Poem: Best Friends

“Running out the back door, wanting eyes and curly hair.
Searching for the shadows that somehow dance in the sunlight.
Looking for the breeze that will take me farther than my eyes can see.

The wind seem to know how to sing songs.
Whistling hymns through their branches and hum melodies with their leaves.
Every breath in Nature’s lungs is such a gift to me.
The more I dance in Nature’s arms, the more I crave to touch.

The way the brook steadies itself down the winding path.
Not knowing what is around each bend, it smiles and quickly passed.

I’ve watched the fields of grain bend in the wind storms and waltzes in the rain.
Felt the tickle of meadow grass slip slowly past my palm,
and dance along my fingertips, leaving traces of the dawn.

Swirls of white winter snow sweeping through the trees.
The cold cruising into the soul of life, and yet,
the sun still shines and the song birds still sing.

It’s been my greatest teacher, Nature, with her lessons on life.
People seem to come and go, no matter how hard you pray for them to stay.
Nature is my best friend.  She’ll never run away.
The more I dance in Nature’s arms, the more I crave her touch.”

By:  Kiesha Crowther

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A Red Cow in Panama

I didn’t believe in purple cows before reading Linda Leinen’s blog post about this strange animal. I thought it was only a literary illusion.  “There are no purple cows”, I said to myself when I first read Linda’s post dubbed, “Purpose Cows on Parade” on her exquisite blog The Task at Hand.

Her well written piece of literary work started with a cute poem written by Gelett Burgess:

“I never saw a purple cow,
I never hope to see one.
But I can tell you, anyhow,
I’d rather see than be one.”

Then she went on and commented that it was possible to find a cow with that particular color if you looked hard enough at the pastures of Texas among Herefords, Angus and Guernseys cows.

‘Unlike Burgess, I never tired of  ‘The Purple Cow’.  I quoted it with abandon, and if my parents tired of my recitations, they never let on. As time passed, I became convinced that somewhere, in some verdant field among the Herefords, Angus and Guernseys, a Purple Cow was grazing. I intended to find it.”

She even wrote a witty poem about the possibility of finding the elusive purple cow somewhere on the verdant fields of Texas, or maybe beyond the great state with the lone star.

“I’ve not yet seen those Purple Cows,
but now I’ve grown more wise.
They won’t be hidden – not at all! -
if we open up our eyes.”

Then she commented again about the real existence of purple cows:

“I suppose to one degree or another we’re all Horatios – our vision imperfect, our grasp of the world’s wonders limited.  Still, we may have the last laugh on Burgess. Just over the ridge, out of sight, flank-deep in fields of unimaginably rich grasses, they stand there among the Herefords, the Angus and the Guernseys – waiting to be discovered.”

I stopped and wondered. What if there are purple cows hidden somewhere and I haven’t seen them?  Maybe I haven’t looked long and hard enough to find them.  Maybe we have to believe more and doubt less, the way children do when they talk about flying dragons, or green little elves, or flying pigs and so forth.

I looked and looked and looked again.  I started scrutinizing the cities and the back alleys.  I scanned my neighborhood and examined the parks and empty lots, but purple cows were not to be seen.  And then I started doubting.  “Linda, perhaps there are no such things as purple cows.”

But I keep on looking—up, down, around and beyond.  I looked towards my right and to my left, but the elusive purple cow was never to be found.  Then, on Christmas Eve my search came to an end.  At last my eyes saw a cow, but it was dressed in red.  At last I found what I was looking for.

Yep, Linda you were right all along.  If you look hard enough you will find purple or red cows waiting to be discovered.  I’m not fabricating this story up.  I have evidence to support my findings.  Take a look at a snapshot of a red cow in Panama.  Here we go.

Snapshot of a red cow which was purchased by Alcibiades, the father of the Twisters, for Paola the youngest of the three. It was one of her Christmas presents placed under the pine tree on Christmas Eve. Photo by ©Omar Upegui R.

Yep Linda, there are indeed purple cows on the green pastures of Texas and red cows on the grasslands of Panama.  Everything is possible if you look long and hard enough for something.  That’s how dreams come true.  Good Day.

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The Poems of Temperamental Dorothy Parker

Young poetess Dorothy Parker (1893-1967). Credit: Wikipedia Encyclopedia

Once more Netflix has opened the window to peep into the life of a great American author, poetess, literary critic and screenwriter.  I’m referring to the famous Dorothy Parker, also known as “Dot” or “Dottie”.  The movie which introduced me to Ms. Parker is Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle (1994), played by Jennifer Jason Leigh.  Dorothy Parker remembers the heyday of the Algonquin Round Table, a circle of friends whose barbed wit, like hers, was fueled by alcohol and flirted with despair.

Dorothy Parker was born in the West End village of Long Beach, New Jersey, but lived most of her life in Manhattan.  She could be called a true New Yorker.

She lived a roller coaster life, thirsty for a love that was afraid of her, insecure, and lonely.  Her erratic life many times led to attempted suicides and a dependence on alcohol.  During the 1920s Parker had extra-marital affairs, she drank heavily and attempted suicide three times, but maintained the high quality of her texts.

Résumé 

Razors pain you;
Rivers are damp;
Acids stain you;
And drugs cause cramp.
Guns aren’t lawful;
Nooses give;
Gas smells awful;
You might as well live.

Parker was educated at a Catholic school. “But as for helping me in the outside world, the convent taught me only that if you spit on a pencil eraser it will erase in,” Parker said later in an interview. She moved to New York City, where she wrote during the day and earned money at night playing the piano in a dancing school.

In her later years, she would come to denigrate the group that had brought her such early notoriety, The Algonquin Round Table:

These were no giants. Think who was writing in those days—Lardner, Fitzgerald, Faulkner and Hemingway. Those were the real giants. The Round Table was just a lot of people telling jokes and telling each other how good they were. Just a bunch of loudmouths showing off, saving their gags for days, waiting for a chance to spring them…. There was no truth in anything they said. It was the terrible day of the wisecrack, so there didn’t have to be any truth…

Dorothy Parker Rothschild represents one of the most accomplished feminist and successful literary writers in women’s history. Existing from 1893-1967, she became known as one of the most brilliant writers from the early 1900s.  As a sad woman, stung with depression and alcoholism her entire adult life, she had a successful and productive life.  Literary historians agree that Ms. Parker is one of the most brilliant writers that revolutionized American thinking then and after.

Parker died alone on June 7, 1967 in the New York hotel that had become her last home. She left her estate to civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr.

Below are several of her poems which define her as a person who was able to faithfully portray the  20th century urban foibles.

Little Words

When you are gone, there is nor bloom nor leaf,
Nor singing sea at night, nor silver birds;
And I can only stare, and shape my grief
In little words.

I cannot conjure loveliness, to drown
The bitter woe that racks my cords apart.
The weary pen that sets my sorrow down
Feeds at my heart.

There is no mercy in the shifting year,
No beauty wraps me tenderly about.
I turn to little words- so you, my dear,
Can spell them out.

A Certain Lady

Oh, I can smile for you, and tilt my head,
And drink your rushing words with eager lips,
And paint my mouth for you a fragrant red,
And trace your brows with tutored finger-tips.
When you rehearse your list of loves to me,
Oh, I can laugh and marvel, rapturous-eyed.
And you laugh back, nor can you ever see
The thousand little deaths my heart has died.
And you believe, so well I know my part,
That I am gay as morning, light as snow,
And all the straining things within my heart
You’ll never know.

Oh, I can laugh and listen, when we meet,
And you bring tales of fresh adventurings, –
Of ladies delicately indiscreet,
Of lingering hands, and gently whispered things.
And you are