come here first! - Christmas tag-sale. Hand made gifts for the hard-to-find person. - Modular Sofas. Only $299 For rest or fore play - Auto Repair Service. Free pickup and delivery. Try us once, and you'll never go anywhere again. - Mixing bowl set designed to please a cook with round bottom for efficient beating. - Semi-Annual after-Christmas Sale. - And now, the Superstore - unequaled in size, unmatched in variety, unrivaled inconvenience. - We will oil your sewing machine and adjust tension in your home for $1. Radio Spots: - Ladies and gentlemen, now you can have a bikini for a ridiculous figure. - When you are thirsty, try 7-Up, the refreshing drink in the green bottle with the big 7 on it and the u-p after. - Tune in next week for another series of classical music programs from the Canadian Broadcorping Castration. - Illiterate? Write for free information. prose Sunday Morning by Jim Esch jmesch@artsci.wustl.edu The sunlight exploded as if someone had slashed the clouds with a giant machete, letting the sun burst out onto the ashpalt. It was a raw light that made every object appear brighter than it really was. The reflection off the chrome wipers blinded Frank for a moment, so that he almost missed the turn into the mini market lot. He gazed across the street, where Sunday dressed people filed out of a red brick Methodist church. Frank considered them. What made people want to get up with the sun, dress in their best, sit on hard benches, only to be put back to sleep by a boring preacher? Especially when you could be sleeping in a soft bed with wrinkled sheets? Frank kicked the door open, crawled from his olive Duster, squinted, and confronted the splendour of the day. His fingers dug into his flaky scalp as he turned to glance at the highway. Mustangs, he mused; how the design of Mustangs had changed over the years. He yanked some change from his fringed pocket, struggling to withdraw his fingers from the tight jeans. Although they were a comfortable pair of old jeans, the crotch creases became painful after a night's sleep in them. He looked at his reflection in the glass windows and found it a crummy sight, but what the hell; he was comfortable that way. He picked up a thick Sunday paper and thought about buying a butterscotch krimpet. From the counter he saw a creamy Chrysler New Yorker pull in beside his Duster. The giant door slowly swung open, and a short old man rocked himself out of the plush seat. Puffing slightly, he circled and opened the door for his wife. His ruddy face looked pressured, as if his tie was knotted too tightly or his belt cinched in a vain struggle to restrain his bulging belly. He was clean though, starched looking in his seersucker suit and shiny white loafers, every hair on his balding head wetted and combed into place. His wife clopped into the minimarket on treacherous black pumps, racing for the freezer section and some Heavenly Hash ice cream. The man stolled into the store, his head up, neck stiff, obviously convinced that he should somehow be in charge here. The very model of the mature male. Yet, his manner was teetering, almost uneasy as he entered the plastic realm of the minimarket/station, where you had to pump your own gas, pour your own coffee, wipe your own windshield, mix with the good and the bad. Frank watched them carefully. "Probably comin' from church," he thought. "They think they're so damn holy. Probably think the rest of us are heathens." Momentarily he felt embarassed by his appearance. The old couple left the store, ignoring him. Suddenly impatient, Frank grabbed his paper and krimpet, slapped the money down and rushed from the store. He revved the Duster and drove home. He passed the church, the lonely trees trapped in the highway's medial strip, the aluminum poles and the chain link fences. "This isn't so bad," he thought. Not bad to get up late when the sun is high. Just roll out of bed, pull on a sweatshirt, take a piss, then run up to the store for a paper. Not bad at all. Once home, he'd call Marrianne and maybe she'd come over. Maybe they'd watch the Eagles game together. It was a nice day to spend watching TV. Was church maybe like a spiritual fix? He thought of the church steeple as a giant, communal needle. All you had to do was go once a week, survive your shot for an hour, and then it was over. Maybe going to church was like insurance. Like it guranteed you a place in heaven, like a restaurant reservation. Maybe the more you went to church the better your chances of getting a good deal. Like a gaming table. Shrugging off these thoughts, he turned on the car radio and drummed on the wheel with the music. Frank pulled into Evergreen Court, grabbed the paper and krimpet cake, and entered his apartment. He looked around. Yesterday's paper lay in a scattered trail across the floor. The shag carpet smelled vaguely of dog's breath, but he didn't have a dog. The orange carpet didn't exactly coordinate decoratively with the puke-green sofa on which he often slept. Fragments of peanut shells were littered on the coffee table. Piled stinky dishes were overflowing from the kitchen. He was puzzled by the presence of his shaving cream and razor next to the kitchen sink. Then he noticed some clothes on the floor that were not his or Marianne's. He wondered about this momentarily, then turned away. He lay on the couch after flicking on the television, trying to decide whether to watch the Eagles pregame show or an Abbott and Costello movie. He probed the bag of cheese puffs left over from last night and munched reflectively. He'd call Marrianne soon, eat his krimpet, and if she came over they could clean the apartment. He threw an afghan onto the floor and chomped on some more puffs. Something smelled like sweaty feet. His thoughts turned back to Sunday mornings. He felt a need to be satisfied in some way. He wasn't sure that he'd make it into heaven at this rate. Rolling over, he thought about Marrianne. Her pretty face, how she looked in her prewashed denims. He thought again about the Eagles' chances and about Mustangs. The sun slit through the window and the heat made him doze. ...oh god from whom all blessings flow and jesus and holiest of holiest spiritual donuts fill me and fix me and let her be home today so she can come and clean and don't let her be mad at me let me make this church at home please don't mind if i don't look good or fancy or clean should i shower and shave or be hot and sweaty...would like grape soda and bacon if she comes over...so it isn't clean but the cat came over last night i gave him milk when he comes to the door...let Bertha be sick at work tomorrow please so we can take longer coffee breaks...oh holy on most high from above lifted so i can feel you here and now in the something...and tell me what she's thinking right now if she comes and then i'll know when i can move in with her but then...the coyote always loses to road runner, why?...but if he wins there won't be no story no more but let me win this time and please save me from what this is if...that smell in the kitchen whatever it is stays...then eagles today let them win and make me whole most goddest of all and from the i'll do good too and maybe not again...well maybe that's ok too once in a while like it hasn't hurt so far except sometimes i smell and the neighbors broke that window when you know Chris and his bloody hand on the rug left a stain, the prick but it's ok...please clean my car but the apartment first i think if she comes over we'll clean first then you know let me know what she's thinking and it doesn't matter and cheese puffs and grape soda, could go for them now and maybe i can move and then on our own, go hit the bars more and bigger parties and more concerts like maybe the Dead and the Stones hope they come soon please let them come soon I want to see the Dead come soon yes thank you lord thank you my dead thank you, blessed are the thank yous bless my dirty sould, amen.... He opened his eyes and squinted at the powerful sunlight seen through the blinds. Something good had certainly happened to him. He was warm and felt full. He turned on the Abbott and Costello movie and ate the remaining cheese puffs. He wondered whether Marrianne would come over and clean. He had faith that she would. He wiggled his toes and skimmed through the paper. Terrified, Lou began to wheeze and cried for Abbott. Frank laughed. He leaned back and mused about his chances for salvation. And they was good. < MISSING DAD - WHY DOGS BITE Ben Whitmer A hot day. A sloppy mean heat that holds the boy in check and keeps him low over his bicycle. He wipes at his forehead and hunkers down even lower, laboring for a current. An unpaved road. There are so many ruts that level neither begins nor ends. Around it lies vast fields of bone-dead grass, an occasional island of forest popping out of the void. The boy's wheels kick up an ever-winding trail of dust, mocking his small body. His eyes dart ahead, seeking out landmarks. A telephone pole or a driveway. Once he finds one he keeps his gaze set upon it, and then looks on for another. Anything to gauge his distance against. At times he rides with his eyes closed for a few seconds, sensing at the ground with his tires. His eyes pop open at the first true tremble of his bike and he laughs aloud. Other times he fixes his stare straight down on the road and watches it whisk past. The closer the ground he stares at, the faster it flies by. An old trick, and even as young as he is, it bores him quickly. And of course, just when he gives up on his destination, his farmhouse peeks up over the horizon. It no different than the others. The siding peeled back at the corners, the roof-tiles staggered just a little off pattern, the mail box leaning in a slow slant to the left. And of course, when the boy sees his home he concentrates all his energy on not acknowledging it. He focuses everything on the road ahead of him, rolling past the closest neighbor's with a burst of speed. And as such, the boy barely even sees the dog. He catches a sharp volley of black from beneath a battered Ford and then he is down, his bike straddling him. Just that quick, he is in the ditch, bitten. Dazed and swallowing dryly, the boy twitches his head around and finally fastens on the dog, which has returned to the truck's shade. The dog watches him quizzically through its fat, stupid eyes. The boy steady watches the dog right back, paralyzed beneath his bike. The dog snaps moronically at a fly. The boy heaves the bike up and jumps on. He pumps the pedals frantically and storms away from the driveway, glancing back after a good hundred yards to see nothing moving. Every muscle and joint in his body is quivering with adrenaline. His vision becomes precise on his house. He peddles in acute explosions until he can't peddle anymore. Then he coasts, regaining his energy for the next eruption. He swings down his driveway, casts his bike into the lawn, and crashes through the door. His mother glances up at him from the television. She has the remote control in one thick hand, a cigarette in the other. She stubs out the butt in an ashtray. "What happened to you?" she asks. She flips a couple channels through as she speaks. "Nothing," Joe says, "I got bit by a dog." Her attention flickers back and forth from the blood to the television. "Looks like you did," she says, hitting a lever on the side of her chair and reclining it. "MARK, GET DOWN HERE. THE BOY GOT BIT." Joe stands in the doorway, afraid to enter for the blood. He drops his weight on his wounded leg and presses down and the pain increases and increases until it is gone. Mark steps into the living room, tucking a T-shirt into his jeans. His hair is pillow-tossed, his beard on end and in need of a trim. "Well," he says, folding his arms across his chest. "You sure did get bit." Joe makes the mistake of taking his full weight off of the leg and it immediately begins to ache. Mark crouches in front of him and scrutinizes the hole in his jeans. "Drop your pants and let's see it." Joe hesitates. He clutches his waistline and glances tentatively at his mother. Her gaze is held unshaken, tuned into a talk show. The crowd is screaming. A man up on the podium shakes a fist at a woman whose every other word is being beeped. "C'mon," Mark says, "drop your pants." Joe unbuttons the shorts and lets them fall to his ankles. The air feels fresh on his genitals, he flushes deeply. "Damn," says Mark, staring his shriveled penis in the face. "You ain't got no clean underwear?" Joe shakes his head mutely. Smirking, Mark examines the four perfect punctures in Joe's leg. The wound is clean and puckered around the edges, less like a bite than something left by a precision instrument. He gets up and walks into the bathroom, leaving Joe there with his pants around his ankles. Joe watches his mother for any indication that she might look his way. He fixes everything he has on her. He knows better than to even blink. Mark brings back a bottle of iodine and a rag ripped from a flannel shirt. He holds the bottle against the rag and up-ends it. "This'll hurt," he says, checking Joe's face. Joe shrugs. "There you go," says Mark. He dabs at one of the holes with the rag and Joe shows nothing. "There you go," he says again, and cleans the punctures thoroughly, taking his time and working around the edges. Joe waits for the cleaning to begin to hurt, but it doesn't. He clenches his fists and unclenches them to show that he is in pain and taking it well. "That's it," Mark says, screwing the cap on the iodine. "Pull up your pants, I'll be right back." He takes the iodine to the bathroom, and then moves to the kitchen and Joe can hear him rummaging around the cabinets. Joe eases his pants up, glancing at his mother. If she was watching no sign of it shows on her face. He breathes a long breath and exhales it silently. "You got a squirt gun?" Mark asks from the kitchen. "YEAH," Joe yells back, too loudly. Mark chuckles. "Well, go get it." Joe dashes out of the living room and up the stairs. He takes a minute to compose himself and then shuffles through his room, digging through a stack of dirty clothes, peering under his bed. He finds the squirt gun, an imitation .45 in neon orange, buried in a stack of comic books. He runs it to the kitchen, puzzled by the request, but taking the stairs down three at a time. Holding a bottle of ammonia, Mark grabs the pistol and smiles. "We're gonna go find that dog," he said, filling the gun with ammonia. "It ain't gonna bite at you again." He pops in the plastic plug and thrusts forth the gun to Joe. Joe holds it awkwardly, wanting to fix it in his pants. He almost does so, but he thinks it would appear childish. "Put it in your pants, boy," Mark says. He steps out into the living room and in front of the television. "We're going out for a minute," he says. She tries to move around his legs to see the television, then she realizes more's expected of her. "Where to?" Mark winks outrageously at her. "I'm gonna teach Joe something about dogs," he says, and walks out the front door, Joe slagging behind. Walking isn't any different from riding, the boy just has to make the landmarks a little closer. He can feel the water pistol leaking in his pants. The ammonia stinking and dribbling slowly down his leg, he too nervous to rearrange the gun. Mark walks quickly, taking the road in long mean strides. Dodging the pot-holes gracefully in his steel-toed boots, swinging his arms up to take space. "Your mother loves you, Joe." With a quick sprint, Joe catches up to him. "She may seem overprotective, but she's a mother." He reaches into his Dickies, extracts a pack of Camel unfiltereds, and lights one with a match. "She forgets that you're about a man. You can't blame her for being concerned when you show up all bloody." "She seemed okay," Joe says. "Well, that's your mother. She has a hard time expressing her feelings." The boy's on an electric pole about a hundred yards away, watching it draw up. "Anyways, she thinks you need a man around full time." Mark picks a piece of tobacco off his tongue and flips it in the dust. "What do you think?" Joe shrugs. The electric pole moves up by his side and the house with the dog is the only next landmark. "Somebody needs to show you the ropes," Mark says. He stops and faces Joe. "I plan on being him." The boy can see the truck, he can even see the dog slavering between the front tires. "Good," he says. "Alright," Mark says, and regains his stride. "I'm glad you said that." They take the last fifty feet, and Mark stands in the driveway. "Is that the dog?" He points beneath the truck. The dog lolls its head lazily and stares out at them, its oily tongue hanging in the dust. The boy nods. Mark leads forward a few steps until they're within ten feet of the indolent mutt. "Take out that squirt gun," he says. The boy fumbles it out of his pocket and aims it ineptly at the dog. "You gotta squirt it in the eyes," Mark says. "Squirt it right in the eyes and it won't bite you again." The front door of the house slams open and a bald man in black jeans and no shirt steps out. He walks, barefoot and rippling with massive muscle, towards them. Tattoos squirm around his arms, and he swings an ax-handle at his side. "What the fuck are you all doing?" "Your dog bit my boy," says Mark, without looking up. The bald man treads up at Mark's shoulder and looks at the boy, his arms rigid and straight, clenching the water pistol. "So you're gonna squirt her?" "Gonna squirt her in the eyes with ammonia," Mark says. "Teach the mutt not to bite people." Crossing his arms, the bald man gives that some thought. "You squirt her in the eyes and you'll blind her," he says. Mark drops his cigarette in the driveway and grinds it out with his boot. "That's kind of the point." The boy has the gun down and is trying to keep from looking at either one of them. He concentrates on the dog and she concentrates back on him, an inane expression on her face. "Well you ain't gonna blind it," the man says, "that's for goddamn sure." "You're lucky I don't take my shotgun to the bitch." The man uncrosses his arms. "That'd be something else," he says, "but you ain't going to blind her." Mark doesn't look at him. "Joe," he says, "squirt that bitch straight in the eye." The boy clenches one eye shut. "Dogs bite," says the man. "They do that sometimes. Your boy been bit, I'll pay the doctor bill." "You squirt that bitch," says Mark to the boy. The man brings the ax-handle up, cocked. "Your boy squirts the dog and I'll bust your fucking skull." "You say," says Mark, "but he's still gonna do it." Joe glances away from the dog at Mark. Mark's eyebrows are drawn rough and he is staring across the fields at nothing. The bald man chokes up on his club. "Hit it in the eyes," Mark says. And that's all the boy needs. He squirts the ammonia straight into the dog's eyes. There's a huge and hollow crack and Mark is on the ground, holding his face, blood spurting around his fingers. His feet paw at the ground and dust flies at his heels. He rolls face down in the dirt and presses at his broken nose frenziedly. Screaming out strangled curses and for Joe to get the bastard. The bald man drops the stick low and looks long at Joe. Joe sticks the squirt gun in his pocket and hangs his head. "Go inside," the man says, clapping Joe on the shoulder. "The phone's in the kitchen." Joe ogles him like an idiot. Behind them the dog slams its head into a tree trunk, scraping and thrashing, trying to snag its eyes out. "Go boy," the man says, "call the dumb fucker an ambulance." He spits and shakes his head, a knowing half-smile washing quickly over his face. Mark's tantrum slows to a lulling sob. His hands still enclose his face but he no longer seeks out pressure points to halt the pain. He's just holding on, unable to relax his grip, knowing something might fall off. Joe steps over Mark carefully and moves for the door. His gut seizes with a laugh that could be hysterical. The dog hasn't got either of her eyes out, they're set too far back in the sockets. But there is a long streak of blood on the tree, and her forehead is rubbed completely raw. She gives up on the tree and digs with her paws, flopping fiercely in the grass. She can't figure out what is making her eyes burn like they are. Everything's moving in shadows and the last thing she remembers seeing is the boy and his ridiculous plastic hand. She lets out a faltering and mean howl. Which doesn't help at all. Ugly Sunday, 7 a.m. Laura Barcella Hadie LB@aol.com There is something sexy and liberating in looking ugly. In knowing your appearance so well, you are unashamed to admit when it is not up to par. It is a secret to revel in, looking horrible but knowing that it isn't the "real" you; knowing that people will look at you and judge you and make assumptions because your eyes are swollen and red, and last night's mascara has formed cloudy black circles under your eyes, and your skin is bland and lifeless and fatigued, almost blue with defeat. People look at you as you walk down the sidewalk towards the Metro, your hair tangled and wild, flying in lumpy strings behind your shoulders, with the wind. People see your clothes, black and rumpled and worn, smelling of deodorant and sweat, cigarette smoke, faded perfume which has sunk into the fabric of your collar, and someone else's spilled beer. Some make comments about your health, like the flower-selling man who informs you that "you don't look too good." He calls you Honey and pats your shoulder. People wonder about you. They wonder where you slept last night. All you notice when you glimpse your reflection in the storefront window is your mascara, which has slid and smeared below your eyes, making you look like a seasick beauty queen, and a proud and vulgar street kid, and a washed-out, burned-out prostitute, and a tough club chick who has danced all night, until the sweat dripped from her chin. You could be anyone. It is obvious that you have been someplace. The woman in the drugstore is rude to you when you buy candy and cigarettes. Maybe she is intimidated, or thinks youÕre a freak, or thinks your hair is too clumpy. Maybe she thinks you're a bitch- the looks you give to the world around you, the wary eyes you shift in directions. Maybe she is in a bad mood, or tired from last night, as you are. Old women and men think you are a "bad girl" as they inspect you with pity and distaste, clucking their tongues and shaking their heads, and adopting expressions of feeble innocence when you stare back. They watch you, dirty teenage girl inhaling from cigarette, and make comments to each other about how the youth of today have gone straight to hell. The three girls at the bus stop make the most dramatic production of your presence. As they watch you walk past, their laughter fades into weighted silence, and their eyes travel carefully over your body, breathing you in, then spitting you out with smirks and whispers. You lock eyes with one of the girls, and you cling to her gaze until you must turn away. Her eyes are as vague and cloudy as yours. You sense their eyes on your back as you walk away, and their banter resumes. You want to laugh because none of these people know you. Random moments, walking down the street, and no one has any idea who you are or where you come from or what you do, and why. You are mystery, untouchable and ominous, and so lonesome. Your eyes focus straight ahead, toward the glaring orange Metro sign, which silently offers the promise of home, and bed, and sleep. fish janet kuypers It's a pretty miraculous thing, I suppose, making the transition from being a fish to being a human being. The first thing I should do is go about explaining how I made the transition, the second thing, attempting to explain why. It has been so long since I made the decision to change and since I have actually assumed the role of a human that it may be hard to explain. Before my role in human civilization, I was a beta - otherwise known as a Japanese fighting fish. Although we generally have a beautiful purple-blue hue, most people familiar with different species of fish thought of us as more expensive goldfish. I was kept in a round bowl, about eight inches wide at it's longest point (in human terms, that would be living in quarters about 25 feet at the widest point). It may seem large enough to live, but keep in mind that as humans, you not only have the choice of a larger home, but you are also able to leave your living quarters at any point in time. I did not have that luxury. In fact, what I had was a very small glass apartment, not well kept by my owners (and I at that point was unable to care for it myself). I had a view of the outside world, but it was a distorted view. And I thought I could never experience that world first-hand. Previous to living anywhere else, before I was purchased, I resided in a very small bowl - no longer than three inches at the widest point. Living in what humans would consider an eight foot square, I had difficulty moving. I even had a hard time breathing. Needless to say from then on I felt I needed more space, I needed to be on my own. No matter what, that was what I needed. I lived in the said bowl alone. There was one plastic tree in the center of my quarters - some algae grew on it, but that was all I had for plant life in my space. The bottom of my quarters was filled with small rocks and clear marbles. It was uneventful. Once they put another beta in my quarters with me - wait, I must correct myself. I thought the put another beta there with me. I must explain, but please do not laugh: I only came to learn at a later point, a point after I was a human, that my owner had actually placed my quarters next to a mirror. I thought another fish was there with me, following my every motion, getting angry when I got angry, never leaving me alone, always taking the same moves as I did. I raced back and forth across my quarters, always staring at the "other" fish, always prepared to fight it. But I never did. Once I was kept in an aquarium for a short period of time. It was a ten-gallon tank, and I was placed in there with other fish of varying species, mostly smaller. I was the only beta there. There were different colored rocks, and there were more plastic plants. And one of the outside walls was colored a bright shade of blue - I later came to discover that it was paper behind the glass wall. Beyond the other fish, there was no substantial difference in my quarters. But my interactions with the other fish is what made the time there more interesting. I wanted to be alone most of the time - that is the way I felt the most comfortable. I felt the other fish didn't look like me, and I often felt that they were specifically out to hamper me from any happiness. You have to understand that we are by nature very predatorial - we want our space, we want dominance over others, we want others to fear us. It is survival of the fittest when it comes to our lives. Eat or be eaten. I stayed to myself most of the time in the aquarium; I occasionally made shows of strength to gain respect from the other fish. It made getting food from the top of the tank easier when no one tempted to fight me for the food. It was lonely, I suppose, but I survived - and I did so with better luck than most of the others there. Then one day it appeared. First closed off to the rest of us by some sort of plastic for a while, then eventually the plastic walls were taken away and it was there. Another beta was suddenly in my space. My space. This was my home, I had proven myself there. I was the only fish of my kind there, and now there was this other fish I would have to prove myself to. Eat or be eaten. I had to make sure - and make sure right away - that this other fish would never be a problem for me. But the thing was, I knew that the other fish had no right to be there. I didn't know how they got there, what those plastic walls were, or why they were there. But I had to stop them. This fish was suddenly my worst enemy. It didn't take long before we fought. It was a difficult battle, all of the other fish got out of the way, and we darted from one end of the aquarium to the other. It wasn't long until I was given the opportunity to strike. I killed the other beta, its blood flowing into my air. Everyone there was breathing the blood of my victory. Almost immediately I was removed from the aquarium and placed in my other dwelling - the bowl. From then on I knew there had to be a way to get out of those quarters, no matter what I had to do. I looked around at the owner; I saw them walking around the tank. I knew that they did not breathe water, and this confused me, but I learned that the first thing I had to do was learn to breathe what they did. It didn't take much time before I was constantly trying to lift my head up out of the bowl for as long as I could. I would manage to stay there usually because I was holding my breath. But then, one time, I went up to the top in the morning, they way I usually did, and without even thinking about it, I just started to breathe. I was able to keep my full head up out of the water for as long as I wanted and listen to what was going on outside my living quarters. Everything sounded so different. There were so many sharp noises. They hurt me to listen to them. Looking back, I now understand that the water in my tank muffled any outside noises. But beyond that, no one in my living quarters made noise - no one bumped into things, no one screamed or made noises. But at the time, all these noises were extremely loud. I then knew I had to keep my head above water as much as possible and try to make sense of the sounds I continually heard. I came to discover what humans refer to as language only through listening to the repeated use of these loud sounds. When I learned I had to breathe, I did. When I understood that I had to figure out their language, I did. It took so long, but I began to understand what they said. Then I had to learn to speak. I tried to practice under the water, in my dwelling, but it was so hard to hear in my quarters that I never knew if I was doing it correctly. Furthermore, I had become so accustomed to breathing air instead of water that I began to have difficulty breathing in my old home. This filled me with an intense fear. If I continue on with this experiment, I thought, will my own home become uninhabitable to me? Will I die here because I learned too much? I decided that I had no choice and that I had to ask my owner for help. I had to hope that my ability to produce sounds - and the correct ones, at that - would be enough to let them know that I am in trouble. Furthermore, I had to hope that my owner would actually want to help me. Maybe they wouldn't want me invading their space. Eat or be eaten. But I had to take the chance. One morning, before I received my daily food, I pulled the upper half of my body from the tank. My owner wasn't coming yet, so I went back down and jumped up again. Still nothing. I kept jumping, until I jumped out of the tank completely. I landed on the table, fell to the floor, coughing. I screamed. The next thing I remember (and you have to forgive me, because my memory is weak here, and this was seven years ago) is being in a hospital. I didn't know what it was then, of course, and it frightened me. Doctors kept me in place and began to study me. They sent me to schools. And to this day I am still learning. I have discovered one thing about humans during my life as one. With all the new space I have available to me, with all of the other opportunities I have, I see that people still fight each other for their space. They kill. They steal. They do not breathe in the blood, but it is all around them. And I still find myself doing it as well, fighting others to stay alive. SAM'S WAKE-UP CALL by DAVID McKENNA Matt is stunned by the white shoes with beige soles, shiny and unscuffed. Such an angel; her feet don't touch the ground. A far cry from the rowdy tramp lying outside Mort Grossbaum's deli with a bullet in her breast and a coat of filth on her bare feet. Even dead on the sidewalk, Samantha was a beauty. Here she's a wax dummy, but not as real. If Matt had his druthers, he'd build Sam a little shrine on the sidewalk, like the one dedicated to Bungalow Bill Mandel, South Street's most famous dead bar owner. Trinkets and other tributes, fresh flowers, photos to prove she was here, or at least appeared to be. More fitting, certainly more enduring, than a disemboweled body in a box, bloodless, lips sewn shut, a little hole in the chest and a big hole where her pierced heart used to be, both well-hidden from mourners. "She looks so healthy," Nina the bartender says, admiring the corpse. "It's an art," Grossbaum informs her, "and a science. These undertakers know their shit." Meanwhile, the ravages of time are working wonders on Grossbaum and the rest of Sam's former cronies. Bulging bellies and extra chins, bald spots and broken blood vessels are breaking up that old gang of theirs. Most are older than Sam was, and have wreaked havoc on their bodies for at least as many years. Not that it matters. The clock ticks on, and you can't turn it back with veggie burgers and vitamins, by starting the day with a leisurely jog or with slow-motion martial arts exercises that make you look like a mime in training. Good genes are a blessing but only delay the inevitable. Knowing how to dress can ease the pain, but looking like a slob was de rigueur with this crowd, and it's a hard habit to break. And life won't get easier, not with heart disease and dicks that don't work and decades of doctors' bills looming. At 33, Matt knows he's got the jump on this diverse bunch of freeloaders and free-marketeers brought together by the shabby allure of South Street. He scoped out the problem in advance, and glimpsed the solution while watching a multitude of cars swerve onto a fiery bridge to the stars that opened up just when gridlock was about to trigger a meltdown on South Street last week. A shift of psychic weight did the trick, putting distance between his life force and the dead meat of what most people call the here and now. Sam's corpse, for instance. The woman is gone - her body gave up the ghost, for God's sake - but her family has laid it out in a lily white box, in a veritable field of flowers, dressed up for an Easter egg hunt. All because their ancestors got scammed into believing Jesus was the Word made flesh who spoke in riddles and drank wine and presumably pissed on camp fires with his cronies in the wild. And suffered crucifixion and death, of course, so that priests could tell the flock, "If He could stand it, so can you. Quit bitching, pal." No sex - Christians have a tough time with that mystery - but a man nonetheless, this Christ of theirs, and an example for people who can't get past the notion that their bodies and selves are one and the same, inseparable in life and death, transcending both when their turn for resurrection comes. Matt takes his eyes off the corpse for a second as Mona appears with dirt on her hands and sweat glistening on her brow. She glances his way then leans over the casket, looking flustered. He sinks into his folding chair in the corner and almost cries out. Ugh, the woman he sleeps with is kissing a corpse. He wants to say, "Wake up, Mona," but it's OK. She is what she is, she'll wake up when it's time. Corky McCarren, South Street's poet and prophet, chastises the multitude. "It's just a bone machine, you fools," he shouts, grappling with Sam's dad and pushing the casket halfway off its tacky platform. He shakes off several mourners, pats the corpse's folded hands and bellows, "It's all used up. Matter don't matter, don't you see?" Matt remains seated, thinking no, they don't see. That's why the semi-mummified are dressed up and put on display - because those who survive them and still believe the scam, and even those who don't, like to think that God, when he gets around to it, will rip their caskets from the earth and raise their miraculously reassembled bodies to the great beyond, to bask in His glory and indulge, guilt-free, in fatty foods and reruns of "I Love Lucy." You want to look spiffy when He comes calling. Beam me up, Jesus. "The dead burying the dead," Corky shouts as Jumbo Jim, the bouncer from Bungalow Bill's, locks him in a wrestling hold and gives him the bum's rush, just as he did to Sam on those many nights when she got too rowdy even for Bill's. Mona exits soon after Corky is tossed out, much to Matt's relief. The last thing he needs is the burden of consoling her, not in the state he's in: out of time but in the moment, at a distance from the comedy unfolding before him and at the center of it, in a world of pure forms that defy the dictates of a unifying pattern. The white casket is soiled with Mona's handprint. The antiseptic aroma of flowers is cut with the odor of Corky sweating speed and booze. The corpse's feet now face the crowd, its head inches from Matt, who doesn't move a muscle as he rides a whirlwind of sensation, unable in this state to numb himself to the world beneath the surface of things. He can smell the shampoo on the curly hair, which the undertakers have arranged in little-girl ringlets, probably on Sam's mom's instructions. He can taste the tongue beneath the stitched lips and feel the power of her stiff legs squeezing him. No way you're pulling out, mister. Don't even think about it. He feels the same power watching skinny Nina, on the floor with her knees together and her arms around her thighs, rocking, as if she's sitting on something so powerful it's hard to control. Sam couldn't control it and wouldn't let go, especially when she knew Matt was holding the sort of drugs that would take her out of time. But Sam's not here, for she has risen - with a flash and a flurry of surprise. A gasp as the flesh fell to the sidewalk like the bag after the cat gets out. You don't need a gospel account or even a police report to know her ecstasy. "So who killed her, Matt?" says Grossbaum, assuming his Mongol warrior mode now that Corky has been kicked out. Matt looks up at him as Jim and Sam's dad straighten out the casket. "You tell me, Mort. You're the expert on everything." Grossbaum pulls a Camel from the pack in his breast pocket. "Don't try to shit me, I know." He grins like a man who knows a secret. Matt eyes him with split-second curiosity. Is it possible? "It's one of those pistol-packing bastards in the project," Grossbaum says. "You know, I know, the cops know, but nobody's gonna do a fucking thing about it." Matt laughs. "I count six guys in here who fucked Sam, or sold her drugs, or got high with her, or fought with her, or all of the above. And they're all white. You sure the killer's in the project, Mort?" Now Grossbaum laughs. "You liberals are all alike," he says, placing the cigarette in his mouth as he makes for the exit. Matt thinks yes, it's a good day to avoid sleep-walking sentimentalists who willfully distort the here and now. He stands and grabs his backpack, which is heavy with food and paperwork and other essentials. He'll go home and watch his favorite video, the one about a virus that turns everyone into mutant robot vampires. Everyone but Sam. She's out of time and well-distanced from the comedy, thanks to the pistol-packing bastard who woke her up. aids watch Argentine AIDS Hunger Strikers Rushed to Hospital BUENOS AIRES, May 27 (Reuter) - Two of 16 Argentine prisoners with AIDS on a hunger strike to push for early release from jail were rushed to a hospital on Monday, prison authorities said. The two had weakened considerably since the group began striking a week ago after the death of another inmate from AIDS in the Devoto prison in Buenos Aires, said officials quoted by the state-owned Telam news agency. Telam did not say what state the men were in. "We denounce abandonment and the death penalty in Argentine prisons for those sick with AIDS and we request human rights groups to take on the committment and act in defence of the victims of AIDS in Argentine prisons," the hunger strikers declared in a written statement on Monday. An Argentine judge recently ruled that prisoners in the final stages of AIDS should be released and the Justice Ministry has set up a commission to examine the problem of inmates with HIV, the virus that causes the disease. A new prison wing in Devoto is being prepared for intermediate-stage AIDS sufferers and President Carlos Menem will soon sign a decree to free 12 critically ill prisoners, said congresswoman Loly Dominguez, a commission member. Child Prostitution Spreads AIDS Among Haitians By Nicole Volpe PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (Reuter) - On Champ de Mars in the daytime, street kids buzz around a hotel making small change washing cars in dirty water or begging by holding their bellies and saying, "I'm hungry.'' They look destitute in their rags, some with unexplained limps or bulges in their skin. When no one with money is looking, they are still little kids. They hold onto car bumpers, laughing and sliding on ratty snakers. They joke around, dancing to music blaring from passing cars. Many of the kids, as young as 5 years old, have nowhere to go once the sun goes down, when cars and shoppers clear out and the gunshots start. "Sometimes I stay on this guy's roof,'' said one 9-year-old boy. "Or sometimes I find someone to let me stay at their house.'' Asked if he ever gets paid to stay with someone, he looked down, shrugged and walked away abruptly. According to Dr. Berthony Cherie, who runs a clinic and program for street kids, 99 percent of those above 8 years old who are on the street make some money as prostitutes. Thirty percent of kids tested at the clinic are infected with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, he said. "Sometimes they are picked up and brought somewhere, and other times there is a pimp,'' he said. ``Some of the kids are so young that they don't know what is happening to them.'' Natasha, who looks much younger than her 19 years, has been off the streets for three years. She had been studying hard to become a doctor, wanting to find a cure for AIDS, or at least help AIDS patients, before she becomes sick herself. After years as a child and then a teen prostitute, she tested HIV positive at Cherie's clinic three years ago. Cherie said the young woman must have contracted HIV in her final months, or even weeks, as a teen prostitute. Her first test upon entering his program was negative. "I was always afraid that these big men would beat me, as they sometimes would,'' she said. ``I was afraid to fight about condoms, or what I didn't want to do. People would get angry and they wouldn't pay you.'' Natasha said she was probably paid 25 gourdes, or about two U.S. dollars, for the trick that gave her HIV. AIDS has devastated Haiti, the poorest nation in the western hemisphere, with an HIV nfection rate estimated at 10 percent in the cities and 4 percent in the rural areas, according to 1992 statistics from the U.S. Agency for International Development. Although experts on infectious disease now say there was little truth to reports in the first years of the epidemic that Haitians were more of a risk group than people from many other nations, many prostitutes blame the conduct of visiting Americans in the early years of AIDS for spreading the disease in the Caribbean nation. Natasha is old enough to remember how, before a series of military coups that began in 1986, she had to know a few phrases in English to accommodate North American tourists. "I make you feel good,'' is the only one she remembers now. While child prostitution once was once blamed solely on Americans, Cherie said there seemed to be a Haitian demand that picked up after tourism dropped off about 10 years ago. "It's very difficult to find trends, because before 1970, it seemed though none of this existed in Haiti,'' he said. "At that point there were no laws against adult-child sexual relations, and doctors weren't suspicious when they found rectal hemorrhaging in boys,'' he said. Young boys, often forced by a pimp to be with as many as five men per night, take in $3 for each trick. But those who work with the children said the youngest boys usually do not see the money because street life is so new to them. "The youngest children are usually the newest on the street,'' said Natasha. ``Their mom died, or pushed them out to beg for money. They just want to fit in somewhere.'' Natasha said she was brought out to the street by older friends. She thought at the time it was better than her physically abusive mother. "The street didn't have anything good for me,'' she said. ''And now I really can't go back.'' AIDS Panel Demands Greater U.S. Effort WASHINGTON, July 8 (Reuter) - An official U.S. advisory panel said the Clinton administration, despite an unprecedented level of investment in the cause, had still not done enough to fight AIDS. This administration has clearly made an unprecedented and laudable investment of funding, human resources and genuine personal commitment,'' the panel said in a report. "However, when compared with what truly needs to be done, this administration's efforts are still insufficient...The time for increased commitment, along with moral and political courage, is now,'' it concluded. The panel, created by President Bill Clinton in June 1995 to advise the White House on key policy issues related to the deadly AIDS epidemic, on Monday released a "progress report'' on the administration's response to its earlier recommendations. It lauded the White House's backing for increased funding to provide health care for AIDS victims, its resistance to Republican proposals to dismantle Medicaid, and support for the Office of AIDS Research at the National Institutes of Health. But it called for more visible leadership and direct involvement by Clinton and his top officials, especially on prevention programmes, the rapid release of a national plan on AIDS and stronger support for needle exchange programmes. It also urged the administration to eliminate mandatory testing for HIV, the virus which causes AIDS, and discrimination in the military, the State Department and the Foreign Service. Clinton's top AIDS adviser Patsy Fleming issued a statement late Monday pledging continued support. "Clearly our job is not finished and it won't be as long as there is a single infection, a single diagnosis, or a single death related to this disease,'' she said. The panel said its first progress report was timed to coincide with the 11th international conference on AIDS in Vancouver, Canada. Doctors Worry AIDS Treatment Hopes Could Backfire By Sarah Edmonds VANCOUVER, British Columbia, July 11 (Reuter) - Drug treatments offering new hope in the fight against AIDS could backfire horribly if they are used improperly, creating fresh and dangerous strains of the virus they were meant to kill. Participants at this week's 11th International Conference on AIDS said the triple drug "cocktails'' - which can require patients to take numerous pills several times a day - may be both too expensive and too complex for key AIDS risk groups such as drug abusers and homeless people. "It goes without saying that if you don't know where your next meal is coming from, taking your next pill becomes very secondary,'' said Dr. Mervyn Silverman, former head of the American Foundation for AIDS Research. The new therapies, which in some initial studies have cut HIV to below detectable levels in patients' blood, have created a mood of optimism in Vancouver, with specialists saying AIDS may now be considered a treatable disease. But what frightens the medical community now is that sporadic or incomplete attempts at this kind of drug therapy could quickly turn the promise of the new ``cocktails'' into a curse, creating a new version of the AIDS virus invulnerable to treatment. "Are we going to see the emergence of a multi-drug resistant virus and go back to where we were in the 1980s where we had to just wring our hands because we could do nothing?'' asked Dr. Marcus Conant, head of the Conant Medical Group, a private clinic for HIV treatment in San Francisco. "You take a group of people, many of whom have never held down a job, have probably never finished school because they are not compulsive enough to get up at a certain time every morning and you expect them to follow this kind of complex drug regimen?'' he asked. Even a short lapse in drug treatment can allow the viral fire, which can now be doused by drug treatment, to rage anew, researchers say. And the new versions of the virus produced could mutate and become invulnerable to multi-drug therapy. This resistant strain is likely to be transmissable from one HIV sufferer to another - creating a new public health nightmare. There are studies which show that HIV resistant to AZT, the main drug so far perscribed for AIDS, can be passed between people and researchers believe it is very likely that a strain resistant to the new therapy could be transmissable as well. Because the much-touted drug cocktails, that involve AZT, the drug 3TC and a protease inhibitor, make sufferers feel better very quickly, the less-disciplined are likely to regard further treatment as unnecessary. "The anecdotal stories are incredible (about the drugs' impact) - people getting out of the grave and working out,'' said Silverman. Some specialists in Vancouver have suggested that the new therapies should be accompanied by "team'' care involving clinicians, social workers and others to make sure that the programme is followed completely. But Conant questions whether drugs should be given to people who might not follow through. "I think this arises as a real issue - should these drugs be given to people who are not compliant (with treatment)? Is society, which is now paying for these drugs, able to withold drugs from those who will not take them?'' Conant said. Argentine AIDS Hunger Strikers Rushed to Hospital BUENOS AIRES, May 27 (Reuter) - Two of 16 Argentine prisoners with AIDS on a hunger strike to push for early release from jail were rushed to a hospital on Monday, prison authorities said. The two had weakened considerably since the group began striking a week ago after the death of another inmate from AIDS in the Devoto prison in Buenos Aires, said officials quoted by the state-owned Telam news agency. Telam did not say what state the men were in. "We denounce abandonment and the death penalty in Argentine prisons for those sick with AIDS and we request human rights groups to take on the committment and act in defence of the victims of AIDS in Argentine prisons," the hunger strikers declared in a written statement on Monday. An Argentine judge recently ruled that prisoners in the final stages of AIDS should be released and the Justice Ministry has set up a commission to examine the problem of inmates with HIV, the virus that causes the disease. A new prison wing in Devoto is being prepared for intermediate-stage AIDS sufferers and President Carlos Menem will soon sign a decree to free 12 critically ill prisoners, said congresswoman Loly Dominguez, a commission member. Clinton Signs AIDS Bill Extension WASHINGTON, May 20 (Reuter) - President Clinton signed into law a five-year extension of the Ryan White programme, which provides federal grants to states, cities and civic organisations to care for people with AIDS. "This legislation offers hope for another five years. Let us all pray that no president will ever have to sign another (extension), because by then we will have found a cure for AIDS," Clinton said at a White House ceremony. Ryan White, for whom the programme is named, was an Indiana teenager infected with AIDS through a blood transfusion. White fought AIDS-related discrimination until his death at age 19. As he signed the bill, Clinton announced that the Health and Human Services Department would provide $350 million for care of AIDS patients in all 50 states and another $52 million to help victims of the disease buy drugs. Since 1981, more than 513,000 cases of AIDS have been reported to the government-run Centres for Disease Control and Prevention. AIDS is now the leading cause of death for Americans between the ages of 25 and 44. Equality of Sexes Would Help AIDS Fight By David Ljunggren ONDON (Reuter) - AIDS experts called for a broad-based campaign to fight the disease, saying more effort should be made to give women in the developing world more control over their sexual and reproductive lives. AIDS rates are highest in the countries of sub-Saharan Africa where prostitution is rife and women are traditionally seen as their husbands' property. "How long will it take us to solve this? It depends on how much we want it. A lot of it is education, education and more education and involves a change of mentality,'' said Alphonse MacDonald, chief of the U.N. Population Fund's European office. "I wouldn't dare to set a time frame. If we do not do something about correcting the imbalances between men and women, then we will not solve the problem and could waste a lot of money,'' he told a news conference. Pramilla Senananyalke, assistant director-general of the International Planned Parenthood federation, said the fight against AIDS was no longer in the hands of doctors. "If we had $50 billion we could provide the conditions to stamp out sexually transmitted diseases. Women have no control over their sexual and reproductive lives in many countries,'' she told the conference. Professor Michael Adler of Britain's National Aids Trust said 8,500 people a day worldwide were becoming infected with the HIV virus which causes AIDS. "One of the major things we have to do is raise the status of women to fight the spread of sexually transmitted diseases. This has to be done through education and employment. "But I think these changes in society will take a long time so I can't be optimistic,'' he said. Dr. Jose Llados of the U.N. Program on HIV and AIDS said money to fight the disease was dwindling. "Many donors are suffering fatigue and are unwilling to donate more resources. This is a problem we'll face more and more in the future,'' he said, adding that businesses could play an increased role. "In Latin America we are seeing a ruralization of epidemics. If we could persuade Coca-Cola to put an anti-AIDS message on their bottles this might help,'' he said. "We're not just talking about giving money, but seeing what kinds of resources businesses are willing to make available.'' Adler said there were more pressing reasons for the multinationals to chip in. "The private sector should get involved because it's losing money. Banks in countries like Uganda are losing out because AIDS is killing so many of the middle managers on whom they have spent money training,'' he said. AIDS Infection Stabilizing in U.S., But at High Level By Joanne Kenen VANCOUVER, British Columbia (Reuter) - The rate of AIDS infection appears to be stabilizing in the United States but ''at an unacceptably high level,'' with about one in 300 Americans carrying the lethal virus, according to Centers for Disease Control figures. Some groups are disproportionately hard hit. One in 50 black men - a stunning two percent of that population - is believed to be infected, compared to about one in 3,000 white women, the CDC study found. Between 650,000 and 900,000 Americans were infected with HIV, the virus which causes AIDS, as of 1992. That is up from the estimates of 400,000 to 450,000 in 1984. More than 325,000 U.S. residents had died of AIDS through 1994, according to official statistics. With roughly 50,000 more dying each year, that brings the death toll in the United States alone painfully close to the 405,000 U.S. military deaths in all of World War Two. "The number of Americans living with HIV increased significantly during the mid-to late-1980s and now may have stabilized, but at an unacceptably high level,'' said John Karon, at the CDC Division of HIV/CDC Prevention. Karon and his colleagues estimated that about half the HIV-infected people were gay or bisexual men, and about one-fourth were injecting drug users. About 15 percent became infected by heterosexual contact - often through a partner who injected drugs. "Fortunately the number of Americans living with HIV no longer appears to be increasingly rapidly, ad may even be declining in some groups,'' he said. "As a nation, we have made significant progress in slowing the spread of the epidemic,'' Dr. David Satcher, director of the CDC told a separate briefing in advance of the 11th International Conference on AIDS here in Vancouver. But with about 60,000 HIV-infected people developing AIDS each year, and 40,000 more becoming infected with the virus, ''there is clearly more to be done,'' Satcher added. Rougher versions of these statistics had been made public earlier, but the new report gives a closer look at the trends and at who is being hit worst by the epidemic. The latest CDC figures, released here before the AIDS conference, will be published next week in the Journal of the American Medical Association. That journal usually has fine art reproduced on its cover, but this special AIDS edition has a blank cover to commemorate the artists who have died and the books, paintings, and performances that will not be created. Karon's team of researchers concluded that about one in 300 Americans over age 13 is infected. Prevalence of the HIV virus is higher in men than women - one in 160 men versus compared to about one in 1,000 women, although the rate of increase is higher among women. Among men and women alike, blacks and Hispanics had higher infection rates than whites. For men,it was one in 50 blacks, one in 100 Hispanics, and one in 250 whites. For women,it was one in 160 blacks, one in 400 Hispanics, and one in 3,000 whites. AIDS Fear Fuels Demand for Sex With Children By Abigail Schmelz STOCKHOLM, Aug 28 (Reuter) - Fear of contracting AIDS from women is prompting some men to turn to children for sex, the head of the U.N. global AIDS agency told a conference on child sex abuse. Horrifying sex scandals involving children in Belgium and Finland burst onto world headlines as delegates pondered how to curb child abuse around the world. More than one million children worldwide are reportedly forced into child prostitution, trafficked and sold for sexual purposes and used in the production of child pornography, according to UNICEF figures. "The AIDS epidemic has become both a cause and a consequence of the trade in children,'' Peter Piot, executive director of UNAIDS said in a speech. "Men are looking out for younger girls because they are concerned that if they have sex with adult women then they are at risk for HIV infection,'' Piot told Reuters. Sex with younger partners as protection from HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, is an illusion, Piot told delegates from more than 100 countries at the first World Congress Against Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children. Many child prostitutes were infected and young people were actually more susceptible to infection than adults, he said. "Because of the physical disproportion between the partners, a child who is not fully grown is more easily torn or damaged by penetrative sex, and this makes it easier for the virus to pass into the child's body,'' Piot said in a speech at the conference. "And a child can't fight back, no matter how rough the sex or how long it lasts.'' About one million children are currently HIV positive or have AIDS. Most contracted the disease from their infected mothers, Piot said. Over two million children had already died from the disease, he said. Statistics showing the rate of HIV infection among child prostitutes were unavailable, but Piot said that very small samples indicated that as many as 50 percent of underage sex workers could have the virus. The Stockholm conference is jointly organised by the Swedish government, the United Nations Childrens Fund (UNICEF), the pressure group ECPAT (End Child Prostitution in Asia Tourism) and the NGO group on the rights of the child. Piot called for broader, urgent measures from governments and communities to end the sexual commercial trade of children. "Through income-generation, promotion of rural industry and education policies, governments can reinforce families' resistance to the lure of commercial gain through the sale of their children,'' Piot said. ECPAT executive director Amihan Abueva demanded airlines and the tourism industry join in combating the child sex trade. Sex offenders from western countries often travel to poorer countries where child prostitution thrives. Belgian police extended their search for bodies on Wednesday at a house owned by the chief suspect in the scandal of child kidnapping, porn and killing that has stunned Europe. Belgium was plunged into a state of shock 11 days ago after Dutroux led police to the bodies of eight-year-old friends Melissa Russo and Julie Lejeune in his garden. Buried with them was an accomplice Bernard Weinstein, whom he admitted killing. The lawyer of convicted child rapist Marc Dutroux, the man at the centre of the storm, refused on Wednesday to defend him, citing moral grounds. Finnish police said on Wednesday they had seized two computers and nearly 350 floppy disks at a Helsinki flat holding material including pictures of sadistic acts with children, torture, mutilation and cannibalism. Law enforcers there said they had no powers to arrest the suspect, a 19-year-old student, because under Finnish law distributing hard pornography is a minor offence. AIDS Product Can Cause Infection By Mike Cooper ATLANTA, Aug 22 (Reuter) - Federal health officials on Thursday said adrenal cortex injection, an alternative therapy used for AIDS patients and weight-watchers, had caused abscesses due to contamination with a rare bacteria. They also warned that the injection could be potentially life-threatening for people with weakened immune systems. In the past year, 54 people in Colorado and Wyoming developed abscesses where adrenal cortex injection had been administered, the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said. It said the product, which has not been approved by the Food & Drug Administration (FDA), was contaminated with bacteria that caused the abscesses. People who developed them were generally treated with antibiotics, but in some cases the abscesses had to be drained or surgically removed. Most of those who became ill had received injections as part of a weight-loss programme. The product has also been sold to ``enhance well-being'' in people infected with the virus that causes AIDS, the CDC said. CDC epidemiologist Michael McNeil said people with weakened immune systems were at particular risk from the unusual bacterium, which appears to have contaminated the product during its manufacture. "In someone who is otherwise healthy, it tends to cause localised infection,'' McNeil said. "In someone who is immuno-compromised, someone with AIDS for instance, it can spread via the bloodstream to infect many organs and may be a life-threatening infection.'' The FDA said drugs containing adrenal cortex extract or adrenal cortex injection have been marketed for many years but there is a ban on importing them. As far back as 1973, the American Medical Association said "there is no known medical use for this drug.'' It is important for doctors to be aware if a patient has used the product so that they can identify the bacteria and prescribe the most effective antibiotics, McNeil said. "This is a completely unapproved drug as far as the FDA is concerned. Were it an approved drug, it would be easy to know what's in it. The important message is that preparations labeled like this may be contaminated with this organism.'' Of 69 patients given the injections by a Colorado physician this year, 47 developed abscesses at the site of the injection, the CDC said. The CDC, FDA and several state health departments are investigating the product. People who develop abscesses after injection should stop using it and contact local or state health authorities, McNeil said. Vials containing the product were labeled "distributed by Hallmark Labs, Inc.,'' and did not have lot numbers or expiration dates, the CDC said. AIDS Researchers Hold Out Hope For Cure By Cynthia Osterman VANCOUVER, British Columbia, July 11 (Reuter) - AIDS researchers ended a global conference holding out hope that powerful new drug treatments might offer a cure for the deadly disease that has infected 28 million people. Dispelling more than a decade of despair, elated researchers presented evidence at the 11th International Conference on AIDS this week that potent drug "cocktails,'' including new medicines called protease inhibitors, can get the virus down to undetectable levels in the bloodstream. Capping the optimistic news, scientists from the Aaron Diamond AIDS Research Centre in New York said on Thursday that a triple-drug combination wiped out all signs of the virus that causes AIDS in the blood of nine patients. Those patients have stayed virus-free for periods ranging from three to 10 months. If the approach is proven to work, they might be cured in a year or two, said David Ho, one of the world's top AIDS researchers. "We've turned a page and opened a new chapter in the history of the pandemic,'' said Dr. Martin Schechter, co-chair of the conference. "Many things we once thought were impossible are now within the realm of the achievable.'' But mindful of past disappointments, sometimes caused by the virus' ability to change or mutate and thus outsmart the drugs, scientists were quick to note that there is still much they do not know about the human immunodeficiency virus. "We have a long way to go,'' Schechter said. ``It would be premature to start using the word 'cure' without caution.'' Repeating a central theme of the conference, Schechter also stressed that the price and complexity of the new therapies places them beyond the reach of much of the world. Still, advances announced here mark a startling breakthrough in the 15-year battle against the AIDS pandemic that has killed nearly six million people. "It holds out for the first time in 15 years the possibility of a complete cure of HIV infection,'' said microbiologist John Coffin of Tufts University. Introduced in the last six months, protease inhibitors block an enzyme crucial to one stage of the multiplication of HIV. Older drugs like AZT, part of a family of therapies called nucleoside analogues, attack the virus in an earlier stage of replication and the combination of the medicines appears to deliver a powerful one-two punch. Ho's latest study used in the test were Norvir made by Abbott Laboratories Inc. and the drugs AZT and 3TC from Glaxo Wellcome Plc . Merck & Co. also has a protease inhibitor, Crixivan, available and other promising inhibitors are in development. But Ho and his colleagues emphasised that they do not yet know how long people will have to take the drugs, which cost about $15,000 a year and can have unpleasant side effects. Some doctors suspect the therapy may have to be life-long but Ho said the most recent findings give him reason to believe that a year or two might be enough - but larger scale and longer studies are needed. "This is an experiment. No patient has been cured,'' he said. Still unknown is whether the virus can rebound once the drug treatment is stopped. The only way to find out is to halt the therapy. The Aaron Diamond scientists will know by September, at the end of one year's treatment, whether they can do so with their first volunteer. They must also investigate whether the virus hides in other parts of the body such as the nervous system even when it is eliminated from the bloodstream and lymph nodes. If so, the disease will be much harder to eradicate. "This will begin to tell us the feasibility of eradication and that is the major goal,'' said Ho. AIDS Seen Undermining S. African Employee Benefits CAPE TOWN, South Africa (Reuter) - South Africa is following the rest of sub-Saharan Africa into an AIDS crisis and the epidemic is going to force a radical review of employee benefits, a life assurance expert said Monday. "Our worst-case scenario is that we follow the rest of sub-Saharan Africa and I think we are on track to do that," Metropolitan Life senior general manager Peter Doyle told a conference of pension fund administrators. He said the Department of Health's annual ante-natal survey indicated an average national HIV infection rate of 10.4 percent at the end of 1995, with a peak of 18.2 percent in KwaZulu-Natal province. HIV is the virus that causes the deadly Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS). He said 10,000 AIDS cases had been reported by the end of last year, but his company estimated that the true figure probably was closer to 30,000. "The epidemic is very well established and the prospect now is that it could reach higher levels in South Africa than it has in other African countries," Doyle said. "By the year 2000, we could have in the order of 200,000 Aids cases in South Africa." He said the nation's relatively sophisticated transport network contributed to the spread of the disease, which showed peak infection levels amongst people aged from 22 to 35. Doyle said South African employers, insurers and labor unions would have to negotiate a response to the epidemic, which threatened to collapse the existing pension and employee benefit schemes. "Whereas in the past, the bulk of benefit claims came later in life, with AIDS it comes plumb in the middle of the working years," he said, adding that proportion of insurance claims based on illness was rising in relation to deaths. Clinton Signs AIDS Bill Extension WASHINGTON, May 20 (Reuter) - President Clinton signed into law a five-year extension of the Ryan White programme, which provides federal grants to states, cities and civic organisations to care for people with AIDS. "This legislation offers hope for another five years. Let us all pray that no president will ever have to sign another (extension), because by then we will have found a cure for AIDS," Clinton said at a White House ceremony. Ryan White, for whom the programme is named, was an Indiana teenager infected with AIDS through a blood transfusion. White fought AIDS-related discrimination until his death at age 19. As he signed the bill, Clinton announced that the Health and Human Services Department would provide $350 million for care of AIDS patients in all 50 states and another $52 million to help victims of the disease buy drugs. Since 1981, more than 513,000 cases of AIDS have been reported to the government-run Centres for Disease Control and Prevention. AIDS is now the leading cause of death for Americans between the ages of 25 and 44. Counseling, Condoms Cut AIDS Among Couples WASHINGTON, Aug 26 (Reuter) - Low-tech solutions such as counselling and free condoms have a good chance of keeping the heterosexual partners of AIDS patients from getting infected, the National Institutes of Health reported. Citing a study of 475 Haitian couples in which one partner was infected with the AIDS virus and the other was not, the institutes found that nearly half of the sexually active couples who got counselling and condoms practised safe sex. In addition, the rate of new infections with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, among couples who consistently used condoms was one-seventh as high as it was among those who did not, according to the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, part of the NIH. Europe Drug Approval Too Slow, Activist Says VANCOUVER, British Columbia (Reuter) - European AIDS activists appealed to the European Commission to speed up its drug approval process, accusing bureaucrats of killing people with delays. Organisers of the 11th International Conference on AIDS invited the European AIDS Treatment Group on stage to make an appeal directly through the conference's main plenary session. "The European Commission has no sense of urgency with regards to getting new AIDS drugs to patients,'' said Raffi Babakhanian of the European AIDS Treatment Group. He directly addressed Irish Health minister of state Brian O'Shea, whose country currently holds the rotating European Union presidency. O'Shea chairs the EU Council of Health Ministers. "Mr O'Shea, I am asking you to pick up the phone and tell the Commission to get its act together,'' Babakhanian said. ''Because killing time is killing people.'' Babakhanian complained that AIDS drugs such as 3TC (Glaxo Wellcome's Epivir), Indinavir (Merck's Crixivan), saquinavir (Hoffman-LaRoche's Invirase) and ritonavir (Abbott Laboratories' Norvir) had all been approved by the European Medicines Evaluation Agency (EMEA) in London, but that the Commission had not given final approval. The drugs have been found to suppress the HIV virus when used in a combination therapy. The EU has 90 days to act on EMEA recommendations. Cure For AIDS And Cancer Hunted for in Jungle By Paul Majendie IX CHEL FARM, Belize, Aug 26 (Reuter) - Deep in the heart of a Central American jungle, botanists have spent almost a decade hunting for elusive plants that could provide a cure for AIDS and cancer. After nine years scouring the rainforests of Belize, they have collected 3,000 plants for research. Just 15 of those may possibly provide the vital clues needed to combat two of the biggest killers of the 20th century. Even though it is a medical race against time to save millions of lives, patience is needed as U.S. scientists back in Washington sift through the mountains of evidence collected by herbologist Rosita Arvigo and her team of seven plant detectives. "We sent in 3,000 plants. About 1,000 have been tested and 10 to 15 are showing hopeful promise in the early laboratory stages,'' said Arvigo who runs the unique Ix Chel Farm that is named after the Mayan goddess of healing. But this pioneer of alternative medicine steadfastly refuses to name the promising plants before the research is completed. Wary of raising false hopes for patients who might try them out of sheer desperation, she said: "Most of these plants are toxic. Take too much and you would die of liver damage.'' Arvigo came to Belize in 1976 from Chicago because she and her husband were ``looking for medical freedom, racial harmony and a year-round growing season.'' They carved their farm out of hillside jungle near the Guatemalan border and set up the facility devoted to researching the healing powers of tropical plants. She spent 10 years apprenticed to a locally venerated medicine man, Don Elijio Panti, absorbing how he unlocked the secrets of the jungle to heal the sick. "I asked him to teach me. He said 'No'. I spent a year gaining his confidence. He finally agreed to teach me if I promised not to leave,'' said this soft-spoken but fiercely determined woman as she spoke lovingly of her mentor who died in April aged 103. She has a simple message to the 10,000 people who visit the centre every year and take the ``medicine trail'' she has created in the forest to highlight the richness of its healing powers: "Stand up for your roots because the forests of the world are worth more standing than destroyed.'' Arvigo points out that less than one percent of the planet's 250,000 plants have been analysed and yet they have produced 25 percent of all prescription drugs from the quinine used to combat malaria to the periwinkle flower extract used in birth control. "Why should man reinvent the wheel? Nature has the molecules. We have to find them and put them together,'' she said. She made a perfect medical match when meeting researcher Dr Michael Balick from New York's Botanical Gardens. It was he that provided the National Cancer Institute funds for the massive nine-year plant hunt. Both as environmentalists and medical pathfinders, the team was racing against time becaus Mayan farmers traditionally use slash-and-burn techniques to clear rainforests to grow their crops. The funds from the U.S. Congress ran out too, leaving a bitterly disappointed Arvigo who believes another 2,000 plants could be collected in Belize for possible research. The 3,000 they did find were sent to Washington where the real detective work began. "They lay out on a lab plate 100 living cancer cells in human tissue and two different HIV viruses that cause AIDS. A drop of leaf extract is put on every single cell,'' Arvigo explained. "They are set aside for 24 hours. The whole shelf is put into a computer and flooded with light. If there is any change, that is considered a million to one hit,'' she said. Arvigo, who is now researching the plants of the indigenous Garinagu people and supplying medicinal extracts for American cosmetic companies, said of her grand project: "I just wish we had more time to finish.'' The work was tough. Arvigo said: "You had to climb to the top of mountains and clamber through anthills. But we kept saying each time this might just be the plant. That made us work all the harder. The weight of the world is on our shoulders. It is a great responsibility.'' But it is a 10-15 year process bringing the plant from the jungle through the laboratory tests to success and synthesis. Patience is vital and Arvigo constantly bears in the mind the words of her mentor Don Elijio Panti: "For every ailment on earth, the spirits have provided a cure. You just have to find it.'' AMA Wants to Help Doctors, Patients Discuss AIDS VANCOUVER, British Columbia (Reuter) - In an ambitious bid to help doctors and patients talk about AIDS prevention, the American Medical Association said it is sending out a new guide to every U.S. family practitioner, internist, pediatrician and gynecologist. Portions of the explicit guide, like a section on how drug users can sterilize needles, may prove controversial. But Dr. James Allen, an AMA public health expert, said the goal is to keep the patient from getting AIDS while also trying to get the person into a drug treatment program. "If you can reduce the medical risk while trying to get the patient into treatment... that is a helpful step and a bridge position to a continuing dialogue with that patient,'' he said in an article appearing in next week's edition of the Journal of the American Medical Association. The AMA released the guide here during a day-long series of briefings in advance of the 11th International Conference on AIDS starting in Vancouver Sunday. AMA officials said they hope to get copies out to 200,000 U.S. physicians by the end of the year, with support from the Henry J. Kaiser Foundation. The guide is aimed at helping time-pressed family doctors quickly assess risks facing each individual. "Patients want to discuss their sexual concerns with their physicians,'' Dr. Nancy Dickey, chairman of the AMA board of trustees,told reporters. "It is important that physicians incorporate screening for risk behavior in the histories they take of their patients. While some are doing a great job of this, others are not,'' she said. The guide stresses that health care workers must avoid ''verbal and nonverbal'' messages that convey philosophical, religious or moral views about intravenous drug use or sexual behavior that raises the risk of contracting the HIV virus that causes AIDS. Such messages can have "a chilling effect'' on a patient's willingness to share personal information. Physicians are more effective by ``expressing acceptance of the patient while challenging unaddressed risk-taking,'' according to the 20 HIV experts that wrote the guide. Up to 900,000 Americans are believed to carry the HIV virus, and more than 325,000 had died through 1994, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control. Worldwide, there are about 21.8 million infected people, according to the latest estimates from the World Health Association. FDA Approves Urine Test for AIDS By Andrea Orr LOS ANGELES, Aug 6 (Reuter) - The Food and Drug Administration approved the first urine test for the AIDS virus, which should boost testing for the virus in developing nations and where blood testing is inconvenient. HIV, the human immunodeficiency virus, is usually diagnosed from blood samples, and occasionally from saliva. Calypte Biomedical Corp.'s urine test "makes testing safer, easier and more accessible compared to traditional methods," Darrel Cummings of the Los Angeles Gay and Lesbian Community Services Center, an HIV testing center, said in a statement issued by Calypte. It "holds particularly important promise for developing countries ... where access to specially trained health professionals and clean needles for drawing blood is not always available," added Dr. Luc Montagnier, a member of Calypte's scientific advisory board. The new test detects antibodies to HIV-1, the form of the virus which causes the vast majority of U.S. cases of acquired immune deficiency. Calypte plans to make the test available immediately. Calypte, a Berkeley, Calif.-based developer of urine-based tests for a variety of sexually transmitted diseases and other illnesses, said the new HIV test will be especially beneficial in settings where blood testing is inconvenient, including prisons and the military. For that reason, it said it was unsure whether its new test would take business away from the many companies that make blood-based tests. "The (blood) tests are primarily used to to screen blood that is being donated or being transfused," said Calypte President Jack Davis. "We think our test will be used in different settings." The company said, however, that the test will also be made available to doctors in public health clinics, hospitals and private practices. Patients being tested will simply provide a urine sample in a plastic cup. Davis said he suspected many patients would prefer that means of testing over giving a blood sample. But he acknowledged that the the urine test, while more than 99 percent accurate, was not as reliable as blood tests. "Blood tests will result in one false positive or one false negative result per thousand people tested," said Davis. "The urine test will yield five to 10 false results per thousand." He added that the sensitivity of the urine test varied depending on the population being tested but was at least 99 percent accurate in all cases. The test underwent clinical trials involving 298 people diagnosed with AIDS who underwent both Calypte's test and a blood test for HIV, the FDA said. The FDA said in a statement that if a urine sample tested positive it would be retested and that even a second positive result would have to be confirmed with a blood test. The agency also said Calypte's test was not approved for screening blood donors for HIV-1. Like a saliva-based test recently introduced by Oregon-based Epitope Inc. , Calypte's urine test works by detecting HIV-fighting antibodies, rather than the virus itself. AIDS experts say this means of testing can be highly accurate, but that the accuracy depends partly on the timing of the test since antibodies appear in larger quantities at certain times after the disease is contracted. Calypte will sell the test as the Calypte HIV-1 Urine EIA, while Seradyn Corp. of Indianapolis will sell it as the Seradyn Sentinel HIV-1 Urine EIA. Stock in Calypte, which went public in late July, soared $2 to close at $9.625 on the Nasdaq market. Female Condom Draws Interest at AIDS Conference Studies Find Acceptability High; Less Unprotected Sex When Female Condom CHICAGO, Aug. 5 /PRNewswire/ - More than 20 studies presented at the recent XI International Conference on AIDS involved the female condom, ranging from a strong supportive discussion by Dr. Christopher Elias of The Population Council at a plenary session, to Dr. Erica Gollub's oral presentation on the encouraging initial findings of her ongoing work at the Philadelphia Department of Public Health, to additional research which explored various aspects of the need for a female condom, its efficacy and acceptability. Some 15,000 delegates attended the biennial conference. One message remained constant throughout all of the research: There is a dire need for access to woman-controlled prevention methods; and the female condom, as the first such viable option, should be included in all safer-sex prevention messages and programs. The studies that focused primarily on the female condom showed that when educated about its use, women and their partners across all studies were eager to try it. Once they did, acceptability was high. Sixteen studies focused on acceptance and use of the female condom by women and their partners. Attitudes before and after using the female condom were compared. Following are highlights from findings of several studies: - "Among women who were presented a hierarchy of choices for prevention methods, 86 percent chose the female condom, resulting in an overall reduction in the number of unprotected acts of intercourse." Gollub et al., "The Women's Safer Sex Hierarchy: Initial Responses to Counseling on Women's Methods of STD/HIV Prevention at an STD Clinic," Philadelphia Department of Public Health. - "Baseline percentage of female condom use during last intercourse doubled ... at follow up." Perry et al., "Perceptions and Use of the Female Condom Among Inner-City Women," Medical College of Wisconsin, Milwaukee. - "Almost all women liked the female condom very much or fairly well (90-100 percent for prostitutes, 90 percent for urban women and 100 percent for rural women)." Kiragga et al., "Acceptability of Female Condom in Uganda" Mulago Hospital, Kampala, Uganada. The studies, none of which were funded by The Female Health Company (AMEX: FHC), were conducted in 13 countries, and contribute to the development of the global public sector market, a key objective for The Female Health Company. The Female Health Company, based in Chicago, is dedicated to developing unique health-care products for women. It owns the worldwide rights to the female condom, including patents which have been issued in the U.S., Japan, the European Union, Canada, Australia and China, and a state-of-the-art manufacturing facility in London, England, involving proprietary processes and equipment. CO: Female Health Company ST: Illinois poetry scrooge madonna lyn lifshin picks off reindeer from a roof with a telescopic lens, cheers her city being number 1 in suicide over the holidays wishes you gut rot, not good champagne out side the Salvation Army that your biopsy comes back positive drink Drano she belches you make less in a year than I do a day, she takes your Mary out of Xmas hopes you open, not presents but your vein TOP GANGSTER cheryl townsend impetus@aol.com You bring out the top in me lay you down submissive as a virgin watch your face reveal fantasies as I control fulfillment or dismay I can see my tits Einsteining my squats I can watch the muscles in my thighs my hands can feminize you as I raise your nipples to mine I can smother you under my weight flat against your compliant flesh I'm a macho bitch and you'll take it then I'll hold you in my arms as we sleep ginger shows up ray heinrich ray@vais.net ginger shows up on her boyfriend's motorcycle says her mom is up to herself again and i guess i have to help which will piss off my wife cause she's guessed what i never told her but i hop on arms around her waist trying not to act like i feel her breasts with each bump in the road and thinking of when i used to bathe her of those sweet lips between her legs BREAKFAST AT DENNY'S Stephen W. Brodie SWBrodie@aol.com Bringing the wispy digits to his face, he leans back on the counter next to the young couple waiting to be seated. "I'll be with you in a moment," he says, wheezing slightly as he draws another breath, and lets out a patient sigh. He stares at the payphone on the wall across from him, remembering the day that he called his mother to tell her that he was sick, and how his father had hung up on him. That was the last time he spoke to either one of them. Now he is all alone; but he knows that this is as it should be. The phone rings. He looks up from sweaty palms and reaches for it, but it only rings once. He turns to seat the couple waiting beside him, only to find that they have since gone. Later, at home, he brushes his teeth, preparing for bed, and stares at his reflection in the mirror before switching off the light, disgusted. He shuffles off to bed, slips gently between the sheets, and cries himself to sleep, again. DADDY'S LITTLE GIRL Stephen W. Brodie SWBrodie@aol.com It was raining. And Mommy was away on business. Again. And in the darkness of her own room, she heard Daddy's familiar voice. Felt his closeness, his warmth around her. On her. Yes. I love you, Daddy. Then she bit her lip so as not to cry. Daddy hated it when she cried. He liked her to whisper sweet things in his ear. He said she was special. Was she? She wasn't sure. She wanted to make Daddy happy and she knew that he was happiest when they "cuddled". He said that when you love someone, you sometimes have to do things that you may not want to do, to make them happy. And of course she loved her daddy. So she grew to accept these special moments, here in the dark, just Daddy and her, even looking forward to them at times. And she would smile, and whisper sweet things in his ear, and he would be happy. So she was happy too. And when he had gone to sleep, she lay awake in bed, whispering those four words over and over to herself... I love you, Daddy. I love you, Daddy. Wondering what they meant. CHRISTMAS, 1987 Stephen W. Brodie SWBrodie@aol.com He had asked his mother before. Many times. Yet he always got the same answer, that strange vacant stare that never seemed to be directed at anything in particular. Right above his left ear, he thought. But he couldn't be for sure. Then, after a few moments of silence, she'd return to her household chores like nothing ever happened. Johnny was thirteen years old. A man. And he had a right to know. After all, how can you be a man without knowing the truth? After school, before his mother had gotten home from work, he would sneak into her room and look through her bureau drawers. Not sure what he was looking for. Never finding it, either. But still he looked, every day, as if one day whatever it was would appear there. And again, he'd ask his mother. Until one day. Christmas was approaching. And he wanted to surprise her by decorating the house. He climbed up into the attic to search for the box marked X-Mas'. He'd never been up in the attic before. Mother always got the box down for him. But he was a man now. As he peered around the attic, he spied the box. He approached it. And as he stooped down to retrieve it, he looked up, noticing another box in the corner under a blanket of dust. It read Jonathan's Things'. His childhood curiosity drew him to it, wondering what could be inside this box with his name on it. He opened it. Inside were a few articles of clothing, a handful of envelopes rubber-banded together, and a silver chain bearing the word DADDY'. Underneath, he found a stack of photographs. His heart raced. He gazed at the faces. His mother. A baby. A young man he'd never seen before. And he knew. Just then he felt a hand on his shoulder. He turned to see his mother's reddened face, eyes filled with tears. He asked her. She looked him in the eye and said, "He died soon after you were born, sweetheart. I just didn't know what to say. I still miss him so much." Johnny hugged his mother and squeezed her tight. Tears of pain and relief covered the box in salty pools of dust as a great burden was lifted. Together, they decorated the house in anticipation of a joyful new holiday season. And Johnny put a star atop the tree. Said a prayer. And wished his father a Merry Christmas. Molly Conway The Borderline Split light become darkness sink hole, quick sand devil in your face hot rage abandoned old house state hospital bodies in a concentration camp rounded, stooped shoulders tight, drawn face overwhelming panic dull eyes black brains a funeral march falling into space old tapes and ancient messages paranoia hot tears dew drops on a velvety rose petal the scent of cholcolate chip cookies baking children hunting Easter eggs graduation day a newborn fawn Kisty saying I love you Gramma a son hug Zek purring receiving a surprise gift angels singing baby's first words a crystal chandelier wind chimes Horowitz playing the piano things all neat in tidy rows laughter of children a piece of pure poetry michael estabrook MEstabr815@aol.com Gravestone Grandmother's unmarked grave a barren battlefield. not good remaining for eternity as a casualty buried in an unmarked battlefield, simply because you're a suicide. Mother and her sisters say "couldn't afford no headstone" back then. But what about now, retired, living off the fat of the land, playing golf, sunning themselves like aging lizards on a rock. michael estabrook MEstabr815@aol.com my father-in-law used to brag all the time about how he hadnÕt yet turned gray, and I never quite understood being proud of such a thing. But now that IÕm bumping-up against 50 I get it. MOVING IN TANDEM Richard Fein bardbyte@chelsea.ios.com As a school of fish; each one sensing the feather-pressure caused by even the minutest of one another's movements, then responding, creating an undulating choreography of silver streamers that skirt, dazzle, and frustrate any outsider who would knife into their midst, then regrouping and resuming the linear harmony, we two also move forward. We both possess a kind of lateral line embedded in our skins. We sense the slightest waver of mood, and we know when to approach and when to veer apart, Our movements have such a synchrony that any onlooker is deceived that he is beholding a tandem traveling of great liquidity. i want by janet kuypers i want a big house with filtered central air and i want a big lawn so i can recreate nature and i want a big fence so i'll know what's mine and i want the evergreens trimmed into neat little balls, because it has to look neat. plant everything in a row. and i want to spray chemicals on my lawn to keep the dandelions away *** and i want a plastic lobster bib over my fancy dress at the fancy restaurant and don't forget the hundred dollar champagne and i want a big fat car, and i want someone else to drive it and i want the two kids, one boy, one girl and i want a nanny to take care of them for me i want to be famous i want everyone to love me i want it i want it all Everyday Blasphemies Jennifer King vern@netxpress.com 73513.1322@compuserve.com Last week my sister called, confined and lonely from her backwoods Virginia town. She was attending Mass again, she said, missing the solace of a Sunday journey, and anyway it was that or the Methodists. I pictured her, still unbaptized, strolling casually through the Communion line, tonguing the Host like a hit of acid as our renegade aunts had taught her. Her new roommates were scandalized. But I simply sat there, remembering the stone Mary who stretched her arms across my grandmother's gardens, defending against earthy sins. The weeds strung themselves around her like homegrown Christmas lights, scraped away at Easter, at the renewal of the daylight season. And I remembered another aunt, willed to the church at birth, who returned yearly to swim in her sister's pool, borrowed shirts draping and sticking to her body. Her superiors preferred this public exposure to our family, after we descended once too many times on the tiny Queens convent. My cousins and I were reprimanded that year for racing retired nuns down convent hallways; the Mother Superior heard the wheelchairs squeaking from the chapel. Sisters, dancers, swimmers alike - all Catholic by compromise, women committing defiance, or revision. Converting ruse into ritual, we sought ourselves in every separate stance and pact, slowly becoming holy, unofficially, and by degrees. ginger writes me ray heinrich ray@vais.net the words fall one after the other put there by ginger by you if you're ginger one after the other with the picture you enclosed of your daughter and of course you would name her ginger too the ginger that lived with me from a child of 4 to 6 while you were off for holding those drugs a long time ago but ginger came through just fine and at 22 she looks like you same hair and nose and all the soft pieces fit together so i can't help thinking maybe it's you again Heart Break (c) 1995 By Paul L. Glaze Poetaster @Aol ,Com Her Heart Was Broken, Its Contents Shattered. He Destroyed Her, With Lies He Scattered. A Nefarious Life, He Secretly Lead. In Her Sweetness, His Cruel Heart Fed. She Gave Him Control Of Her Being. While Other Women, He Was Seeing. His Love Was Loose, His Morals, crass. She Knew nothing of his amorous past She Loved Him With Body And Soul. Her Very Life, He Had Control. Women Were His Ardent Slaves, In Fulfilling His Sexual Craves. She Knew Of His Dark History. This Was Part Of His Mystery. He Said His Past Was Over And Done. She Was His Faithful And Only One. He Was Caught In His Malicious Lies. Causing Her Jealousy And Despise. He Was With Another, Now Fast Asleep. Into Their Chests, Her Bullets Went Deep. She Stood Before Her Lover Untrue. He Met His Fate Before It Was Due. She Placed The Gun To Her Head. And Quickly Shot Herself.....DEAD ! H O R S E & C A R R I A G E By Paul L. Glaze We Should Miss Those Days Of The Come What Mays. Summer Evenings At The Park. Bands Would Play After Dark Life Then Was Not A Maze, Music Plays On Sunny Days. And The Horse And Carriage Was The Latest Craze. Life Was A Joy, With Great Pride. A Man Takes His Loving Bride. They Ride In Their Carriage. Over Hills With Thrills They Glide, Around And Down To Countryside. These Days Are Forever Gone Deep Within Our Heart, They Do Truly Belong. And In Our Mind, We Will Find, They Will Always Have A Home. ~ I Love You ~ "I Love You", Burns My Heart In Claim. "I Love You", Churns Its Burning Flame. To Love You, In The Sunlight Bright. Then Love You, Thru Each Starry Night. I'll Love You, From A Mountain's Crest. For Loving You, Is My Earthly Quest. "I Love You", Flies On An Eagle's Wing "May I love you", Two love birds sing. "I Still Love You", Sounding Waves on Shores "I Must Love You", A Bounding Ocean Roars. "I Have Loved You", As My Love Imparts "True Love", Cries My Heart Of Hearts I Will Love You, In So Many Ways "I Love You", Echoes my soul in praise, "I Will Always Love You", ...........The Rest Of My Days! (C)1995 Paul L. Glaze Poetaster@aol.com DOWN THE DRAIN Kurt Nimmo knimmo@mail.ic.net First, I went to the cabinet and dragged out the booze. There was half a bottle and I poured it down the drain. There goes more goddamn money, I thought. Everything is money and war and misery. Next, she came out of the bedroom. She was drunk. Where's the checkbook, I asked. She looked at me with drunk eyes, said nothing. I went over, grabbed her purse, and dumped every- thing on the floor. I saw the checkbook and a few dollars crumpled up in hard green balls. I'm taking control of the money, I screamed. I picked up the checkbook and money from the floor. She stood there like a zombie as the dog ran off to hide somewhere. Later, as I slept, she took back the check- book and the few crumpled dollars. She went to the liquor store and bought two fifths of gin. I awoke, found her with the booze. A little demon crawled up the side of my spine, leaned against my neck, and yelled in my ear: kill the fucking bitch, kill her right now. I ignored him, went over and grabbed the bottle. She resisted, but I pushed her down, went over to the kitchen sink, began pouring it out. You can't win this, the demon sneered. She will win and the prize will be the grave. I ignored him and poured out the booze. It made a gurgle sound like slow strangulation as it went down the drain. "Her" Eric Leake Carmagnole@aol.com I see her now, how perfectly She moves with grace not forcefully As if the ground gives willingly Her beauty is that of the night Of the unknown and of starlight Of wishes made hopefully Of lovers loving endlessly Her eyes are warming to the sight As if by some antique right She became so very bright In a world of nonstop night. Between Friends Julie Schillinger julie@onrampbbs.com Ok this is sappy and corny and doesn't really mean anything it won't win an award, make money or be published in the New Yorker it's just poetry between friends print it out put it in your desk drawer a year from now you'll find it all yellow and faded read it and smile to yourself think of me and feel good a warm summer memory from a night of love and affection and sweet comfort between friends INTO SERENITY Christopher Stolle cstolle@indiana.edu no tuxedo can hold my galactic powers that once allowed me to circle city limits but now those times are past they are gone. no aspirin can ever relieve these thoughts I have did I write these words or did someone only speak them, speak again, speak again. no hope can kill these fears of regret as success is only a feeling of possibilities of a more fulfilling life as rejection is driven away in distress. tomorrow will come as those shadows that creep in your mirrors, and the silence in your head, will all but disappear so young children, spread your wings and fly. Goodbye Toledo Jerry Walraven Martian55@aol.com I feel I should have found love this trip. But I leave again with none (except maybe a pocketful given grudgingly by those who have love for others) And I should feel happy. They had some to spare. Frederick By Peter Scott Bluntly Rather strangely Frederick Alters the conversations in his head Asks a different question Amongst constant answers How would reality paint itself Without inhibition? Not a disease ravaging the land Could our walls of hate fall Crushing and creasing Those feelings of inadequacy Build back the fences of invisible mesh Self-esteem and trust Interdependent on my neighbors Might pins prick my face Proliferate around the world In one transcendent Smile? Content with myself I could boost those people That might tear me down ...Only Maybe if All could have free sex around the world !Forget the old rules When knowledge was ignorant Science too bold Everyone of us close Merely a step away Would life scar so badly If we gave? House and home Fortuna and wealth Possessions and pride Everything ever had... Could be kept Reality required to share Nothing would stand lost Except your problems Those blades of steel that cut Into the heart of man If all agreed Presented their bodies To everyone else Waltzed past inhibition Those who damn us while dead Touched each other Accepted who they are Held and kissed strangers Who we are yet to know we love Might we end Complete and start our lives in One orgasm? You tell me For I do not know... If your consciousness remains open There is something else The final key locked In our society Introspect Ask the question why You refuse empathy Without a real sense Of where you are Travel nowhere farther Than the ends of the globe Overlook you do Never notice your thoughts Aren't alone Bred in a realm With two realities Like a fruiting amoebae You aren't the only one Remember what I didn't say How I could have said it Resting in the chair A thousand have used before Hope ran little in Frederick They didn't care Never would Never should Never bothered He peered around All was as he had spoken Life was as he wished For perception is reality. BLUE STRING QUARTET mark hartenbach saint ishmael splinters off in a million directions self mutilates for our entertainment, such a human thing auto-erotic decomposition & emanations from soul brother number two please please please please bid farewell to latches of monotony, to neurotic exploitation, to choreographed raindance pearl phrased slumbering & get it together cat you got nothing to prove whatchamacallit hinges twist into reckless mocking strays your despair doesn't dazzle nor even titillate fact is, it never did the white house doesn't want your ass, or your opinion to overstate the obvious or...& this is important your self conscious strokes of genius or otherwise Thursday Afternoon lyn lifshin Dampness brings out the smell of things leather, plums when I'm in France when you're shooting rats or eating blueberries with her will my hands ache for it's raining while you sleep my fingers memorize get all of this by heart For Barb mike lazarchuk I'd write you something About chiffon air But my life is unrefined & love poems prove Impossible as picking Shit with birds I'd rather write about Rattle snake hides & black cat moans Mock hopes & foolish dreams I'd rather devour you with cobwebs Obscure you from society Fill you with caustic sarcasm Spin you an old crankcase daddy Of a yarn about fading youth Hot radio & dry bones Tell you tales of coyote reckoning Of death in unlit rooms of how dark The night the young girl vanished Draw you into the secrets of Bad tasting mouths homosexual hands & my son who lurks in the alley I'd rather make fiery orations about Rusty film cans fast drives Through the abyss blood soaked bandages & the fetus inside the earth Take a Viking's funeral worth of Pleasure reciting you the Life & times history of every Jerkwater Joe who's every splattered his brains Against a dingy wall fed up with being Bleak & bleary in some rat roach Bottom rung down on rickety row Hold your smooth hand ghostly Leading you down that rubble Strewn path of exaggeration to Where lions guard the temple of Insanity's big religion & dragons Shoot metaphors through the Laughing mouth of the sky Make myself as clear to you as A moon dog's blood Clear as a bursting egg In a jimson weed jungle & if that isn't close enough to love Close enough to modern love I'll write you something impossible as Picking shit with birds GOING BACK TO THE BEER STORE c ra mcguirt the car seems out of character at this point, so i walk with my umbrella in the twisting rain & let it pull me back to the place where they were polishing the floor 2 or 3 poems ago. the normal architecture of the aisles is still in disarray, but they buzz me in the guys who were doing the floor & the girl behind the register, who warns me: 'you can't buy no beer that you can't reach. it's still wet back there.' they have cards spead on the counter, & as i grab 2 miller lites from the iced bin near the front, i warn the lady not to bet the store. she laughs dutifully, taking my money. i go out & back downhill. the wind is biting deeper from the north. been a strange night so far. maybe it will snow after all. #Packing greg kosmicki Now we are once again packing boxes full of our stuff less stuff than the last time less than the time before that less than the time before that one too. We actually reached our peak of the pile of stuff 3 houses and 6 years ago when I was UPSing and Debbie was teaching school and the family, all caught up in getting and spending was growing apart. I quit my job at UPS it was a good job by all the standard yardsticks pay was good, benefits too hours long and hard but only Monday through Friday - it was like a divorce, really, the kids crying that first night Mark especially, then Audrey came up with her brave child's words about new beginnings. Debbie finished out the year at school, we tried to sell the houses but couldn't, I worked a little part time delivering flowers for a floral company Valentine's Day a few weeks teaching school at the Catholic High (I told one class just wait'll you get out into the real world and kid shouted this is the real world we're real students, these are real desks this is a real school) a part-time job installing satellite dishes with a friend, taught a high school religion class for kids that went to public high stayed home and began to learn to meditate prayed a lot, read the bible started looking for work in social services in all the big cities of our country. We got a nibble from Cabrini-Green in Chicago, corresponded with a Dorothy Day House in Des Moines, talked to Good News down in Florida and got an interview in Omaha. We were hired to live-in as house parents at a group home for mentally handicapped men and three and a half years later Debbie was promoted, so we moved into this house in a tough part of town where people come by in their cars and throw glass bottles to break on the sidewalk, neighbors have screaming matches at 3 in the morning some nights are filled with repeated gunfire things got stolen off our porch until we learned to keep it locked so then they broke into the house twice con men drifted by like we had a sign in the front yard advertising for them, we had garter snakes get into the house the last two summers a bat flew into the house a few days ago, (I was able to trap it in Mark's room until the Humane Society guy came by, put on his heavy leather gloves, and caught the bat just like a baseball pitched to him from some other world, took it out and I saw its weird tiny face and heard it say clickclickclick) each winter mice invade to eat their last suppers of my poison, pigeons have come to roost on our roof on the south side, maybe because I started to feed the sparrows, cockroaches have come back this summer after the initial spraying 3 years ago kept them all killed and away, the ropes for the counter-weights in the windows are breaking one by one, the basement leaked last summer in heavy rains, continued to do so this Summer, all our books and papers and everything in storage got musty and last summer my paintings were covered with mildew which broke my spirit, the Gulf Ware came and went and it burned me back inside like an old tree stump and when Clinton went in, to bomb, they showed that little Iraqi girl on TV while the commentator blustered about our strength and power like a bunch of two-bit bullies, I went into the bathroom and cried you might say I was depressed you might say that I gave up all hope in politicians ever again, or governments you might say that I gave up all hope in humanity in general and it was only moments before the TV thing came on about the Iraqi girl who looked so much like my Audrey whom they showed her father crying over and talked about how tough we are it was just before I read in a book by Ralph Wiley how he was only two blocks away from the motel in Memphis, in his own home, when the word of King's shooting swept over the city like wildfire, then I saw the girl then I went into the bathroom and wept then I could not stop it anymore Debbie came to ask me if I am OK and I said I was and explained but I really wasn't, I was clinically depressed, I was working three jobs and not doing well in any of them, I was presiding over a volunteer peace organization and getting wasted, and the house was just recovering from an invasion of fleas we had to spray to kill three times wash all our linen three times spray poison in our cars over and over, so I quit everything but my main job and the family, but the house continued to fall apart and after the drain for the tub plugged up to not unplug finally, after having slowed down and plugged up enough times that I had to snake it out at least once a month they came and knocked a hole in the wall going up the steps a hole about 3 feet long by a foot and a half high and they cut out the rusted-shut pipe and left the hole for our landlord to repair, which they still haven't and when the plumbers were working on the pipes they were getting electric shocks off the ductwork, and they had to tear a hole into the bathroom wall too above the front of the tub but the grout's all rotting in the tile anyway and the tiles are falling down so we finally decided damn it we're going to get ourselves a house so we did even though we had bad credit explaining what wonderful people we really are so now the house is cluttered with boxes filled with whatever we think is worth saving for the rest of our lives THOSE LITTLE SEEDS paul weinman When mom caught us we were back where raspberries were just getting soft enough when their red tinted just a bit toward purple - plump orbs bulging together into puckered cups. When you put your thumb, index and middle finger together to gently touch, pinch and pull it away ... bring it to your lips, tongue extended into its cavity to press, squish it so that sweetness flowed through your mouth. But almost always ... one little seed gets caught in your teeth. Stays there forever. angels die john sweet april's dreams hang onto her like frightened children she says everything has a meaning says everything can be interpreted she doesn't believe me when i tell her she's beautiful and angels die slow deaths when she cries and flowers turn to dust and she makes me promise i'll never leave everything was alive and dying janet kuypers I I had a dream the other night I walked out of the city to a forest and there were neatly paved bicycle paths and trash cans every fifty feet and trash every ten and then a raccoon came right up to me she had a few little baby raccoons following her, it was so cute, I wish I had my camera and she spoke to me, she said, thank you thank you for not buying furs, I know you humans are pretty smart, you have to be able to figure out a way to keep yourselves warm without killing me and I said, you know they don't do it for warmth, they do it for fashion, they do it for power. And she said I know. But thank you anyway. II Then I walked a little further and there was a stray cat she still had her little neon collar on with a little bell and she walked a few feet, stretched her front paws, oh, she looked so darling and then she walked right up to me and she said thank you and I said for what? And she just looked at me for a moment, her little ears were standing straight up, and then she said, you know, in some countries I'm considered a delicacy. And I said how do you know of these things? And she said when somebody eats one of you word gets around and then she looked up at me again and said, and in some countries the cow is sacred. Wouldn't they love to see how you humans prepare them for slaughter, how you hang them upside-down and slit their throats so their still beating hearts will drain out all the blood for you and she said isn't it funny how arbitrary your decision to eat meat is? and I said, don't put me in that category, I don't eat meat and she said I know III And I walked deeper in to the forest managed to get away from the picnic tables and the outhouses that lined the forest edges the roaring cars gave way to the rustling of tree branches crackling of fallen leaves under my step when the wind tunneled through the wind whistled and sang as it flew past the bark and leaves I walked listened to the crack of dead branches under my feet and I felt a branch against my shoulder I looked up and I could hear the trees speak to me, and they said thank you for letting the endangered animals live here amongst us we do think they're so pretty and it would be a shame to see them go and thank you for recycling paper because you're saving us for just a little while longer we've been on this planet for so long embedded in the earth we do have souls, you know you can hear it in our songs we cling with our roots we don't want to let go and I said, but I don't do much, I don't do enough and they said we know but we'll take what we can get IV and I woke up in a sweat V so tell me, Bob Dole so tell me, Newt Gingrich so tell me, Pat Bucannan so tell me, Jesse Helms if you woke up from that dream would you be in a sweat, too? VI Do you even know why we should save the rain forest? Oh preserve the delicate balance, just tear the whole forest down, what difference does it make? Put in some orange groves so our concentrate orange juice can be a little cheaper did you know that medical researchers have a very, very hard time trying to come up with synthetic cures for diseases on their own? It helps them out a little if they can first find the substance in nature. A tree that appears in the rain forest may be the only one of its species. Or one like it may be two miles away, instead of right next to it. I wonder how many cures we've destroyed to plant more orange groves. Serves us right. VII You know my motives aren't selfless I know that these things are worthwhile in my life I'd like to find a cure to these diseases before I die of them and I'm not just a vegetarian because I think it's wrong to kill an animal unless I have to I also know the excess protein pulls the calcium away from my bones and gives me osteoperosis and the excess fat gives me heart attacks and I also know that we could be feeding ten times more people with the same resources used for meat production You know, I know you're looking at me and calling me an extremist but I'm sitting here, looking around me looking at the destruction caused by family values and thinking the right, moral, non-violent decisions are also those extreme ones VII everything is linked here we destroy our animals so we can be wasteful and violent we destroy our plants we destroy our earth we're even destroying our air we wreak havoc on the soil, on the atmosphere we dump our wastes into our lakes we pump aerosol cans and exhaust pipes and you tell me I'm extreme and these animals and forests keep calling out to me the oceans, the wind and I'm beginning to think that we just keep doing it because we don't know how to stop and deep inside we feel the pain of all that we've killed and we try to control it by popping a chemical-filled pain-killer we live through the guilt by taking caffeine, nicotine, morphine and we keep ourselves thin with saccharin and we keep ourselves sane with our alcohol poisoning and when that's not enough maybe a line of coke maybe shoot ourselves in the head in front of the mirror in the master bedroom or maybe just take some pills walk into the garage, turn on the car and just fall asleep in the wild you have no power over anyone else now that we're civilized we create our own wild maybe when we have all this power the only choice we have is to destroy ourselves and so we do Alternative Boys joan papalia eisert Alternative boys arch one eyebrow when they check you out sideways - their hueless eyes study your shift and your averted self-consciousness They've either got tight sinewy bodies or just a bit too much beef coming at you from over their Harley belt buckles or under their kelly green polo shirt-sleeves Alternative boys take shop and recreate under Chevy Novas or they breeze through prep honors and don't give a damn about career day or SAT scores They're busy they're busy at their lockers and maybe they'll see you later at the dance When they'll come too late but in time to take you home so you can inhale those redolent leather jackets or Brut cologne And kiss open-mouthed and never forget the smell of Winstons on their breath or their soft warm necks Alternative boys wear oil-stained coveralls when they jump on the hood of your car as you leave your shift at the bar They tell you they'll die if they don't hold you or they wear their Armani suits and have neatly-trimmed beards When you meet them for a drink to celebrate their doctorates in psychology before they throw a martini in your face because you won't go home with them They never leave town they never return they go to jail for rape or they get off as easily as bleaching their white collars it was summer roger kyle keith It was too hot to breathe so I sucked short bursts like a cnacer victim on oxygen or a salt-and-pepper graying man gringing into little girls "the youngerthe better" cries the headlines though why a budding teenager would allow the crushing and heaving of a fat executive was never explained and the charges were dropped the snickerings and titterings will follow forever where the once-proud begs for employ at a fraction of previous income around the maypole with a new wife liek the bent metal fan I stick my face to that throws illusion with no real relief but it does flutter the newspaper and turns the page so I'll sit here sucking on fire and wondering why they had to be so young. Trailer Park Kids david staton Saturday with trailer park kids their busy fingers sneaking nickels from a brown bag stealing colored rolls of penny candy stacking empty cans snaking butts from bottles. Jelly stained faces (peanut butter bangs) with eyes like sad fruit watch their mother's boyfriend scratching through the morning after everything went upside down. Keys on a silver cat's tail Slinking and purring down his thighs Another twitches over blue jeans Into his seat pocket The chrome rope he swung at their mom Elegant violence: leather, face and fist shimmering in a bare, light bulb dance. Lipstick shrieking wounded over walls. Swollen mascara sweat. Such busy fingers Wrap around the neck of a beer, of their mom. Cinnamon red scrapes on fingers on napes. The morning after a black dram night when everything went upside down again. ....... Saturday afternoon with trailer park kids late sun slippery shadows nipping at Keds scrambling over fences, across lawns, through ditches. Bare-chested boys, flat stomachs filled with cheese sandwiches, buzz bombs and lime Koolaid Yell Gotcha Not it. Girls braid twisting in air, jump underneath and over blacktop rhythms Sing Cinderella Dressed in Yella. Ankles playing catch and go with knees, bouncing a yellow green mambo in their guts. Stomach so full, heart a desert, their mother has taken three baths, eight pills and no phone calls. Gonna wash That man right out of her house. She thinks. And he has sat out front all day. That man. Mother's boyfriend. Watching those goddamn kids. Filling his belly. Drips of blood mixing with splash after splash of beer chased by minty antacids, spinning a slow cycle. Waiting for the black microcosm of life, therefore smaller mallets seth putnam * 10 children on each team and there were in this parking lot 1 player from each side drove a remote control car * the course was a straight line and the remaining 9 players had mallets they hit the car as hard & as long as they could, keeping the opposition from the finish * after everyone drove, the game was over some got clubbed and totalled at the starting line, a couple got to the goal, the others were just in between, all settling in for as far as they're gonna go declaration to st. paul alice olds-ellington i have never like you you my favorite despise i credit you with hating breasts ona woman and throwing stones at her lower parts. now i would like yo to beg. you who never realized a Mother-in-law. how you can hate woman i don't know. bit i guess that's guerilla warfare for you. spain john sweet he calls her mary because he likes the name she never talks to him she escapes sometimes but he always finds her she makes the bed with hospital corners and puts powdered sugar on the french toast she has a garden and a baby and a scrapbook of pictures from her trip to spain he brings he flowers she swallows pills all day but nothing ever changes her eyes are ocean blue and bottomless UPS AND DOWNS paul weinman Why is it that her finger's touch effects me so ... I don't know. Just that slow reach, press of forefinger moving easily over my eyebrow up to the edge of forehead ... where hair starts - All thoughts of housing disparities comparisons in pay between blacks and whites ... women ... all disappear, fade in almost equal proportion to my pant's swelling. VEGETABLE SEX paul weinman Where his ear had been bitten off - I mean, the whole thing - he'd slice a pepper the long way stick it there in flour paste. We'd laugh, but some women would nibble at it. Let him rub their breasts as they did. He'd stick green ones, red, yellow ...didn't seem to care which. Or matter to those that teethed it. He got sloppy, careless with age. Took to using squash, eggplant settles for a touch of elbow, wrist. Back to a Warehouse The boss' bird hand-picked the special-order bolts of fabric with a hi-lo His name slips me but he was dark-skinned tall and slender from the islands and wore bright pants collared shirts and caused no trouble, No the one to watch for was john s. & some writing appeared on the mens room wall about this old italian guy tony who worked there And somehow rumors spread And I tried to explain as tony all fiery-eyed A piece of wood in hand chasing me yelling me he's gonna kill me! & john s. By the two stanleys The feller with the glass-eye all by the scale watching all LAFFING LAFFING LAFFING at my bad day no better A week before Morning break I got a cheese pastry off the lunch wagon And bit into Yep the baker's missing band-aid mark sonnenfeld THE BEAST LAMENTS c ra mcguirt thou hast wings & innocence bright quicksilver soul. thou art fresh from Faerie, & i'm a goddamn troll. BEWARE c ra mcguirt according to the posters, the most dangerous poet in america is coming to town at the end of the month. i see he's from st. louis... huh. i thought all nine of us lived here. AND YOU CALL YOURSELF A POET c ra mcguirt he said, after i bumped him to the end of the list. he thought i did it out of revenge because he put me down last time, but damn, he does that every month with perfect consistency, by which i mean he does it badly every month, & usually several people leave before he's through. i guess they're afraid that the rest of us will be like him or that he'll just keep reading... it honors me to be attacked. anything's better than being ignored. but he does it with so little style or grace, or class, or especially craft, that it pisses me off to be seen in the company of his words. but that's not why i bumped you, boy. you took too fucking long. 8 people left, & everyone else already knew why we who don't believe you to be the truth on 2 legs are liars. call myself a poet? i'm almost afraid to. after all, if i called for a poet, i might get you instead. ~I Wish, I Didn't Love You~ Feelings That Haunt Me Wherever I Go. Revealings A Taunt In My Inner Flow. If I Try To Cease, And End This Haunting. It Will Only Increase, My Desires Of Wanting. Oh, How I Love You, But You'll Never Know. I Pray For The Day I Won't Love You So. Is There Nothing I Can Ever Try? To Kill This Love And Let It Die! Then As I Try, My Heart Says No. That's When I Cry, Not Letting You Go! My Broken Heart Travels Its Rocky Road. For I Can Not Depart, From Love's Harsh Load. You Will Be With Me Wherever I Go. For I Must Love Thee In Constant Flow. My Love, You'll Never Know, Hidden,....Forbidden To Show. Oh How I Wish, I Didn't Love You So! ( (C)1995 Paul L. Glaze POETASTER@aol.com Not to be confused with Poetaser1 THE ICE MEN COMETH By Paul L. Glaze Mans Earth Year Is Sixty Thousand Ten The Earth Is Covered With Ice Again. Cold Is Everywhere And Very Severe. Life As We Know It, Ceased To Appear. Mankind Was A Failure In Earth's Begotten Ancient Man Has Since Been Long Forgotten. Man Was Given His Earth Life Opportunity. He Chose To Live With War And Disunity. Mankind Was Never Mother Earth's Master. Earth Allowed Him To Fulfill His Disaster. With Mankind's Destruction Totally En Mass. Earth Then Begin Its New Species Class.. Ice Men Evolved To Fulfill Earth's Schemes. They Are Free To Create A New Species Dreams. Unaware Of Mans Corruption's And Disease. Their Body Temperature Is At Forty Degrees. A Purplish Scale Cover Acts As Their Skin Much Stronger And Thicker Than Ours Had Been. Their Expressions Are Bland And Somewhat Dull. Large Eyes Are Embedded Deep Within Their Skull. The Iceman Species Is A New Earth Evolution. Not Kindred To Man Or His Violet Resolution. They Are In Tune With Their Mother Earth. For To Chose Them To Give Home And Birth. The Ice Men Now Have Their Opportunity Perhaps They Will Exist In Proper Unity. If They Do Not Live In Proper Resolve. Then Earth Will Have A New Species Evolve Earth Cares Not If Its Species Survive As It Will Wait For New Ones To Arrive ! gracious bells Ray Heinrich ray@vais.net your prince of peace framed with bones and nails keeps you safe from the faces in the window but i am not so good at these things i can't explain the pictures of belief lining your walls and i will never know your father or his bones but i am waiting watching you secure upon your rock me swimming the sea listening to your gracious bells gratuitous wordage ray heinrich ray@vais.net a lot of people ask for coffee and a little kiss in the morning using only the words they need but poets (and you've guessed it by now) kill for the pleasure of it it seems bees have a notion of honor ray heinrich ray@vais.net (after reading a poem by sylvia plath) my fantasy poor fantasy i am not crazy or genius enough to come to you but after reading this i want to keep you close to find out more i know you were a complete trouble in this life born at a wrong angle born with the pain to shout this loud and louder and louder to greet us with your puzzle with your furious capacity to fill us til we burst precinct fourteen janet kuypers it was a long night for us, starting out at your apartment with your roommate's coworkers coming over and making margaritas until two in the morning, but of course we then decided that the best thing to do would be to go out and so off to the blue note we went, found some interesting people to talk to, closed the bar, i think that was the first time i ever did that, closed a late- night bar, i mean, and at four-thirty you drove me home down milwaukee ave and i know it angles, and you can see the traffic light for oncoming traffic as easily as you can see your own light, but i'm sure the light was green, and not red like the cops said, when they pulled you over. you could have been in big trouble that night, no insurance, no city registration sticker, a michigan driver's license when you'd lived in illinois for over a year now, a cracked windshied, running a red light, probably intoxicated. so they brought us to the station at five a.m., and all they did was write you a ticket, and they gave me a business card, said if we had any problems to give them a call. you drove me home, and the cops met us there, too, hitting on me again, and although we both agreed that the night was a lot of fun, even with the involvement of the fourteenth precinct, i still believe that damn light wasn't even red. philosophy monthly DISCOURSE ON THE METHOD OF RIGHTLY CONDUCTING THE REASON, AND SEEKING TRUTH IN THE SCIENCES by Rene Descartes PREFATORY NOTE BY THE AUTHOR If this Discourse appear too long to be read at once, it may be divided into six Parts: and, in the first, will be found various considerations touching the Sciences; in the second, the principal rules of the Method which the Author has discovered, in the third, certain of the rules of Morals which he has deduced from this Method; in the fourth, the reasonings by which he establishes the existence of God and of the Human Soul, which are the foundations of his Metaphysic; in the fifth, the order of the Physical questions which he has investigated, and, in particular, the explication of the motion of the heart and of some other difficulties pertaining to Medicine, as also the difference between the soul of man and that of the brutes; and, in the last, what the Author believes to be required in order to greater advancement in the investigation of Nature than has yet been made, with the reasons that have induced him to write. PART 1 Good sense is, of all things among men, the most equally distributed; for every one thinks himself so abundantly provided with it, that those even who are the most difficult to satisfy in everything else, do not usually desire a larger measure of this quality than they already possess. And in this it is not likely that all are mistaken the conviction is rather to be held as testifying that the power of judging aright and of distinguishing truth from error, which is properly what is called good sense or reason, is by nature equal in all men; and that the diversity of our opinions, consequently, does not arise from some being endowed with a larger share of reason than others, but solely from this, that we conduct our thoughts along different ways, and do not fix our attention on the same objects. For to be possessed of a vigorous mind is not enough; the prime requisite is rightly to apply it. The greatest minds, as they are capable of the highest excellences, are open likewise to the greatest aberrations; and those who travel very slowly may yet make far greater progress, provided they keep always to the straight road, than those who, while they run, forsake it. For myself, I have never fancied my mind to be in any respect more perfect than those of the generality; on the contrary, I have often wished that I were equal to some others in promptitude of thought, or in clearness and distinctness of imagination, or in fullness and readiness of memory. And besides these, I know of no other qualities that contribute to the perfection of the mind; for as to the reason or sense, inasmuch as it is that alone which constitutes us men, and distinguishes us from the brutes, I am disposed to believe that it is to be found complete in each individual; and on this point to adopt the common opinion of philosophers, who say that the difference of greater and less holds only among the accidents, and not among the forms or natures of individuals of the same species. I will not hesitate, however, to avow my belief that it has been my singular good fortune to have very early in life fallen in with certain tracks which have conducted me to considerations and maxims, of which I have formed a method that gives me the means, as I think, of gradually augmenting my knowledge, and of raising it by little and little to the highest point which the mediocrity of my talents and the brief duration of my life will permit me to reach. For I have already reaped from it such fruits that, although I have been accustomed to think lowly enough of myself, and although when I look with the eye of a philosopher at the varied courses and pursuits of mankind at large, I find scarcely one which does not appear in vain and useless, I nevertheless derive the highest satisfaction from the progress I conceive myself to have already made in the search after truth, and cannot help entertaining such expectations of the future as to believe that if, among the occupations of men as men, there is any one really excellent and important, it is that which I have chosen. After all, it is possible I may be mistaken; and it is but a little copper and glass, perhaps, that I take for gold and diamonds. I know how very liable we are to delusion in what relates to ourselves, and also how much the judgments of our friends are to be suspected when given in our favor. But I shall endeavor in this discourse to describe the paths I have followed, and to delineate my life as in a picture, in order that each one may also be able to judge of them for himself, and that in the general opinion entertained of them, as gathered from current report, I myself may have a new help towards instruction to be added to those I have been in the habit of employing. My present design, then, is not to teach the method which each ought to follow for the right conduct of his reason, but solely to describe the way in which I have endeavored to conduct my own. They who set themselves to give precepts must of course regard themselves as possessed of greater skill than those to whom they prescribe; and if they err in the slightest particular, they subject themselves to censure. But as this tract is put forth merely as a history, or, if you will, as a tale, in which, amid some examples worthy of imitation, there will be found, perhaps, as many more which it were advisable not to follow, I hope it will prove useful to some without being hurtful to any, and that my openness will find some favor with all. From my childhood, I have been familiar with letters; and as I was given to believe that by their help a clear and certain knowledge of all that is useful in life might be acquired, I was ardently desirous of instruction. But as soon as I had finished the entire course of study, at the close of which it is customary to be admitted into the order of the learned, I completely changed my opinion. For I found myself involved in so many doubts and errors, that I was convinced I had advanced no farther in all my attempts at learning, than the discovery at every turn of my own ignorance. And yet I was studying in one of the most celebrated schools in Europe, in which I thought there must be learned men, if such were anywhere to be found. I had been taught all that others learned there; and not contented with the sciences actually taught us, I had, in addition, read all the books that had fallen into my hands, treating of such branches as are esteemed the most curious and rare. I knew the judgment which others had formed of me; and I did not find that I was considered inferior to my fellows, although there were among them some who were already marked out to fill the places of our instructors. And, in fine, our age appeared to me as flourishing, and as fertile in powerful minds as any preceding one. I was thus led to take the liberty of judging of all other men by myself, and of concluding that there was no science in existence that was of such a nature as I had previously been given to believe. I still continued, however, to hold in esteem the studies of the schools. I was aware that the languages taught in them are necessary to the understanding of the writings of the ancients; that the grace of fable stirs the mind; that the memorable deeds of history elevate it; and, if read with discretion, aid in forming the judgment; that the perusal of all excellent books is, as it were, to interview with the noblest men of past ages, who have written them, and even a studied interview, in which are discovered to us only their choicest thoughts; that eloquence has incomparable force and beauty; that poesy has its ravishing graces and delights; that in the mathematics there are many refined discoveries eminently suited to gratify the inquisitive, as well as further all the arts an lessen the labour of man; that numerous highly useful precepts and exhortations to virtue are contained in treatises on morals; that theology points out the path to heaven; that philosophy affords the means of discoursing with an appearance of truth on all matters, and commands the admiration of the more simple; that jurisprudence, medicine, and the other sciences, secure for their cultivators honors and riches; and, in fine, that it is useful to bestow some attention upon all, even upon those abounding the most in superstition and error, that we may be in a position to determine their real value, and guard against being deceived. But I believed that I had already given sufficient time to languages, and likewise to the reading of the writings of the ancients, to their histories and fables. For to hold converse with those of other ages and to travel, are almost the same thing. It is useful to know something of the manners of different nations, that we may be enabled to form a more correct judgment regarding our own, and be prevented from thinking that everything contrary to our customs is ridiculous and irrational, a conclusion usually come to by those whose experience has been limited to their own country. On the other hand, when too much time is occupied in traveling, we become strangers to our native country; and the over curious in the customs of the past are generally ignorant of those of the present. Besides, fictitious narratives lead us to imagine the possibility of many events that are impossible; and even the most faithful histories, if they do not wholly misrepresent matters, or exaggerate their importance to render the account of them more worthy of perusal, omit, at least, almost always the meanest and least striking of the attendant circumstances; hence it happens that the remainder does not represent the truth, and that such as regulate their conduct by examples drawn from this source, are apt to fall into the extravagances of the knight-errants of romance, and to entertain projects that exceed their powers. I esteemed eloquence highly, and was in raptures with poesy; but I thought that both were gifts of nature rather than fruits of study. Those in whom the faculty of reason is predominant, and who most skillfully dispose their thoughts with a view to render them clear and intelligible, are always the best able to persuade others of the truth of what they lay down, though they should speak only in the language of Lower Brittany, and be wholly ignorant of the rules of rhetoric; and those whose minds are stored with the most agreeable fancies, and who can give expression to them with the greatest embellishment and harmony, are still the best poets, though unacquainted with the art of poetry. I was especially delighted with the mathematics, on account of the certitude and evidence of their reasonings; but I had not as yet a precise knowledge of their true use; and thinking that they but contributed to the advancement of the mechanical arts, I was astonished that foundations, so strong and solid, should have had no loftier superstructure reared on them. On the other hand, I compared the disquisitions of the ancient moralists to very towering and magnificent palaces with no better foundation than sand and mud: they laud the virtues very highly, and exhibit them as estimable far above anything on earth; but they give us no adequate criterion of virtue, and frequently that which they designate with so fine a name is but apathy, or pride, or despair, or parricide. I revered our theology, and aspired as much as any one to reach heaven: but being given assuredly to understand that the way is not less open to the most ignorant than to the most learned, and that the revealed truths which lead to heaven are above our comprehension, I did not presume to subject them to the impotency of my reason; and I thought that in order competently to undertake their examination, there was need of some special help from heaven, and of being more than man. Of philosophy I will say nothing, except that when I saw that it had been cultivated for many ages by the most distinguished men, and that yet there is not a single matter within its sphere which is not still in dispute, and nothing, therefore, which is above doubt, I did not presume to anticipate that my success would be greater in it than that of others; and further, when I considered the number of conflicting opinions touching a single matter that may be upheld by learned men, while there can be but one true, I reckoned as well-nigh false all that was only probable. As to the other sciences, inasmuch as these borrow their principles from philosophy, I judged that no solid superstructures could be reared on foundations so infirm; and neither the honor nor the gain held out by them was sufficient to determine me to their cultivation: for I was not, thank Heaven, in a condition which compelled me to make merchandise of science for the bettering of my fortune; and though I might not profess to scorn glory as a cynic, I yet made very slight account of that honor which I hoped to acquire only through fictitious titles. And, in fine, of false sciences I thought I knew the worth sufficiently to escape being deceived by the professions of an alchemist, the predictions of an astrologer, the impostures of a magician, or by the artifices and boasting of any of those who profess to know things of which they are ignorant. For these reasons, as soon as my age permitted me to pass from under the control of my instructors, I entire y abandoned the study of letters, and resolved no longer to seek any other science than the knowledge of myself, or of the great book of the world. I spent the remainder of my youth in traveling, in visiting courts and armies, in holding intercourse with men of different dispositions and ranks, in collecting varied experience, in proving myself in the different situations into which fortune threw me, and, above all, in making such reflection on the matter of my experience as to secure my improvement. For it occurred to me that I should find much more truth in the reasonings of each individual with reference to the affairs in which he is personally interested, and the issue of which must presently punish him if he has judged amiss, than in those conducted by a man of letters in his study, regarding speculative matters that are of no practical moment, and followed by no consequences to himself, farther, perhaps, than that they foster his vanity the better the more remote they are from common sense; requiring, as they must in this case, the exercise of greater ingenuity and art to render them probable. In addition, I had always a most earnest desire to know how to distinguish the true from the false, in order that I might be able clearly to discriminate the right path in life, and proceed in it with confidence. It is true that, while busied only in considering the manners of other men, I found here, too, scarce any ground for settled conviction, and remarked hardly less contradiction among them than in the opinions of the philosophers. So that the greatest advantage I derived from the study consisted in this, that, observing many things which, however extravagant and ridiculous to our apprehension, are yet by common consent received and approved by other great nations, I learned to entertain too decided a belief in regard to nothing of the truth of which I had been persuaded merely by example and custom; and thus I gradually extricated myself from many errors powerful enough to darken our natural intelligence, and incapacitate us in great measure from listening to reason. But after I had been occupied several years in thus studying the book of the world, and in essaying to gather some experience, I at length resolved to make myself an object of study, and to employ all the powers of my mind in choosing the paths I ought to follow, an undertaking which was accompanied with greater success than it would have been had I never quitted my country or my books. PART II I was then in Germany, attracted thither by the wars in that country, which have not yet been brought to a termination; and as I was returning to the army from the coronation of the emperor, the setting in of winter arrested me in a locality where, as I found no society to interest me, and was besides fortunately undisturbed by any cares or passions, I remained the whole day in seclusion, with full opportunity to occupy my attention with my own thoughts. Of these one of the very first that occurred to me was, that there is seldom so much perfection in works composed of many separate parts, upon which different hands had been employed, as in those completed by a single master. Thus it is observable that the buildings which a single architect has planned and executed, are generally more elegant and commodious than those which several have attempted to improve, by making old walls serve for purposes for which they were not originally built. Thus also, those ancient cities which, from being at first only villages, have become, in course of time, large towns, are usually but ill laid out compared with the regularity constructed towns which a professional architect has freely planned on an open plain; so that although the several buildings of the former may often equal or surpass in beauty those of the latter, yet when one observes their indiscriminate juxtaposition, there a large one and here a small, and the consequent crookedness and irregularity of the streets, one is disposed to allege that chance rather than any human will guided by reason must have led to such an arrangement. And if we consider that nevertheless there have been at all times certain officers whose duty it was to see that private buildings contributed to public ornament, the difficulty of reaching high perfection with but the materials of others to operate on, will be readily acknowledged. In the same way I fancied that those nations which, starting from a semi-barbarous state and advancing to civilization by slow degrees, have had their laws successively determined, and, as it were, forced upon them simply by experience of the hurtfulness of particular crimes and disputes, would by this process come to be possessed of less perfect institutions than those which, from the commencement of their association as communities, have followed the appointments of some wise legislator. It is thus quite certain that the constitution of the true religion, the ordinances of which are derived from God, must be incomparably superior to that of every other. And, to speak of human affairs, I believe that the pre-eminence of Sparta was due not to the goodness of each of its laws in particular, for many of these were very strange, and even opposed to good morals, but to the circumstance that, originated by a single individual, they all tended to a single end. In the same way I thought that the sciences contained in books (such of them at least as are made up of probable reasonings, without demonstrations), composed as they are of the opinions of many different individuals massed together, are farther removed from truth than the simple inferences which a man of good sense using his natural and unprejudiced judgment draws respecting the matters of his experience. And because we have all to pass through a state of infancy to manhood, and have been of necessity, for a length of time, governed by our desires and preceptors (whose dictates were frequently conflicting, while neither perhaps always counseled us for the best), I farther concluded that it is almost impossible that our judgments can be so correct or solid as they would have been, had our reason been mature from the moment of our birth, and had we always been guided by it alone. It is true, however, that it is not customary to pull down all the houses of a town with the single design of rebuilding them differently, and thereby rendering the streets more handsome; but it often happens that a private individual takes down his own with the view of erecting it anew, and that people are even sometimes constrained to this when their houses are in danger of falling from age, or when the foundations are insecure. With this before me by way of example, I was persuaded that it would indeed be preposterous for a private individual to think of reforming a state by fundamentally changing it throughout, and overturning it in order to set it up amended; and the same I thought was true of any similar project for reforming the body of the sciences, or the order of teaching them established in the schools: but as for the opinions which up to that time I had embraced, I thought that I could not do better than resolve at once to sweep them wholly away, that I might afterwards be in a position to admit either others more correct, or even perhaps the same when they had undergone the scrutiny of reason. I firmly believed that in this way I should much better succeed in the conduct of my life, than if I built only upon old foundations, and leaned upon principles which, in my youth, I had taken upon trust. For although I recognized various difficulties in this undertaking, these were not, however, without remedy, nor once to be compared with such as attend the slightest reformation in public affairs. Large bodies, if once overthrown, are with great difficulty set up again, or even kept erect when once seriously shaken, and the fall of such is always disastrous. Then if there are any imperfections in the constitutions of states (and that many such exist the diversity of constitutions is alone sufficient to assure us), custom has without doubt materially smoothed their inconveniences, and has even managed to steer altogether clear of, or insensibly corrected a number which sagacity could not have provided against with equal effect; and, in fine, the defects are almost always more tolerable than the change necessary for their removal; in the same manner that highways which wind among mountains, by being much frequented, become gradually so smooth and commodious, that it is much better to follow them than to seek a straighter path by climbing over the tops of rocks and descending to the bottoms of precipices. Hence it is that I cannot in any degree approve of those restless and busy meddlers who, called neither by birth nor fortune to take part in the management of public affairs, are yet always projecting reforms; and if I thought that this tract contained aught which might justify the suspicion that I was a victim of such folly, I would by no means permit its publication. I have never contemplated anything higher than the reformation of my own opinions, and basing them on a foundation wholly my own. And although my own satisfaction with my work has led me to present here a draft of it, I do not by any means therefore recommend to every one else to make a similar attempt. Those whom God has endowed with a larger measure of genius will entertain, perhaps, designs still more exalted; but for the many I am much afraid lest even the present undertaking be more than they can safely venture to imitate. The single design to strip one's self of all past beliefs is one that ought not to be taken by every one. The majority of men is composed of two classes, for neither of which would this be at all a befitting resolution: in the first place, of those who with more than a due confidence in their own powers, are precipitate in their judgments and want the patience requisite for orderly and circumspect thinking; whence it happens, that if men of this class once take the liberty to doubt of their accustomed opinions, and quit the beaten highway, they will never be able to thread the byway that would lead them by a shorter course, and will lose themselves and continue to wander for life; in the second place, of those who, possessed of sufficient sense or modesty to determine that there are others who excel them in the power of discriminating between truth and error, and by whom they may be instructed, ought rather to content themselves with the opinions of such than trust for more correct to their own reason. For my own part, I should doubtless have belonged to the latter class, had I received instruction from but one master, or had I never known the diversities of opinion that from time immemorial have prevailed among men of the greatest learning. But I had become aware, even so early as during my college life, that no opinion, however absurd and incredible, can be imagined, which has not been maintained by some on of the philosophers; and afterwards in the course of my travels I remarked that all those whose opinions are decidedly repugnant to ours are not in that account barbarians and savages, but on the contrary that many of these nations make an equally good, if not better, use of their reason than we do. I took into account also the very different character which a person brought up from infancy in France or Germany exhibits, from that which, with the same mind originally, this individual would have possessed had he lived always among the Chinese or with savages, and the circumstance that in dress itself the fashion which pleased us ten years ago, and which may again, perhaps, be received into favor before ten years have gone, appears to us at this moment extravagant and ridiculous. I was thus led to infer that the ground of our opinions is far more custom and example than any certain knowledge. And, finally, although such be the ground of our opinions, I remarked that a plurality of suffrages is no guarantee of truth where it is at all of difficult discovery, as in such cases it is much more likely that it will be found by one than by many. I could, however, select from the crowd no one whose opinions seemed worthy of preference, and thus I found myself constrained, as it were, to use my own reason in the conduct of my life. But like one walking alone and in the dark, I resolved to proceed so slowly and with such circumspection, that if I did not advance far, I would at least guard against falling. I did not even choose to dismiss summarily any of the opinions that had crept into my belief without having been introduced by reason, but first of all took sufficient time carefully to satisfy myself of the general nature of the task I was setting myself, and ascertain the true method by which to arrive at the knowledge of whatever lay within the compass of my powers. Among the branches of philosophy, I had, at an earlier period, given some attention to logic, and among those of the mathematics to geometrical analysis and algebra, - three arts or sciences which ought, as I conceived, to contribute something to my design. But, on examination, I found that, as for logic, its syllogisms and the majority of its other precepts are of avail- rather in the communication of what we already know, or even as the art of Lully, in speaking without judgment of things of which we are ignorant, than in the investigation of the unknown; and although this science contains indeed a number of correct and very excellent precepts, there are, nevertheless, so many others, and these either injurious or superfluous, mingled with the former, that it is almost quite as difficult to effect a severance of the true from the false as it is to extract a Diana or a Minerva from a rough block of marble. Then as to the analysis of the ancients and the algebra of the moderns, besides that they embrace only matters highly abstract, and, to appearance, of no use, the former is so exclusively restricted to the consideration of figures, that it can exercise the understanding only on condition of greatly fatiguing the imagination; and, in the latter, there is so complete a subjection to certain rules and formulas, that there results an art full of confusion and obscurity calculated to embarrass, instead of a science fitted to cultivate the mind. By these considerations I was induced to seek some other method which would comprise the advantages of the three and be exempt from their defects. And as a multitude of laws often only hampers justice, so that a state is best governed when, with few laws, these are rigidly administered; in like manner, instead of the great number of precepts of which logic is composed, I believed that the four following would prove perfectly sufficient for me, provided I took the firm and unwavering resolution never in a single instance to fail in observing them. The first was never to accept anything for true which I did not clearly know to be such; that is to say, carefully to avoid precipitancy and prejudice, and to comprise nothing more in my judgement than what was presented to my mind so clearly and distinctly as to exclude all ground of doubt. The second, to divide each of the difficulties under examination into as many parts as possible, and as might be necessary for its adequate solution. The third, to conduct my thoughts in such order that, by commencing with objects the simplest and easiest to know, I might ascend by little and little, and, as it were, step by step, to the knowledge of the more complex; assigning in thought a certain order even to those objects which in their own nature do not stand in a relation of antecedence and sequence. And the last, in every case to make enumerations so complete, and reviews so general, that I might be assured that nothing was omitted. The long chains of simple and easy reasonings by means of which geometers are accustomed to reach the conclusions of their most difficult demonstrations, had led me to imagine that all things, to the knowledge of which man is competent, are mutually connected in the same way, and that there is nothing so far removed from us as to be beyond our reach, or so hidden that we cannot discover it, provided only we abstain from accepting the false for the true, and always preserve in our thoughts the order necessary for the deduction of one truth from another. And I had little difficulty in determining the objects with which it was necessary to commence, for I was already persuaded that it must be with the simplest and easiest to know, and, considering that of all those who have hitherto sought truth in the sciences, the mathematicians alone have been able to find any demonstrations, that is, any certain and evident reasons, I did not doubt but that such must have been the rule of their investigations. I resolved to commence, therefore, with the examination of the simplest objects, not anticipating, however, from this any other advantage than that to be found in accustoming my mind to the love and nourishment of truth, and to a distaste for all such reasonings as were unsound. But I had no intention on that account of attempting to master all the particular sciences commonly denominated mathematics: but observing that, however different their objects, they all agree in considering only the various relations or proportions subsisting among those objects, I thought it best for my purpose to consider these proportions in the most general form possible, without referring them to any objects in particular, except such as would most facilitate the knowledge of them, and without by any means restricting them to these, that afterwards I might thus be the better able to apply them to every other class of objects to which they are legitimately applicable. Perceiving further, that in order to understand these relations I should sometimes have to consider them one by one and sometimes only to bear them in mind, or embrace them in the aggregate, I thought that, in order the better to consider them individually, I should view them as subsisting between straight lines, than which I could find no objects more simple, or capable of being more distinctly represented to my imagination and senses; and on the other hand, that in order to retain them in the memory or embrace an aggregate of many, I should express them by certain characters the briefest possible. In this way I believed that I could borrow all that was best both in geometrical analysis and in algebra, and correct all the defects of the one by help of the other. And, in point of fact, the accurate observance of these few precepts gave me, I take the liberty of saying, such ease in unraveling all the questions embraced in these two sciences, that in the two or three months I devoted to their examination, not only did I reach solutions of questions I had formerly deemed exceedingly difficult but even as regards questions of the solution of which I continued ignorant, I was enabled, as it appeared to me, to determine the means whereby, and the extent to which a solution was possible; results attributable to the circumstance that I commenced with the simplest and most general truths, and that thus each truth discovered was a rule available in the discovery of subsequent ones Nor in this perhaps shall I appear too vain, if it be considered that, as the truth on any particular point is one whoever apprehends the truth, knows all that on that point can be known. The child, for example, who has been instructed in the elements of arithmetic, and has made a particular addition, according to rule, may be assured that he has found, with respect to the sum of the numbers before him, and that in this instance is within the reach of human genius. Now, in conclusion, the method which teaches adherence to the true order, and an exact enumeration of all the conditions of the thing .sought includes all that gives certitude to the rules of arithmetic. But the chief ground of my satisfaction with thus method, was the assurance I had of thereby exercising my reason in all matters, if not with absolute perfection, at least with the greatest attainable by me: besides, I was conscious that by its use my mind was becoming gradually habituated to clearer and more distinct conceptions of its objects; and I hoped also, from not having restricted this method to any particular matter, to apply it to the difficulties of the other sciences, with not less success than to those of algebra. I should not, however, on this account have ventured at once on the examination of all the difficulties of the sciences which presented themselves to me, for this would have been contrary to the order prescribed in the method, but observing that the knowledge of such is dependent on principles borrowed from philosophy, in which I found nothing certain, I thought it necessary first of all to endeavor to establish its principles. .And because I observed, besides, that an inquiry of this kind was of all others of the greatest moment, and one in which precipitancy and anticipation in judgment were most to be dreaded, I thought that I ought not to approach it till I had reached a more mature age (being at that time but twenty-three), and had first of all employed much of my time in preparation for the work, as well by eradicating from my mind all the erroneous opinions I had up to that moment accepted, as by amassing variety of experience to afford materials for my reasonings, and by continually exercising myself in my chosen method with a view to increased skill in its application. PART III And finally, as it is not enough, before commencing to rebuild the house in which we live, that it be pulled down, and materials and builders provided, or that we engage in the work ourselves, according to a plan which we have beforehand carefully drawn out, but as it is likewise necessary that we be furnished with some other house in which we may live commodiously during the operations, so that I might not remain irresolute in my actions, while my reason compelled me to suspend my judgement, and that I might not be prevented from living thenceforward in the greatest possible felicity, I formed a provisory code of morals, composed of three or four maxims, with which I am desirous to make you acquainted. The first was to obey the laws and customs of my country, adhering firmly to the faith in which, by the grace of God, I had been educated from my childhood and regulating my conduct in every other matter according to the most moderate opinions, and the farthest removed from extremes, which should happen to be adopted in practice with general consent of the most judicious of those among whom I might be living. For as I had from that time begun to hold my own opinions for nought because I wished to subject them all to examination, I was convinced that I could not do better than follow in the meantime the opinions of the most judicious; and although there are some perhaps among the Persians and Chinese as judicious as among ourselves, expediency seemed to dictate that I should regulate my practice conformably to the opinions of those with whom I should have to live; and it appeared to me that, in order to ascertain the real opinions of such, I ought rather to take cognizance of what they practised than of what they said, not only because, in the corruption of our manners, there are few disposed to speak exactly as they believe, but also because very many are not aware of what it is that they really believe; for, as the act of mind by which a thing is believed is different from that by which we know that we believe it, the one act is often found without the other. Also, amid many opinions held in equal repute, I chose always the most moderate, as much for the reason that these are always the most convenient for practice, and probably the best (for all excess is generally vicious), as that, in the event of my falling into error, I might be at less distance from the truth than if, having chosen one of the extremes, it should turn out to be the other which I ought to have adopted. And I placed in the class of extremes especially all promises by which somewhat of our freedom is abridged; not that I disapproved of the laws which, to provide against the instability of men of feeble resolution, when what is sought to be accomplished is some good, permit engagements by vows and contracts binding the parties to persevere in it, or even, for the security of commerce, sanction similar engagements where the purpose sought to be realized is indifferent: but because I did not find anything on earth which was wholly superior to change, and because, for myself in particular, I hoped gradually to perfect my judgments, and not to suffer them to deteriorate, I would have deemed it a grave sin against good sense, if, for the reason that I approved of something at a particular time, I therefore bound myself to hold it for good at a subsequent time, when perhaps it had ceased to be so, or I had ceased to esteem it such. My second maxim was to be as firm and resolute in my actions as I was able, and not to adhere less steadfastly to the most doubtful opinions, when once adopted, than if they had been highly certain; imitating in this the example of travelers who, when they have lost their way in a forest, ought not to wander from side to side, far less remain in one place, but proceed constantly towards the same side in as straight a line as possible, without changing their direction for slight reasons, although perhaps it might be chance alone which at first determined the selection; for in this way, if they do not exactly reach the point they desire, they will come at least in the end to some place that will probably be preferable to the middle of a forest. In the same way, since in action it frequently happens that no delay is permissible, it is very certain that, when it is not in our power to determine what is true, we ought to act according to what is most probable; and even although we should not remark a greater probability in one opinion than in another, we ought notwithstanding to choose one or the other, and afterwards consider it, in so far as it relates to practice, as no longer dubious, but manifestly true and certain, since the reason by which our choice has been determined is itself possessed of these qualities. This principle was sufficient thenceforward to rid me of all those repentings and pangs of remorse that usually disturb the consciences of such feeble and uncertain minds as, destitute of any clear and determinate principle of choice, allow themselves one day to adopt a course of action as the best, which they abandon the next, as the opposite. My third maxim was to endeavor always to conquer myself rather than fortune, and change my desires rather than the order of the world, and in general, accustom myself to the persuasion that, except our own thoughts, there is nothing absolutely in our power; so that when we have done our best in things external to us, all wherein we fail of success is to be held, as regards us, absolutely impossible: and this single principle seemed to me sufficient to prevent me from desiring for the future anything which I could not obtain, and thus render me contented; for since our will naturally seeks those objects alone which the understanding represents as in some way possible of attainment, it is plain, that if we consider all external goods as equally beyond our power, we shall no more regret the absence of such goods as seem due to our birth, when deprived of them without any fault of ours, than our not possessing the kingdoms of China or Mexico, and thus making, so to speak, a virtue of necessity, we shall no more desire health in disease, or freedom in imprisonment, than we now do bodies incorruptible as diamonds, or the wings of birds to fly with. But I confess there is need of prolonged discipline and frequently repeated meditation to accustom the mind to view all objects in this light; and I believe that in this chiefly consisted the secret of the power of such philosophers as in former times were enabled to rise superior to the influence of fortune, and, amid suffering and poverty, enjoy a happiness which their gods might have envied. For, occupied incessantly with the consideration of the limits prescribed to their power by nature, they became so entirely convinced that nothing was at their disposal except their own thoughts, that this conviction was of itself sufficient to prevent their entertaining any desire of other objects; and over their thoughts they acquired a sway so absolute, that they had some ground on this account for esteeming themselves more rich and more powerful, more free and more happy, than other men who, whatever be the favors heaped on them by nature and fortune, if destitute of this philosophy, can never command the realization of all their desires. In fine, to conclude this code of morals, I thought of reviewing the different occupations of men in this life, with the view of making choice of the best. And, without wishing to offer any remarks on the employments of others, I may state that it was my conviction that I could not do better than continue in that in which I was engaged, viz., in devoting my whole life to the culture of my reason, and in making the greatest progress I was able in the knowledge of truth, on the principles of the method which I had prescribed to myself. This method, from the time I had begun to apply it, had been to me the source of satisfaction so intense as to lead me to, believe that more perfect or more innocent could not be enjoyed in this life; and as by its means I daily discovered truths that appeared to me of some importance, and of which other men were generally ignorant, the gratification thence arising so occupied my mind that I was wholly indifferent to every other object. Besides, the three preceding maxims were founded singly on the design of continuing the work of self- instruction. For since God has endowed each of us with some light of reason by which to distinguish truth from error, I could not have believed that I ought for a single moment to rest satisfied with the opinions of another, unless I had resolved to exercise my own judgment in examining these whenever I should be duly qualified for the task. Nor could I have proceeded on such opinions without scruple, had I supposed that I should thereby forfeit any advantage for attaining still more accurate, should such exist. And, in fine, I could not have restrained my desires, nor remained satisfied had I not followed a path in which I thought myself certain of attaining all the knowledge to the acquisition of which I was competent, as well as the largest amount of what is truly good which I could ever hope to secure Inasmuch as we neither seek nor shun any object except in so far as our understanding represents it as good or bad, all that is necessary to right action is right judgment, and to the best action the most correct judgment, that is, to the acquisition of all the virtues with all else that is truly valuable and within our reach; and the assurance of such an acquisition cannot fail to render us contented. Having thus provided myself with these maxims, and having placed them in reserve along with the truths of faith, which have ever occupied the first place in my belief, I came to the conclusion that I might with freedom set about ridding myself of what remained of my opinions. And, inasmuch as I hoped to be better able successfully to accomplish this work by holding intercourse with mankind, than by remaining longer shut up in the retirement where these thoughts had occurred to me, I betook me again to traveling before the winter was well ended. And, during the nine subsequent years, I did nothing but roam from one place to another, desirous of being a spectator rather than an actor in the plays exhibited on the theater of the world; and, as I made it my business in each matter to reflect particularly upon what might fairly be doubted and prove a source of error, I gradually rooted out from my mind all the errors which had hitherto crept into it. Not that in this I imitated the sceptics who doubt only that they may doubt, and seek nothing beyond uncertainty itself; for, on the contrary, my design was singly to find ground of assurance, and cast aside the loose earth and sand, that I might reach the rock or the clay. In this, as appears to me, I was successful enough; for, since I endeavored to discover the falsehood or incertitude of the propositions I examined, not by feeble conjectures, but by clear and certain reasonings, I met with nothing so doubtful as not to yield some conclusion of adequate certainty, although this were merely the inference, that the matter in question contained nothing certain. And, just as in pulling down an old house, we usually reserve the ruins to contribute towards the erection, so, in destroying such of my opinions as I judged to be Ill-founded, I made a variety of observations and acquired an amount of experience of which I availed myself in the establishment of more certain. And further, I continued to exercise myself in the method I had prescribed; for, besides taking care in general to conduct all my thoughts according to its rules, I reserved some hours from time to time which I expressly devoted to the employment of the method in the solution of mathematical difficulties, or even in the solution likewise of some questions belonging to other sciences, but which, by my having detached them from such principles of these sciences as were of inadequate certainty, were rendered almost mathematical: the truth of this will be manifest from the numerous examples contained in this volume. And thus, without in appearance living otherwise than those who, with no other occupation than that of spending their lives agreeably and innocently, study to sever pleasure from vice, and who, that they may enjoy their leisure without ennui, have recourse to such pursuits as are honorable, I was nevertheless prosecuting my design, and making greater progress in the knowledge of truth, than I might, perhaps, have made had I been engaged in the perusal of books merely, or in holding converse with men of letters. These nine years passed away, however, before I had come to any determinate judgment respecting the difficulties which form matter of dispute among the learned, or had commenced to seek the principles of any philosophy more certain than the vulgar. And the examples of many men of the highest genius, who had, in former times, engaged in this inquiry, but, as appeared to me, without success, led me to imagine it to be a work of so much difficulty, that I would not perhaps have ventured on it so soon had I not heard it currently rumored that I had already completed the inquiry. I know not what were the grounds of this opinion; and, if my conversation contributed in any measure to its rise, this must have happened rather from my having confessed my Ignorance with greater freedom than those are accustomed to do who have studied a little, and expounded perhaps, the reasons that led me to doubt of many of those things that by others are esteemed certain, than from my having boasted of any system of philosophy. But, as I am of a disposition that makes me unwilling to be esteemed different from what I really am, I thought it necessary to endeavor by all means to render myself worthy of the reputation accorded to me; and it is now exactly eight years since this desire constrained me to remove from all those places where interruption from any of my acquaintances was possible, and betake myself to this country, in which the long duration of the war has led to the establishment of such discipline, that the armies maintained seem to be of use only in enabling the inhabitants to enjoy more securely the blessings of peace and where, in the midst of a great crowd actively engaged in business, and more careful of their own affairs than curious about those of others, I have been enabled to live without being deprived of any of the conveniences to be had in the most populous cities, and yet as solitary and as retired as in the midst of the most remote deserts. PART IV I am in doubt as to the propriety of making my first meditations in the place above mentioned matter of discourse; for these are so metaphysical, and so uncommon, as not, perhaps, to be acceptable to every one. And yet, that it may be determined whether the foundations that I have laid are sufficiently secure, I find myself in a measure constrained to advert to them. I had long before remarked that, in relation to practice, it is sometimes necessary to adopt, as if above doubt, opinions which we discern to be highly uncertain, as has been already said; but as I then desired to give my attention solely to the search after truth, I thought that a procedure exactly the opposite was called for, and that I ought to reject as absolutely false all opinions in regard to which I could suppose the least ground for doubt, in order to ascertain whether after that there remained aught in my belief that was wholly indubitable. Accordingly, seeing that our senses sometimes deceive us, I was willing to suppose that there existed nothing really such as they presented to us; and because some men err in reasoning, and fall into paralogisms, even on the simplest matters of geometry, I, convinced that I was as open to error as any other, rejected as false all the reasonings I had hitherto taken for demonstrations; and finally, when I considered that the very same thoughts (presentations) which we experience when awake may also be experienced when we are asleep, while there is at that time not one of them true, I supposed that all the objects (presentations) that had ever entered into my mind when awake, had in them no more truth than the illusions of my dreams. But immediately upon this I observed that, whilst I thus wished to think that all was false, it was absolutely necessary that I, who thus thought, should be somewhat; and as I observed that this truth, I think, therefore I am (COGITO ERGO SUM), was so certain and of such evidence that no ground of doubt, however extravagant, could be alleged by the sceptics capable of shaking it, I concluded that I might, without scruple, accept it as the first principle of the philosophy of which I was in search In the next place, I attentively examined what I was and as I observed that I could suppose that I had no body, and that there was no world nor any place in which I might be; but that I could not therefore suppose that I was not; and that, on the contrary, from the very circumstance that I thought to doubt of the truth of other things, it most clearly and certainly followed that I was; while, on the other hand, if I had only ceased to think, although all the other objects which I had ever imagined had been in reality existent, I would have had no reason to believe that I existed; I thence concluded that I was a substance whose whole essence or nature consists only in thinking, and which, that it may exist, has need of no place, nor is dependent on any material thing; so that " I," that is to say, the mind by which I am what I am, is wholly distinct from the body, and is even more easily known than the latter, and is such, that although the latter were not, it would still continue to be all that it is. After this I inquired in general into what is essential I to the truth and certainty of a proposition; for since I had discovered one which I knew to be true, I thought that I must likewise be able to discover the ground of this certitude. And as I observed that in the words I think, therefore I am, there is nothing at all which gives me assurance of their truth beyond this, that I see very clearly that in order to think it is necessary to exist, I concluded that I might take, as a general rule, the principle, that all the things which we very clearly and distinctly conceive are true, only observing, however, that there is some difficulty in rightly determining the objects which we distinctly conceive. In the next place, from reflecting on the circumstance that I doubted, and that consequently my being was not wholly perfect (for I clearly saw that it was a greater perfection to know than to doubt), I was led to inquire whence I had learned to think of something more perfect than myself; and I clearly recognized that I must hold this notion from some nature which in reality was more perfect. As for the thoughts of many other objects external to me, as of the sky, the earth, light, heat, and a thousand more, I was less at a loss to know whence these came; for since I remarked in them nothing which seemed to render them superior to myself, I could believe that, if these were true, they were dependencies on my own nature, in so far as it possessed a certain perfection, and, if they were false, that I held them from nothing, that is to say, that they were in me because of a certain imperfection of my nature. But this could not be the case with-the idea of a nature more perfect than myself; for to receive it from nothing was a thing manifestly impossible; and, because it is not less repugnant that the more perfect should be an effect of, and dependence on the less perfect, than that something should proceed from nothing, it was equally impossible that I could hold it from myself: accordingly, it but remained that it had been placed in me by a nature which was in reality more perfect than mine, and which even possessed within itself all the perfections of which I could form any idea; that is to say, in a single word, which was God. And to this I added that, since I knew some perfections which I did not possess, I was not the only being in existence (I will here, with your permission, freely use the terms of the schools); but, on the contrary, that there was of necessity some other more perfect Being upon whom I was dependent, and from whom I had received all that I possessed; for if I had existed alone, and independently of every other being, so as to have had from myself all the perfection, however little, which I actually possessed, I should have been able, for the same reason, to have had from myself the whole remainder of perfection, of the want of which I was conscious, and thus could of myself have become infinite, eternal, immutable, omniscient, all-powerful, and, in fine, have possessed all the perfections which I could recognize in God. For in order to know the nature of God (whose existence has been established by the preceding reasonings), as far as my own nature permitted, I had only to consider in reference to all the properties of which I found in my mind some idea, whether their possession was a mark of perfection; and I was assured that no one which indicated any imperfection was in him, and that none of the rest was awanting. Thus I perceived that doubt, inconstancy, sadness, and such like, could not be found in God, since I myself would have been happy to be free from them. Besides, I had ideas of many sensible and corporeal things; for although I might suppose that I was dreaming, and that all which I saw or imagined was false, I could not, nevertheless, deny that the ideas were in reality in my thoughts. But, because I had already very clearly recognized in myself that the intelligent nature is distinct from the corporeal, and as I observed that all composition is an evidence of dependency, and that a state of dependency is manifestly a state of imperfection, I therefore determined that it could not be a perfection in God to be compounded of these two natures and that consequently he was not so compounded; but that if there were any bodies in the world, or even any intelligences, or other natures that were not wholly perfect, their existence depended on his power in such a way that they could not subsist without him for a single moment. I was disposed straightway to search for other truths and when I had represented to myself the object of the geometers, which I conceived to be a continuous body or a space indefinitely extended in length, breadth, and height or depth, divisible into divers parts which admit of different figures and sizes, and of being moved or transposed in all manner of ways (for all this the geometers suppose to be in the object they contemplate), I went over some of their simplest demonstrations. And, in the first place, I observed, that the great certitude which by common consent is accorded to these demonstrations, is founded solely upon this, that they are clearly conceived in accordance with the rules I have already laid down In the next place, I perceived that there was nothing at all in these demonstrations which could assure me of the existence of their object: thus, for example, supposing a triangle to be given, I distinctly perceived that its three angles were necessarily equal to two right angles, but I did not on that account perceive anything which could assure me that any triangle existed: while, on the contrary, recurring to the examination of the idea of a Perfect Being, I found that the existence of the Being was comprised in the idea in the same way that the equality of its three angles to two right angles is comprised in the idea of a triangle, or as in the idea of a sphere, the equidistance of all points on its surface from the center, or even still more clearly; and that consequently it is at least as certain that God, who is this Perfect Being, is, or exists, as any demonstration of geometry can be. But the reason which leads many to persuade them selves that there is a difficulty in knowing this truth, and even also in knowing what their mind really is, is that they never raise their thoughts above sensible objects, and are so accustomed to consider nothing except by way of imagination, which is a mode of thinking limited to material objects, that all that is not imaginable seems to them not intelligible. The truth of this is sufficiently manifest from the single circumstance, that the philosophers of the schools accept as a maxim that there is nothing in the understanding which was not previously in the senses, in which however it is certain that the ideas of God and of the soul have never been; and it appears to me that they who make use of their imagination to comprehend these ideas do exactly the some thing as if, in order to hear sounds or smell odors, they strove to avail themselves of their eyes; unless indeed that there is this difference, that the sense of sight does not afford us an inferior assurance to those of smell or hearing; in place of which, neither our imagination nor our senses can give us assurance of anything unless our understanding intervene. Finally, if there be still persons who are not sufficiently persuaded of the existence of God and of the soul, by the reasons I have adduced, I am desirous that they should know that all the other propositions, of the truth of which they deem themselves perhaps more assured, as that we have a body, and that there exist stars and an earth, and such like, are less certain; for, although we have a moral assurance of these things, which is so strong that there is an appearance of extravagance in doubting of their existence, yet at the same time no one, unless his intellect is impaired, can deny, when the question relates to a metaphysical certitude, that there is sufficient reason to exclude entire assurance, in the observation that when asleep we can in the same way imagine ourselves possessed of another body and that we see other stars and another earth, when there is nothing of the kind. For how do we know that the thoughts which occur in dreaming are false rather than those other which we experience when awake, since the former are often not less vivid and distinct than the latter? And though men of the highest genius study this question as long as they please, I do not believe that they will be able to give any reason which can be sufficient to remove this doubt, unless they presuppose the existence of God. For, in the first place even the principle which I have already taken as a rule, viz., that all the things which we clearly and distinctly conceive are true, is certain only because God is or exists and because he is a Perfect Being, and because all that we possess is derived from him: whence it follows that our ideas or notions, which to the extent of their clearness and distinctness are real, and proceed from God, must to that extent be true. Accordingly, whereas we not infrequently have ideas or notions in which some falsity is contained, this can only be the case with such as are to some extent confused and obscure, and in this proceed from nothing (participate of negation), that is, exist in us thus confused because we are not wholly perfect. And it is evident that it is not less repugnant that falsity or imperfection, in so far as it is imperfection, should proceed from God, than that truth or perfection should proceed from nothing. But if we did not know that all which we possess of real and true proceeds from a Perfect and Infinite Being, however clear and distinct our ideas might be, we should have no ground on that account for the assurance that they possessed the perfection of being true. But after the knowledge of God and of the soul has rendered us certain of this rule, we can easily understand that the truth of the thoughts we experience when awake, ought not in the slightest degree to be called in question on account of the illusions of our dreams. For if it happened that an individual, even when asleep, had some very distinct idea, as, for example, if a geometer should discover some new demonstration, the circumstance of his being asleep would not militate against its truth; and as for the most ordinary error of our dreams, which consists in their representing to us various objects in the same way as our external senses, this is not prejudicial, since it leads us very properly to suspect the truth of the ideas of sense; for we are not infrequently deceived in the same manner when awake; as when persons in the jaundice see all objects yellow, or when the stars or bodies at a great distance appear to us much smaller than they are. For, in fine, whether awake or asleep, we ought never to allow ourselves to be persuaded of the truth of anything unless on the evidence of our reason. And it must be noted that I say of our reason, and not of our imagination or of our senses: thus, for example, although we very clearly see the sun, we ought not therefore to determine that it is only of the size which our sense of sight presents; and we may very distinctly imagine the head of a lion joined to the body of a goat, without being therefore shut up to the conclusion that a chimaera exists; for it is not a dictate of reason that what we thus see or imagine is in reality existent; but it plainly tells us that all our ideas or notions contain in them some truth; for otherwise it could not be that God, who is wholly perfect and veracious, should have placed them in us. And because our reasonings are never so clear or so complete during sleep as when we are awake, although sometimes the acts of our imagination are then as lively and distinct, if not more so than in our waking moments, reason further dictates that, since all our thoughts cannot be true because of our partial imperfection, those possessing truth must infallibly be found in the experience of our waking moments rather than in that of our dreams. PART V I would here willingly have proceeded to exhibit the whole chain of truths which I deduced from these primary but as with a view to this it would have been necessary now to treat of many questions in dispute among the earned, with whom I do not wish to be embroiled, I believe that it will be better for me to refrain from this exposition, and only mention in general what these truths are, that the more judicious may be able to determine whether a more special account of them would conduce to the public advantage. I have ever remained firm in my original resolution to suppose no other principle than that of which I have recently availed myself in demonstrating the existence of God and of the soul, and to accept as true nothing that did not appear to me more clear and certain than the demonstrations of the geometers had formerly appeared; and yet I venture to state that not only have I found means to satisfy myself in a short time on all the principal difficulties which are usually treated of in philosophy, but I have also observed certain laws established in nature by God in such a manner, and of which he has impressed on our minds such notions, that after we have reflected sufficiently upon these, we cannot doubt that they are accurately observed in all that exists or takes place in the world and farther, by considering the concatenation of these laws, it appears to me that I have discovered many truths more useful and more important than all I had before learned, or even had expected to learn. But because I have essayed to expound the chief of these discoveries in a treatise which certain considerations prevent me from publishing, I cannot make the results known more conveniently than by here giving a summary of the contents of this treatise. It was my design to comprise in it all that, before I set myself to write it, I thought I knew of the nature of material objects. But like the painters who, finding themselves unable to represent equally well on a plain surface all the different faces of a solid body, select one of the chief, on which alone they make the light fall, and throwing the rest into the shade, allow them to appear only in so far as they can be seen while looking at the principal one; so, fearing lest I should not be able to compense in my discourse all that was in my mind, I resolved to expound singly, though at considerable length, my opinions regarding light; then to take the opportunity of adding something on the sun and the fixed stars, since light almost wholly proceeds from them; on the heavens since they transmit it; on the planets, comets, and earth, since they reflect it; and particularly on all the bodies that are upon the earth, since they are either colored, or transparent, or luminous; and finally on man, since he is the spectator of these objects. Further, to enable me to cast this variety of subjects somewhat into the shade, and to express my judgment regarding them with greater freedom, without being necessitated to adopt or refute the opinions of the learned, I resolved to leave all the people here to their disputes, and to speak only of what would happen in a new world, if God were now to create somewhere in the imaginary spaces matter sufficient to compose one, and were to agitate variously and confusedly the different parts of this matter, so that there resulted a chaos as disordered as the poets ever feigned, and after that did nothing more than lend his ordinary concurrence to nature, and allow her to act in accordance with the laws which he had established. On this supposition, I, in the first place, described this matter, and essayed to represent it in such a manner that to my mind there can be nothing clearer and more intelligible, except what has been recently said regarding God and the soul; for I even expressly supposed that it possessed none of those forms or qualities which are so debated in the schools, nor in general anything the knowledge of which is not so natural to our minds that no one can so much as imagine himself ignorant of it. Besides, I have pointed out what are the laws of nature; and, with no other principle upon which to found my reasonings except the infinite perfection of God, I endeavored to demonstrate all those about which there could be any room for doubt, and to prove that they are such, that even if God had created more worlds, there could have been none in which these laws were not observed. Thereafter, I showed how the greatest part of the matter of this chaos must, in accordance with these laws, dispose and arrange itself in such a way as to present the appearance of heavens; how in the meantime some of its parts must compose an earth and some planets and comets, and others a sun and fixed stars. And, making a digression at this stage on the subject of light, I expounded at considerable length what the nature of that light must be which is found in the sun and the stars, and how thence in an instant of time it traverses the immense spaces of the heavens, and how from the planets and comets it is reflected towards the earth. To this I likewise added much respecting the substance, the situation, the motions, and all the different qualities of these heavens and stars; so that I thought I had said enough respecting them to show that there is nothing observable in the heavens or stars of our system that must not, or at least may not appear precisely alike in those of the system which I described. I came next to speak of the earth in particular, and to show how, even though I had expressly supposed that God had given no weight to the matter of which it is composed, this should not prevent all its parts from tending exactly to its center; how with water and air on its surface, the disposition of the heavens and heavenly bodies, more especially of the moon, must cause a flow and ebb, like in all its circumstances to that observed in our seas, as also a certain current both of water and air from east to west, such as is likewise observed between the tropics; how the mountains, seas, fountains, and rivers might naturally be formed in it, and the metals produced in the mines, and the plants grow in the fields and in general, how all the bodies which are commonly denominated mixed or composite might be generated and, among other things in the discoveries alluded to inasmuch as besides the stars, I knew nothing except fire which produces light, I spared no pains to set forth all that pertains to its nature, - the manner of its production and support, and to explain how heat is sometimes found without light, and light without heat; to show how it can induce various colors upon different bodies and other diverse qualities; how it reduces some to a liquid state and hardens others; how it can consume almost all bodies, or convert them into ashes and smoke; and finally, how from these ashes, by the mere intensity of its action, it forms glass: for as this transmutation of ashes into glass appeared to me as wonderful as any other in nature, I took a special pleasure in describing it. I was not, however, disposed, from these circumstances, to conclude that this world had been created in the manner I described; for it is much more likely that God made it at the first such as it was to be. But this is certain, and an opinion commonly received among theologians, that the action by which he now sustains it is the same with that by which he originally created it; so that even although he had from the beginning given it no other form than that of chaos, provided only he had established certain laws of nature, and had lent it his concurrence to enable it to act as it is wont to do, it may be believed, without discredit to the miracle of creation, that, in this way alone, things purely material might, in course of time, have become such as we observe them at present; and their nature is much more easily conceived when they are beheld coming in this manner gradually into existence, than when they are only considered as produced at once in a finished and perfect state. to be continued in the next issue... From the description of inanimate bodies and plants, I passed to animals, and particularly to man. But since I had not as yet sufficient knowledge to enable me to treat of these in the same manner as of the rest, that is to say, by deducing effects from their causes, and by showing from what elements and in what manner nature must produce them, I remained satisfied with the supposition that God formed the body of man wholly like to one of ours, as well in the external shape of the members as in the internal conformation of the organs, of the same matter with that I had described, and at first placed in it no rational soul, nor any other principle, in room of the vegetative or sensitive soul, beyond kindling in the heart one of those fires without light, such as I had already described, and which I thought was not different from the heat in hay that has been heaped together before it is dry, or that which causes fermentation in new wines before they are run clear of the fruit. For, when I examined the kind of functions which might, as consequences of this supposition, exist in this body, I found precisely all those which may exist in us independently of all power of thinking, and consequently without being in any measure owing to the soul; in other words, to that part of us which is distinct from the body, and of which it has been said above that the nature distinctively consists in thinking, functions in which the animals void of reason may be said wholly to resemble us; but among which I could not discover any of those that, as dependent on thought alone, belong to us as men, while, on the other hand, I did afterwards discover these as soon as I supposed God to have created a rational soul, and to have annexed it to this body in a particular manner which I described. But, in order to show how I there handled this matter, I mean here to give the explication of the motion of the heart and arteries, which, as the first and most general motion observed in animals, will afford the means of readily determining what should be thought of all the rest. And that there may be less difficulty in understanding what I am about to say on this subject, I advise those who are not versed in anatomy, before they commence the perusal of these observations, to take the trouble of getting dissected in their presence the heart of some large animal possessed of lungs (for this is throughout sufficiently like the human), and to have shown to them its two ventricles or cavities: in the first place, that in the right side, with which correspond two very ample tubes, viz., the hollow vein (vena cava), which is the principal receptacle of the blood, and the trunk of the tree, as it were, of which all the other veins in the body are branches; and the arterial vein (vena arteriosa), inappropriately so denominated, since it is in truth only an artery, which, taking its rise in the heart, is divided, after passing out from it, into many branches which presently disperse themselves all over the lungs; in the second place, the cavity in the left side, with which correspond in the same manner two canals in size equal to or larger than the preceding, viz., the venous artery (arteria venosa), likewise inappropriately thus designated, because it is simply a vein which comes from the lungs, where it is divided into many branches, interlaced with those of the arterial vein, and those of the tube called the windpipe, through which the air we breathe enters; and the great artery which, issuing from the heart, sends its branches all over the body. I should wish also that such persons were carefully shown the eleven pellicles which, like so many small valves, open and shut the four orifices that are in these two cavities, viz., three at the entrance of the hollow veins where they are disposed in such a manner as by no means to prevent the blood which it contains from flowing into the right ventricle of the heart, and yet exactly to prevent its flowing out; three at the entrance to the arterial vein, which, arranged in a manner exactly the opposite of the former, readily permit the blood contained in this cavity to pass into the lungs, but hinder that contained in the lungs from returning to this cavity; and, in like manner, two others at the mouth of the venous artery, which allow the blood from the lungs to flow into the left cavity of the heart, but preclude its return; and three at the mouth of the great artery, which suffer the blood to flow from the heart, but prevent its reflux. Nor do we need to seek any other reason for the number of these pellicles beyond this that the orifice of the venous artery being of an oval shape from the nature of its situation, can be adequately closed with two, whereas the others being round are more conveniently closed with three. Besides, I wish such persons to observe that the grand artery and the arterial vein are of much harder and firmer texture than the venous artery and the hollow vein; and that the two last expand before entering the heart, and there form, as it were, two pouches denominated the auricles of the heart, which are composed of a substance similar to that of the heart itself; and that there is always more warmth in the heart than in any other part of the body- and finally, that this heat is capable of causing any drop of blood that passes into the cavities rapidly to expand and dilate, just as all liquors do when allowed to fall drop by drop into a highly heated vessel. For, after these things, it is not necessary for me to say anything more with a view to explain the motion of the heart, except that when its cavities are not full of blood, into these the blood of necessity flows, - - from the hollow vein into the right, and from the venous artery into the left; because these two vessels are always full of blood, and their orifices, which are turned towards the heart, cannot then be closed. But as soon as two drops of blood have thus passed, one into each of the cavities, these drops which cannot but be very large, because the orifices through which they pass are wide, and the vessels from which they come full of blood, are immediately rarefied, and dilated by the heat they meet with. In this way they cause the whole heart to expand, and at the same time press home and shut the five small valves that are at the entrances of the two vessels from which they flow, and thus prevent any more blood from coming down into the heart, and becoming more and more rarefied, they push open the six small valves that are in the orifices of the other two vessels, through which they pass out, causing in this way all the branches of the arterial vein and of the grand artery to expand almost simultaneously with the heart which immediately thereafter begins to contract, as do also the arteries, because the blood that has entered them has cooled, and the six small valves close, and the five of the hollow vein and of the venous artery open anew and allow a passage to other two drops of blood, which cause the heart and the arteries again to expand as before. And, because the blood which thus enters into the heart passes through these two pouches called auricles, it thence happens that their motion is the contrary of that of the heart, and that when it expands they contract. But lest those who are ignorant of the force of mathematical demonstrations and who are not accustomed to distinguish true reasons from mere verisimilitudes, should venture. without examination, to deny what has been said, I wish it to be considered that the motion which I have now explained follows as necessarily from the very arrangement of the parts, which may be observed in the heart by the eye alone, and from the heat which may be felt with the fingers, and from the nature of the blood as learned from experience, as does the motion of a clock from the power, the situation, and shape of its counterweights and wheels. But if it be asked how it happens that the blood in the veins, flowing in this way continually into the heart, is not exhausted, and why the arteries do not become too full, since all the blood which passes through the heart flows into them, I need only mention in reply what has been written by a physician 1 of England, who has the honor of having broken the ice on this subject, and of having been the first to teach that there are many small passages at the extremities of the arteries, through which the blood received by them from the heart passes into the small branches of the veins, whence it again returns to the heart; so that its course amounts precisely to a perpetual circulation. Of this we have abundant proof in the ordinary experience of surgeons, who, by binding the arm with a tie of moderate straitness above the part where they open the vein, cause the blood to flow more copiously than it would have done without any ligature; whereas quite the contrary would happen were they to bind it below; that is, between the hand and the opening, or were to make the ligature above the opening very tight. For it is manifest that the tie, moderately straightened, while adequate to hinder the blood already in the arm from returning towards the heart by the veins, cannot on that account prevent new blood from coming forward through the arteries, because these are situated below the veins, and their coverings, from their greater consistency, are more difficult to compress; and also that the blood which comes from the heart tends to pass through them to the hand with greater force than it does to return from the hand to the heart through the veins. And since the latter current escapes from the arm by the opening made in one of the veins, there must of necessity be certain passages below the ligature, that is, towards the extremities of the arm through which it can come thither from the arteries. This physician likewise abundantly establishes what he has advanced respecting the motion of the blood, from the existence of certain pellicles, so disposed in various places along the course of the veins, in the manner of small valves, as not to permit the blood to pass from the middle of the body towards the extremities, but only to return from the extremities to the heart; and farther, from experience which shows that all the blood which is in the body may flow out of it in a very short time through a single artery that has been cut, even although this had been closely tied in the immediate neighborhood of the heart and cut between the heart and the ligature, so as to prevent the supposition that the blood flowing out of it could come from any other quarter than the heart. But there are many other circumstances which evince that what I have alleged is the true cause of the motion of the blood: thus, in the first place, the difference that is observed between the blood which flows from the veins, and that from the arteries, can only arise from this, that being rarefied, and, as it were, distilled by passing through the heart, it is thinner, and more vivid, and warmer immediately after leaving the heart, in other words, when in the arteries, than it was a short time before passing into either, in other words, when it was in the veins; and if attention be given, it will be found that this difference is very marked only in the neighborhood of the heart; and is not so evident in parts more remote from it. In the next place, the consistency of the coats of which the arterial vein and the great artery are composed, sufficiently shows that the blood is impelled against them with more force than against the veins. And why should the left cavity of the heart and the great artery be wider and larger than the right cavity and the arterial vein, were it not that the blood of the venous artery, having only been in the lungs after it has passed through the heart, is thinner, and rarefies more readily, and in a higher degree, than the blood which proceeds immediately from the hollow vein? And what can physicians conjecture from feeling the pulse unless they know that according as the blood changes its nature it can be rarefied by the warmth of the heart, in a higher or lower degree, and more or less quickly than before? And if it be inquired how this heat is communicated to the other members, must it not be admitted that this is effected by means of the blood, which, passing through the heart, is there heated anew, and thence diffused over all the body? Whence it happens, that if the blood be withdrawn from any part, the heat is likewise withdrawn by the same means; and although the heart were as-hot as glowing iron, it would not be capable of warming the feet and hands as at present, unless it continually sent thither new blood. We likewise perceive from this, that the true use of respiration is to bring sufficient fresh air into the lungs, to cause the blood which flows into them from the right ventricle of the heart, where it has been rarefied and, as it were, changed into vapors, to become thick, and to convert it anew into blood, before it flows into the left cavity, without which process it would be unfit for the nourishment of the fire that is there. This receives confirmation from the circumstance, that it is observed of animals destitute of lungs that they have also but one cavity in the heart, and that in children who cannot use them while in the womb, there is a hole through which the blood flows from the hollow vein into the left cavity of the heart, and a tube through which it passes from the arterial vein into the grand artery without passing through the lung. In the next place, how could digestion be carried on in the stomach unless the heart communicated heat to it through the arteries, and along with this certain of the more fluid parts of the blood, which assist in the dissolution of the food that has been taken in? Is not also the operation which converts the juice of food into blood easily comprehended, when it is considered that it is distilled by passing and repassing through the heart perhaps more than one or two hundred times in a day? And what more need be adduced to explain nutrition, and the production of the different humors of the body, beyond saying, that the force with which the blood, in being rarefied, passes from the heart towards the extremities of the arteries, causes certain of its parts to remain in the members at which they arrive, and there occupy the place of some others expelled by them; and that according to the situation, shape, or smallness of the pores with which they meet, some rather than others flow into certain parts, in the same way that some sieves are observed to act, which, by being variously perforated, serve to separate different species of grain? And, in the last place, what above all is here worthy of observation, is the generation of the animal spirits, which are like a very subtle wind, or rather a very pure and vivid flame which, continually ascending in great abundance from the heart to the brain, thence penetrates through the nerves into the muscles, and gives motion to all the members; so that to account for other parts of the blood which, as most agitated and penetrating, are the fittest to compose these spirits, proceeding towards the brain, it is not necessary to suppose any other cause, than simply, that the arteries which carry them thither proceed from the heart in the most direct lines, and that, according to the rules of mechanics which are the same with those of nature, when many objects tend at once to the same point where there is not sufficient room for all (as is the case with the parts of the blood which flow forth from the left cavity of the heart and tend towards the brain), the weaker and less agitated parts must necessarily be driven aside from that point by the stronger which alone in this way reach it I had expounded all these matters with sufficient minuteness in the treatise which I formerly thought of publishing. And after these, I had shown what must be the fabric of the nerves and muscles of the human body to give the animal spirits contained in it the power to move the members, as when we see heads shortly after they have been struck off still move and bite the earth, although no longer animated; what changes must take place in the brain to produce waking, sleep, and dreams; how light, sounds, odors, tastes, heat, and all the other qualities of external objects impress it with different ideas by means of the senses; how hunger, thirst, and the other internal affections can likewise impress upon it divers ideas; what must be understood by the common sense (sensus communis) in which these ideas are received, by the memory which retains them, by the fantasy which can change them in various ways, and out of them compose new ideas, and which, by the same means, distributing the animal spirits through the muscles, can cause the members of such a body to move in as many different ways, and in a manner as suited, whether to the objects that are presented to its senses or to its internal affections, as can take place in our own case apart from the guidance of the will. Nor will this appear at all strange to those who are acquainted with the variety of movements performed by the different automata, or moving machines fabricated by human industry, and that with help of but few pieces compared with the great multitude of bones, muscles, nerves, arteries, veins, and other parts that are found in the body of each animal. Such persons will look upon this body as a machine made by the hands of God, which is incomparably better arranged, and adequate to movements more admirable than is any machine of human invention. And here I specially stayed to show that, were there such machines exactly resembling organs and outward form an ape or any other irrational animal, we could have no means of knowing that they were in any respect of a different nature from these animals; but if there were machines bearing the image of our bodies, and capable of imitating our actions as far as it is morally possible, there would still remain two most certain tests whereby to know that they were not therefore really men. Of these the first is that they could never use words or other signs arranged in such a manner as is competent to us in order to declare our thoughts to others: for we may easily conceive a machine to be so constructed that it emits vocables, and even that it emits some correspondent to the action upon it of external objects which cause a change in its organs; for example, if touched in a particular place it may demand what we wish to say to it; if in another it may cry out that it is hurt, and such like; but not that it should arrange them variously so as appositely to reply to what is said in its presence, as men of the lowest grade of intellect can do. The second test is, that although such machines might execute many things with equal or perhaps greater perfection than any of us, they would, without doubt, fail in certain others from which it could be discovered that they did not act from knowledge, but solely from the disposition of their organs: for while reason is an universal instrument that is alike available on every occasion, these organs, on the contrary, need a particular arrangement for each particular action; whence it must be morally impossible that there should exist in any machine a diversity of organs sufficient to enable it to act in all the occurrences of life, in the way in which our reason enables us to act. Again, by means of these two tests we may likewise know the difference between men and brutes. For it is highly deserving of remark, that there are no men so dull and stupid, not even idiots, as to be incapable of joining together different words, and thereby constructing a declaration by which to make their thoughts understood; and that on the other hand, there is no other animal, however perfect or happily circumstanced, which can do the like. Nor does this inability arise from want of organs: for we observe that magpies and parrots can utter words like ourselves, and are yet unable to speak as we do, that is, so as to show that they understand what they say; in place of which men born deaf and dumb, and thus not less, but rather more than the brutes, destitute of the organs which others use in speaking, are in the habit of spontaneously inventing certain signs by which they discover their thoughts to those who, being usually in their company, have leisure to learn their language. And this proves not only that the brutes have less reason than man, but that they have none at all: for we see that very little is required to enable a person to speak; and since a certain inequality of capacity is observable among animals of the same species, as well as among men, and since some are more capable of being instructed than others, it is incredible that the most perfect ape or parrot of its species, should not in this be equal to the most stupid infant of its kind or at least to one that was crack-brained, unless the soul of brutes were of a nature wholly different from ours. And we ought not to confound speech with the natural movements which indicate the passions, and can be imitated by machines as well as manifested by animals; nor must it be thought with certain of the ancients, that the brutes speak, although we do not understand their language. For if such were the case, since they are endowed with many organs analogous to ours, they could as easily communicate their thoughts to us as to their fellows. It is also very worthy of remark, that, though there are many animals which manifest more industry than we in certain of their actions, the same animals are yet observed to show none at all in many others: so that the circumstance that they do better than we does not prove that they are endowed with mind, for it would thence follow that they possessed greater reason than any of us, and could surpass us in all things; on the contrary, it rather proves that they are destitute of reason, and that it is nature which acts in them according to the disposition of their organs: thus it is seen, that a clock composed only of wheels and weights can number the hours and measure time more exactly than we with all our skin. I had after this described the reasonable soul, and shown that it could by no means be educed from the power of matter, as the other things of which I had spoken, but that it must be expressly created; and that it is not sufficient that it be lodged in the human body exactly like a pilot in a ship, unless perhaps to move its members, but that it is necessary for it to be joined and united more closely to the body, in order to have sensations and appetites similar to ours, and thus constitute a real man. I here entered, in conclusion, upon the subject of the soul at considerable length, because it is of the greatest moment: for after the error of those who deny the existence of God, an error which I think I have already sufficiently refuted, there is none that is more powerful in leading feeble minds astray from the straight path of virtue than the supposition that the soul of the brutes is of the same nature with our own; and consequently that after this life we have nothing to hope for or fear, more than flies and ants; in place of which, when we know how far they differ we much better comprehend the reasons which establish that the soul is of a nature wholly independent of the body, and that consequently it is not liable to die with the latter and, finally, because no other causes are observed capable of destroying it, we are naturally led thence to judge that it is immortal. PART VI Three years have now elapsed since I finished the treatise containing all these matters; and I was beginning to revise it, with the view to put it into the hands of a printer, when I learned that persons to whom I greatly defer, and whose authority over my actions is hardly less influential than is my own reason over my thoughts, had condemned a certain doctrine in physics, published a short time previously by another individual to which I will not say that I adhered, but only that, previously to their censure I had observed in it nothing which I could imagine to be prejudicial either to religion or to the state, and nothing therefore which would have prevented me from giving expression to it in writing, if reason had persuaded me of its truth; and this led me to fear lest among my own doctrines likewise some one might be found in which I had departed from the truth, notwithstanding the great care I have always taken not to accord belief to new opinions of which I had not the most certain demonstrations, and not to give expression to aught that might tend to the hurt of any one. This has been sufficient to make me alter my purpose of publishing them; for although the reasons by which I had been induced to take this resolution were very strong, yet my inclination, which has always been hostile to writing books, enabled me immediately to discover other considerations sufficient to excuse me for not undertaking the task. And these reasons, on one side and the other, are such, that not only is it in some measure my interest here to state them, but that of the public, perhaps, to know them. I have never made much account of what has proceeded from my own mind; and so long as I gathered no other advantage from the method I employ beyond satisfying myself on some difficulties belonging to the speculative sciences, or endeavoring to regulate my actions according to the principles it taught me, I never thought myself bound to publish anything respecting it. For in what regards manners, every one is so full of his own wisdom, that there might be found as many reformers as heads, if any were allowed to take upon themselves the task of mending them, except those whom God has constituted the supreme rulers of his people or to whom he has given sufficient grace and zeal to be prophets; and although my speculations greatly pleased myself, I believed that others had theirs, which perhaps pleased them still more. But as soon as I had acquired some general notions respecting physics, and beginning to make trial of them in various particular difficulties, had observed how far they can carry us, and how much they differ from the principles that have been employed up to the present time, I believed that I could not keep them concealed without sinning grievously against the law by which we are bound to promote, as far as in us lies, the general good of mankind. For by them I perceived it to be possible to arrive at knowledge highly useful in life; and in room of the speculative philosophy usually taught in the schools, to discover a practical, by means of which, knowing the force and action of fire, water, air the stars, the heavens, and all the other bodies that surround us, as distinctly as we know the various crafts of our artisans, we might also apply them in the same way to all the uses to which they are adapted, and thus render ourselves the lords and possessors of nature. And this is a result to be desired, not only in order to the invention of an infinity of arts, by which we might be enabled to enjoy without any trouble the fruits of the earth, and all its comforts, but also and especially for the preservation of health, which is without doubt, of all the blessings of this life, the first and fundamental one; for the mind is so intimately dependent upon the condition and relation of the organs of the body, that if any means can ever be found to render men wiser and more ingenious than hitherto, I believe that it is in medicine they must be sought for. It is true that the science of medicine, as it now exists, contains few things whose utility is very remarkable: but without any wish to depreciate it, I am confident that there is no one, even among those whose profession it is, who does not admit that all at present known in it is almost nothing in comparison of what remains to be discovered; and that we could free ourselves from an infinity of maladies of body as well as of mind, and perhaps also even from the debility of age, if we had sufficiently ample knowledge of their causes, and of all the remedies provided for us by nature. But since I designed to employ my whole life in the search after so necessary a science, and since I had fallen in with a path which seems to me such, that if any one follow it he must inevitably reach the end desired, unless he be hindered either by the shortness of life or the want of experiments, I judged that there could be no more effectual provision against these two impediments than if I were faithfully to communicate to the public all the little I might myself have found, and incite men of superior genius to strive to proceed farther, by contributing, each according to his inclination and ability, to the experiments which it would be necessary to make, and also by informing the public of all they might discover, so that, by the last beginning where those before them had left off, and thus connecting the lives and labours of many, we might collectively proceed much farther than each by himself could do. I remarked, moreover, with respect to experiments, that they become always more necessary the more one is advanced in knowledge; for, at the commencement, it is better to make use only of what is spontaneously presented to our senses, and of which we cannot remain ignorant, provided we bestow on it any reflection, however slight, than to concern ourselves about more uncommon and recondite phenomena: the reason of which is, that the more uncommon often only mislead us so long as the causes of the more ordinary are still unknown; and the circumstances upon which they depend are almost always so special and minute as to be highly difficult to detect. But in this I have adopted the following order: first, I have essayed to find in general the principles, or first causes of all that is or can be in the world, without taking into consideration for this end anything but God himself who has created it, and without educing them from any other source than from certain germs of truths naturally existing in our minds In the second place, I examined what were the first and most ordinary effects that could be deduced from these causes; and it appears to me that, in this way, I have found heavens, stars, an earth, and even on the earth water, air, fire, minerals, and some other things of this kind, which of all others are the most common and simple, and hence the easiest to know. Afterwards when I wished to descend to the more particular, so many diverse objects presented themselves to me, that I believed it to be impossible for the human mind to distinguish the forms or species of bodies that are upon the earth, from an infinity of others which might have been, if it had pleased God to place them there, or consequently to apply them to our use, unless we rise to causes through their effects, and avail ourselves of many particular experiments. Thereupon, turning over in my mind I the objects that had ever been presented to my senses I freely venture to state that I have never observed any which I could not satisfactorily explain by the principles had discovered. But it is necessary also to confess that the power of nature is so ample and vast, and these principles so simple and general, that I have hardly observed a single particular effect which I cannot at once recognize as capable of being deduced in man different modes from the principles, and that my greatest difficulty usually is to discover in which of these modes the effect is dependent upon them; for out of this difficulty cannot otherwise extricate myself than by again seeking certain experiments, which may be such that their result is not the same, if it is in the one of these modes at we must explain it, as it would be if it were to be explained in the other. As to what remains, I am now in a position to discern, as I think, with sufficient clearness what course must be taken to make the majority those experiments which may conduce to this end: but I perceive likewise that they are such and so numerous, that neither my hands nor my income, though it were a thousand times larger than it is, would be sufficient for them all; so that according as henceforward I shall have the means of making more or fewer experiments, I shall in the same proportion make greater or less progress in the knowledge of nature. This was what I had hoped to make known by the treatise I had written, and so clearly to exhibit the advantage that would thence accrue to the public, as to induce all who have the common good of man at heart, that is, all who are virtuous in truth, and not merely in appearance, or according to opinion, as well to communicate to me the experiments they had already made, as to assist me in those that remain to be made. But since that time other reasons have occurred to me, by which I have been led to change my opinion, and to think that I ought indeed to go on committing to writing all the results which I deemed of any moment, as soon as I should have tested their truth, and to bestow the same care upon them as I would have done had it been my design to publish them. This course commended itself to me, as well because I thus afforded myself more ample inducement to examine them thoroughly, for doubtless that is always more narrowly scrutinized which we believe will be read by many, than that which is written merely for our private use (and frequently what has seemed to me true when I first conceived it, has appeared false when I have set about committing it to writing), as because I thus lost no opportunity of advancing the interests of the public, as far as in me lay, and since thus likewise, if my writings possess any value, those into whose hands they may fall after my death may be able to put them to what use they deem proper. But I resolved by no means to consent to their publication during my lifetime, lest either the oppositions or the controversies to which they might give rise, or even the reputation, such as it might be, which they would acquire for me, should be any occasion of my losing the time that I had set apart for my own improvement. For though it be true that every one is bound to promote to the extent of his ability the good of others, and that to be useful to no one is really to be worthless, yet it is likewise true that our cares ought to extend beyond the present, and it is good to omit doing what might perhaps bring some profit to the living, when we have in view the accomplishment of other ends that will be of much greater advantage to posterity. And in truth, I am quite willing it should be known that the little I have hitherto learned is almost nothing in comparison with that of which I am ignorant, and to the knowledge of which I do not despair of being able to attain; for it is much the same with those who gradually discover truth in the sciences, as with those who when growing rich find less difficulty in making great acquisitions, than they formerly experienced when poor in making acquisitions of much smaller amount. Or they may be compared to the commanders of armies, whose forces usually increase in proportion to their victories, and who need greater prudence to keep together the residue of their troops after a defeat than after a victory to take towns and provinces. For he truly engages in battle who endeavors to surmount all the difficulties and errors which prevent him from reaching the knowledge of truth, and he is overcome in fight who admits a false opinion touching a matter of any generality and importance, and he requires thereafter much more skill to recover his former position than to make great advances when once in possession of thoroughly ascertained principles. As for myself, if I have succeeded in discovering any truths in the sciences (and I trust that what is contained in this volume 1 will show that I have found some), I can declare that they are but the consequences and results of five or six principal difficulties which I have surmounted, and my encounters with which I reckoned as battles in which victory declared for me. I will not hesitate even to avow my belief that nothing further is wanting to enable me fully to realize my designs than to gain two or three similar victories; and that I am not so far advanced in years but that, according to the ordinary course of nature, I may still have sufficient leisure for this end. But I conceive myself the more bound to husband the time that remains the greater my expectation of being able to employ it aright, and I should doubtless have much to rob me of it, were I to publish the principles of my physics: for although they are almost all so evident that to assent to them no more is needed than simply to understand them, and although there is not one of them of which I do not expect to be able to give demonstration, yet, as it is impossible that they can be in accordance with all the diverse opinions of others, I foresee that I should frequently be turned aside from my grand design, on occasion of the opposition which they would be sure to awaken. It may be said, that these oppositions would be useful both in making me aware of my errors, and, if my speculations contain anything of value, in bringing others to a fuller understanding of it; and still farther, as many can see better than one, in leading others who are now beginning to avail themselves of my principles, to assist me in turn with their discoveries. But though I recognize my extreme liability to error, and scarce ever trust to the first thoughts which occur to me, yet-the experience I have had of possible objections to my views prevents me from anticipating any profit from them. For I have already had frequent proof of the judgments, as well of those I esteemed friends, as of some others to whom I thought I was an object of indifference, and even of some whose malignancy and envy would, I knew, determine them to endeavor to discover what partiality concealed from the eyes of my friends. But it has rarely happened that anything has been objected to me which I had myself altogether overlooked, unless it were something far removed from the subject: so that I have never met with a single critic of my opinions who did not appear to me either less rigorous or less equitable than myself. And further, I have never observed that any truth before unknown has been brought to light by the disputations that are practised in the schools; for while each strives for the victory, each is much more occupied in making the best of mere verisimilitude, than in weighing the reasons on both sides of the question; and those who have been long good advocates are not afterwards on that account the better judges. As for the advantage that others would derive from the communication of my thoughts, it could not be very great; because I have not yet so far prosecuted them as that much does not remain to be added before they can be applied to practice. And I think I may say without vanity, that if there is any one who can carry them out that length, it must be myself rather than another: not that there may not be in the world many minds incomparably superior to mine, but because one cannot so well seize a thing and make it one's own, when it has been learned from another, as when one has himself discovered it. And so true is this of the present subject that, though I have often explained some of my opinions to persons of much acuteness, who, whilst I was speaking, appeared to understand them very distinctly, yet, when they repeated them, I have observed that they almost always changed them to such an extent that I could no longer acknowledge them as mine. I am glad, by the way, to take this opportunity of requesting posterity never to believe on hearsay that anything has proceeded from me which has not been published by myself; and I am not at all astonished at the extravagances attributed to those ancient philosophers whose own writings we do not possess; whose thoughts, however, I do not on that account suppose to have been really absurd, seeing they were among the ablest men of their times, but only that these have been falsely represented to us. It is observable, accordingly, that scarcely in a single instance has any one of their disciples surpassed them; and I am quite sure that the most devoted of the present followers of Aristotle would think themselves happy if they had as much knowledge of nature as he possessed, were it even under the condition that they should never afterwards attain to higher. In this respect they are like the ivy which never strives to rise above the tree that sustains it, and which frequently even returns downwards when it has reached the top; for it seems to me that they also sink, in other words, render themselves less wise than they would be if they gave up study, who, not contented with knowing all that is intelligibly explained in their author, desire in addition to find in him the solution of many difficulties of which he says not a word, and never perhaps so much as thought. Their fashion of philosophizing, however, is well suited to persons whose abilities fall below mediocrity; for the obscurity of the distinctions and principles of which they make use enables them to speak of all things with as much confidence as if they really knew them, and to defend all that they say on any subject against the most subtle and skillful, without its being possible for any one to convict them of error. In this they seem to me to be like a blind man, who, in order to fight on equal terms with a person that sees, should have made him descend to the bottom of an intensely dark cave: and I may say that such persons have an interest in my refraining from publishing the principles of the philosophy of which I make use; for, since these are of a kind the simplest and most evident, I should, by publishing them, do much the same as if I were to throw open the windows, and allow the light of day to enter the cave into which the combatants had descended. But even superior men have no reason for any great anxiety to know these principles, for if what they desire is to be able to speak of all things, and to acquire a reputation for learning, they will gain their end more easily by remaining satisfied with the appearance of truth, which can be found without much difficulty in all sorts of matters, than by seeking the truth itself which unfolds itself but slowly and that only in some departments, while it obliges us, when we have to speak of others, freely to confess our ignorance. If, however, they prefer the knowledge of some few truths to the vanity of appearing ignorant of none, as such knowledge is undoubtedly much to be preferred, and, if they choose to follow a course similar to mine, they do not require for this that I should say anything more than I have already said in this discourse. For if they are capable of making greater advancement than I have made, they will much more be able of themselves to discover all that I believe myself to have found; since as I have never examined aught except in order, it is certain that what yet remains to be discovered is in itself more difficult and recondite, than that which I have already been enabled to find, and the gratification would be much less in learning it from me than in discovering it for themselves. Besides this, the habit which they will acquire, by seeking first what is easy, and then passing onward slowly and step by step to the more difficult, will benefit them more than all my instructions. Thus, in my own case, I am persuaded that if I had been taught from my youth all the truths of which I have since sought out demonstrations, and had thus learned them without labour, I should never, perhaps, have known any beyond these; at least, I should never have acquired the habit and the facility which I think I possess in always discovering new truths in proportion as I give myself to the search. And, in a single word, if there is any work in the world which cannot be so well finished by another as by him who has commenced it, it is that at which I labour. It is true, indeed, as regards the experiments which may conduce to this end, that one man is not equal to the task of making them all; but yet he can advantageously avail himself, in this work, of no hands besides his own, unless those of artisans, or parties of the same kind, whom he could pay, and whom the hope of gain (a means of great efficacy) might stimulate to accuracy in the performance of what was prescribed to them. For as to those who, through curiosity or a desire of learning, of their own accord, perhaps, offer him their services, besides that in general their promises exceed their performance, and that they sketch out fine designs of which not one is ever realized, they will, without doubt, expect to be compensated for their trouble by the explication of some difficulties, or, at least, by compliments and useless speeches, in which he cannot spend any portion of his time without loss to himself. And as for the experiments that others have already made, even although these parties should be willing of themselves to communicate them to him (which is what those who esteem them secrets will never do), the experiments are, for the most part, accompanied with so many circumstances and superfluous elements, as to make it exceedingly difficult to disentangle the truth from its adjuncts- besides, he will find almost all of them so ill described, or even so false (because those who made them have wished to see in them only such facts as they deemed conformable to their principles), that, if in the entire number there should be some of a nature suited to his purpose, still their value could not compensate for the time what would be necessary to make the selection. So that if there existed any one whom we assuredly knew to be capable of making discoveries of the highest kind, and of the greatest possible utility to the public; and if all other men were therefore eager by all means to assist him in successfully prosecuting his designs, I do not see that they could do aught else for him beyond contributing to defray the expenses of the experiments that might be necessary; and for the rest, prevent his being deprived of his leisure by the unseasonable interruptions of any one. But besides that I neither have so high an opinion of myself as to be willing to make promise of anything extraordinary, nor feed on imaginations so vain as to fancy that the public must be much interested in my designs; I do not, on the other hand, own a soul so mean as to be capable of accepting from any one a favor of which it could be supposed that I was unworthy. These considerations taken together were the reason why, for the last three years, I have been unwilling to publish the treatise I had on hand, and why I even resolved to give publicity during my life to no other that was so general, or by which the principles of my physics might be understood. But since then, two other reasons have come into operation that have determined me here to subjoin some particular specimens, and give the public some account of my doings and designs. Of these considerations, the first is, that if I failed to do so, many who were cognizant of my previous intention to publish some writings, might have imagined that the reasons which induced me to refrain from so doing, were less to my credit than they really are; for although I am not immoderately desirous of glory, or even, if I may venture so to say, although I am averse from it in so far as I deem it hostile to repose which I hold in greater account than aught else, yet, at the same time, I have never sought to conceal my actions as if they were crimes, nor made use of many precautions that I might remain unknown; and this partly because I should have thought such a course of conduct a wrong against myself, and partly because it would have occasioned me some sort of uneasiness which would again have been contrary to the perfect mental tranquillity which I court. And forasmuch as, while thus indifferent to the thought alike of fame or of forgetfulness, I have yet been unable to prevent myself from acquiring some sort of reputation, I have thought it incumbent on me to do my best to save myself at least from being ill-spoken of. The other reason that has determined me to commit to writing these specimens of philosophy is, that I am becoming daily more and more alive to the delay which my design of self-instruction suffers, for want of the infinity of experiments I require, and which it is impossible for me to make without the assistance of others: and, without flattering myself so much as to expect the public to take a large share in my interests, I am yet unwilling to be found so far wanting in the duty I owe to myself, as to give occasion to those who shall survive me to make it matter of reproach against me some day, that I might have left them many things in a much more perfect state than I have done, had I not too much neglected to make them aware of the ways in which they could have promoted the accomplishment of my designs. And I thought that it was easy for me to select some matters which should neither be obnoxious to much controversy, nor should compel me to expound more of my principles than I desired, and which should yet be sufficient clearly to exhibit what I can or cannot accomplish in the sciences. Whether or not I have succeeded in this it is not for me to say; and I do not wish to forestall the judgments of others by speaking myself of my writings; but it will gratify me if they be examined, and, to afford the greater inducement to this I request all who may have any objections to make to them, to take the trouble of forwarding these to my publisher, who will give me notice of them, that I may endeavor to subjoin at the same time my reply; and in this way readers seeing both at once will more easily determine where the truth lies; for I do not engage in any case to make prolix replies, but only with perfect frankness to avow my errors if I am convinced of them, or if I cannot perceive them, simply to state what I think is required for defense of the matters I have written, adding thereto no explication of any new matte that it may not be necessary to pass without end from one thing to another. If some of the matters of which I have spoken in the beginning of the "Dioptrics" and "Meteorics" should offend at first sight, because I call them hypotheses and seem indifferent about giving proof of them, I request a patient and attentive reading of the whole, from which I hope those hesitating will derive satisfaction; for it appears to me that the reasonings are so mutually connected in these treatises, that, as the last are demonstrated by the first which are their causes, the first are in their turn demonstrated by the last which are their effects. Nor must it be imagined that I here commit the fallacy which the logicians call a circle; for since experience renders the majority of these effects most certain, the causes from which I deduce them do not serve so much to establish their reality as to explain their existence; but on the contrary, the reality of the causes is established by the reality of the effects. Nor have I called them hypotheses with any other end in view except that it may be known that I think I am able to deduce them from those first truths which I have already expounded; and yet that I have expressly determined not to do so, to prevent a certain class of minds from thence taking occasion to build some extravagant philosophy upon what they may take to be my principles, and my being blamed for it. I refer to those who imagine that they can master in a day all that another has taken twenty years to think out, as soon as he has spoken two or three words to them on the subject; or who are the more liable to error and the less capable of perceiving truth in very proportion as they are more subtle and lively. As to the opinions which are truly and wholly mine, I offer no apology for them as new, - persuaded as I am that if their reasons be well considered they will be found to be so simple and so conformed, to common sense as to appear less extraordinary and less paradoxical than any others which can be held on the same subjects; nor do I even boast of being the earliest discoverer of any of them, but only of having adopted them, neither because they had nor because they had not been held by others, but solely because reason has convinced me of their truth. Though artisans may not be able at once to execute the invention which is explained in the "Dioptrics," I do not think that any one on that account is entitled to condemn it; for since address and practice are required in order so to make and adjust the machines described by me as not to overlook the smallest particular, I should not be less astonished if they succeeded on the first attempt than if a person were in one day to become an accomplished performer on the guitar, by merely having excellent sheets of music set up before him. And if I write in French, which is the language of my country, in preference to Latin, which is that of my preceptors, it is because I expect that those who make use of their unprejudiced natural reason will be better judges of my opinions than those who give heed to the writings of the ancients only; and as for those who unite good sense with habits of study, whom alone I desire for judges, they will not, I feel assured, be so partial to Latin as to refuse to listen to my reasonings merely because I expound them in the vulgar tongue. In conclusion, I am unwilling here to say anything very specific of the progress which I expect to make for the future in the sciences, or to bind myself to the public by any promise which I am not certain of being able to fulfill; but this only will I say, that I have resolved to devote what time I may still have to live to no other occupation than that of endeavoring to acquire some knowledge of Nature, which shall be of such a kind as to enable us therefrom to deduce rules in medicine of greater certainty than those at present in use; and that my inclination is so much opposed to all other pursuits, especially to such as cannot be useful to some without being hurtful to others, that if, by any circumstances, I had been constrained to engage in such, I do not believe that I should have been able to succeed. Of this I here make a public declaration, though well aware that it cannot serve to procure for me any consideration in the world, which, however, I do not in the least affect; and I shall alwayshold myself more obliged to those through whose favor I am permitted to enjoy my retirement without interruption than to any who might offer me the highest earthly preferments. Nick DiSpoldo, Small Press Review (on "Children, Churches and Daddies," April 1997) Kuypers is the widely-published poet of particular perspectives and not a little existential rage, but she does not impose her personal or artistic agenda on her magazine. CC+D is a provocative potpourri of news stories, poetry, humor, art and the "dirty underwear" of politics. One piece in this issue is "Crazy," an interview Kuypers conducted with "Madeline," a murderess who was found insane, and is confined to West Virginia's Arronsville Correctional Center. Madeline, whose elevator definitely doesn't go to the top, killed her boyfriend during sex with an ice pick and a chef's knife, far surpassing the butchery of Elena Bobbitt. Madeline, herself covered with blood, sat beside her lover's remains for three days, talking to herself, and that is how the police found her. For effect, Kuypers publishes Madeline's monologue in different-sized type, and the result is something between a sense of Dali's surrealism and Kafka-like craziness. Debra Purdy Kong, writer, British Columbia, Canada I like the magazine a lot. I like the spacious lay-out and the different coloured pages and the variety of writer's styles. Too many literary magazines read as if everyone graduated from the same course. We need to collect more voices like these and send them everywhere. Ed Hamilton, writer #85 (of children, churches and daddies) turned out well. I really enjoyed the humor section, especially the test score answers. And, the cup-holder story is hilarious. I'm not a big fan of poetry - since much of it is so hard to decipher - but I was impressed by the work here, which tends toward the straightforward and unpretentious. As for the fiction, the piece by Anderson is quite perceptive: I liked the way the self-deluding situation of the character is gradually, subtly revealed. (Kuypers') story is good too: the way it switches narrative perspective via the letter device is a nice touch. Children, Churches and Daddies. It speaks for itself. Write to Scars Publications to submit poetry, prose and artwork to Children, Churches and Daddies literary magazine, or to inquire about having your own chapbook, and maybe a few reviews like these. Jim Maddocks, GLASGOW, via the Internet I'll be totally honest, of the material in Issue (either 83 or 86 of Children, Churches and Daddies) the only ones I really took to were Kuypers'. TRYING was so simple but most truths are, aren't they? what is veganism? A vegan (VEE-gun) is someone who does not consume any animal products. While vegetarians avoid flesh foods, vegans don't consume dairy or egg products, as well as animal products in clothing and other sources. why veganism? This cruelty-free lifestyle provides many benefits, to animals, the environment and to ourselves. The meat and dairy industry abuses billions of animals. Animal agriculture takes an enormous toll on the land. Consumtion of animal products has been linked to heart disease, colon and breast cancer, osteoporosis, diabetes and a host of other conditions. so what is vegan action? We can succeed in shifting agriculture away from factory farming, saving millions, or even billions of chickens, cows, pigs, sheep turkeys and other animals from cruelty. We can free up land to restore to wilderness, pollute less water and air, reduce topsoil reosion, and prevent desertification. We can improve the health and happiness of millions by preventing numerous occurrences od breast and prostate cancer, osteoporosis, and heart attacks, among other major health problems. A vegan, cruelty-free lifestyle may be the most important step a person can take towards creatin a more just and compassionate society. Contact us for membership information, t-shirt sales or donations. vegan action po box 4353, berkeley, ca 94707-0353 510/704-4444 C Ra McGuirt, Editor, The Penny Dreadful Review (on Children, Churches and Daddies) cc&d is obviously a labor of love ... I just have to smile when I go through it. (Janet Kuypers) uses her space and her poets to best effect, and the illos attest to her skill as a graphic artist. "I really like ("Writing Your Name"). It's one of those kind of things where your eye isn't exactly pulled along, but falls effortlessly down the poem. I liked "knowledge" for its mix of disgust and acceptance. Janet Kuypers does good little movies, by which I mean her stuff provokes moving imagery for me. Color, no dialogue; the voice of the poem is the narrator over the film. Children, Churches and Daddies no longer distributes free contributor's copies of issues. In order to receive issues of Children, Churches and Daddies, contact Janet Kuypers at the cc&d e-mail addres. Free electronic subscriptions are available via email. All you need to do is email ccandd@aol.com... and ask to be added to the free cc+d electronic subscription mailing list. And you can still see issues every month at the Children, Churches and Daddies website, located at http://scars.tv Also, visit our new web sites: the Art Gallery and the Poetry Page. Mark Blickley, writer The precursor to the magazine title (Children, Churches and Daddies) is very moving. "Scars" is also an excellent prose poem. I never really thought about scars as being a form of nostalgia. But in the poem it also represents courage and warmth. I look forward to finishing her book. MIT Vegetarian Support Group (VSG) functions: * To show the MIT Food Service that there is a large community of vegetarians at MIT (and other health-conscious people) whom they are alienating with current menus, and to give positive suggestions for change. * To exchange recipes and names of Boston area veg restaurants * To provide a resource to people seeking communal vegetarian cooking * To provide an option for vegetarian freshmen We also have a discussion group for all issues related to vegetarianism, which currently has about 150 members, many of whom are outside the Boston area. The group is focusing more toward outreach and evolving from what it has been in years past. We welcome new members, as well as the opportunity to inform people about the benefits of vegetarianism, to our health, the environment, animal welfare, and a variety of other issues. Gary, Editor, The Road Out of Town (on the Children, Churches and Daddies Web Site) I just checked out the site. It looks great. Dusty Dog Reviews: These poems document a very complicated internal response to the feminine side of social existence. And as the book proceeds the poems become increasingly psychologically complex and, ultimately, fascinating and genuinely rewarding. John Sweet, writer (on chapbook designs) Visuals were awesome. They've got a nice enigmatic quality to them. Front cover reminds me of the Roman sculptures of angels from way back when. Loved the staggered tire lettering, too. Way cool. (on "Hope Chest in the Attic") Some excellent writing in "Hope Chest in the Attic." I thought "Children, Churches and Daddies" and "The Room of the Rape" were particularly powerful pieces. C Ra McGuirt, Editor, The Penny Dreadful Review: cc&d is obviously a labor of love ... I just have to smile when I go through it. (Janet Kuypers) uses her space and her poets to best effect, and the illos attest to her skill as a graphic artist. Cheryl Townsend, Editor, Impetus (on Children, Churches and Daddies) The new cc&d looks absolutely amazing. It's a wonderful lay-out, looks really professional - all you need is the glossy pages. Truly impressive AND the calendar, too. Can't wait to actually start reading all the stuff inside.. Wanted to just say, it looks good so far!!! Dusty Dog Reviews: She opens with a poem of her own devising, which has that wintry atmosphere demonstrated in the movie version of Boris Pasternak's Doctor Zhivago. The atmosphere of wintry white and cold, gloriously murderous cold, stark raging cold, numbing and brutalizing cold, appears almost as a character who announces to his audience, "Wisdom occurs only after a laboriously magnificent disappointment." Alas, that our Dusty Dog for mat cannot do justice to Ms. Kuypers' very personal layering of her poem across the page. Fithian Press, Santa Barbara, CA Indeed, there's a healthy balance here between wit and dark vision, romance and reality, just as there's a good balance between words and graphics. The work shows brave self-exploration, and serves as a reminder of mortality and the fragile beauty of friendship. Mark Blickley, writer The precursor to the magazine title (Children, Churches and Daddies) is very moving. "Scars" is also an excellent prose poem. I never really thought about scars as being a form of nostalgia. But in the poem it also represents courage and warmth. I look forward to finishing her book. You Have to be Published to be Appreciated. Do you want to be heard? Contact Children, Churches and Daddies about book or chapbook publishing. These reviews can be yours. Scars Publications, attention J. Kuypers. We're only an e-mail away. Write to us. Brian B. Braddock, Writer (on 1996 Children, Churches and Daddies) I passed on a copy to my brother who is the director of the St. Camillus AIDS programs. We found (Children, Churches and Daddies') obvious dedication along this line admirable. The Center for Renewable Energy and Sustainable Technology The Solar Energy Research & Education Foundation (SEREF), a non-profit organization based in Washington, D.C., established on Earth Day 1993 the Center for Renewable Energy and Sustainable Technology (CREST) as its central project. CREST's three principal projects are to provide: * on-site training and education workshops on the sustainable development interconnections of energy, economics and environment; * on-line distance learning/training resources on CREST's SOLSTICE computer, available from 144 countries through email and the Internet; * on-disc training and educational resources through the use of interactive multimedia applications on CD-ROM computer discs - showcasing current achievements and future opportunities in sustainable energy development. The CREST staff also does "on the road" presentations, demonstrations, and workshops showcasing its activities and available resources. For More Information Please Contact: Deborah Anderson dja@crest.org or (202) 289-0061 Brian B. Braddock, Writer (on 1996 Children, Churches and Daddies) I passed on a copy to my brother who is the director of the St. Camillus AIDS programs. We found (Children, Churches and Daddies') obvious dedication along this line admirable. Dorrance Publishing Co., Pittsburgh, PA "Hope Chest in the Attic" captures the complexity of human nature and reveals startling yet profound discernments about the travesties that surge through the course of life. This collection of poetry, prose and artwork reflects sensitivity toward feminist issues concerning abuse, sexism and equality. It also probes the emotional torrent that people may experience as a reaction to the delicate topics of death, love and family. "Chain Smoking" depicts the emotional distress that afflicted a friend while he struggled to clarify his sexual ambiguity. Not only does this thought-provoking profile address the plight that homosexuals face in a homophobic society, it also characterizes the essence of friendship. "The room of the rape" is a passionate representation of the suffering rape victims experience. Vivid descriptions, rich symbolism, and candid expressions paint a shocking portrait of victory over the gripping fear that consumes the soul after a painful exploitation. want a review like this? contact scars about getting your own book published. Paul Weinman, Writer (on 1996 Children, Churches and Daddies) Wonderful new direction (Children, Churches and Daddies has) taken - great articles, etc. (especially those on AIDS). Great stories - all sorts of hot info! The magazine Children Churches and Daddies is Copyright © through Scars Publications and Design. The rights of the individual pieces remain with the authors. No material may be reprinted without express permission from the author. Okay, nilla wafer. Listen up and listen good. How to save your life. Submit, or I'll have to kill you. Okay, it's this simple: send me published or unpublished poetry, prose or art work (do not send originals), along with a bio, to us - then sit around and wait... Pretty soon you'll hear from the happy people at cc&d that says (a) Your work sucks, or (b) This is fancy crap, and we're gonna print it. It's that simple! Okay, butt-munch. Tough guy. This is how to win the editors over. Hope Chest in the Attic is a 200 page, perfect-bound book of 13 years of poetry, prose and art by Janet Kuypers. It's a really classy thing, if you know what I mean. We also have a few extra sopies of the book "Rinse and Repeat", which has all the 1999 issues of cc&d crammed into one book. And you can have either one of these things at just five bucks a pop if you just contact us. It's an offer you can't refuse... Carlton Press, New York, NY: HOPE CHEST IN THE ATTIC is a collection of well-fashioned, often elegant poems and short prose that deals in many instances, with the most mysterious and awesome of human experiences: love... Janet Kuypers draws from a vast range of experiences and transforms thoughts into lyrical and succinct verse... Recommended as poetic fare that will titillate the palate in its imagery and imaginative creations. Mark Blickley, writer: The precursor to the magazine title (Children, Churches and Daddies) is very moving. "Scars" is also an excellent prose poem. I never really thought about scars as being a form of nostalgia. But in the poem it also represents courage and warmth. I look forward to finishing the book. You Have to be Published to be Appreciated. Do you want to be heard? Contact Children, Churches and Daddies about book and chapbook publishing. These reviews can be yours. Scars Publications, attention J. Kuypers - you can write for yourself or you can write for an audience. It's your call... Dorrance Publishing Co., Pittsburgh, PA: "Hope Chest in the Attic" captures the complexity of human nature and reveals startling yet profound discernments about the travesties that surge through the course of life. This collection of poetry, prose and artwork reflects sensitivity toward feminist issues concerning abuse, sexism and equality. It also probes the emotional torrent that people may experience as a reaction to the delicate topics of death, love and family. "Chain Smoking" depicts the emotional distress that afflicted a friend while he struggled to clarify his sexual ambiguity. Not only does this thought-provoking profile address the plight that homosexuals face in a homophobic society, it also characterizes the essence of friendship. "The room of the rape" is a passionate representation of the suffering rape victims experience. Vivid descriptions, rich symbolism, and candid expressions paint a shocking portrait of victory over the gripping fear that consumes the soul after a painful exploitation. Dusty Dog Reviews, CA (on knife): These poems document a very complicated internal response to the feminine side of social existence. And as the book proceeds the poems become increasingly psychologically complex and, ultimately, fascinating and genuinely rewarding. Children, Churches and Daddies. It speaks for itself. Dusty Dog Reviews (on Without You): She open with a poem of her own devising, which has that wintry atmosphere demonstrated in the movie version of Boris Pasternak's Doctor Zhivago. The atmosphere of wintry white and cold, gloriously murderous cold, stark raging cold, numbing and brutalizing cold, appears almost as a character who announces to his audience, "Wisdom occurs only after a laboriously magnificent disappointment." Alas, that our Dusty Dog for mat cannot do justice to Ms. Kuypers' very personal layering of her poem across the page. Children, Churches and Daddies. It speaks for itself. Debra Purdy Kong, writer, British Columbia, Canada (on Children, Churches and Daddies): I like the magazine a lot. I like the spacious lay-out and the different coloured pages and the variety of writer's styles. Too many literary magazines read as if everyone graduated from the same course. We need to collect more voices like these and send them everywhere. Fithian Press, Santa Barbara, CA: Indeed, there's a healthy balance here between wit and dark vision, romance and reality, just as there's a good balance between words and graphics. The work shows brave self-exploration, and serves as a reminder of mortality and the fragile beauty of friendship. Published since 1993 No racist, sexist or homophobic material is appreciated; we do accept work of almost any genre of poetry, prose or artwork, though we shy away from concrete poetry and rhyme for rhyme's sake. Do not send originals. Any work sent to Scars Publications on Macintosh disks, text format, will be given special attention over smail-mail submissions. There is no limit to how much you may submit at a time; previously published work accepted.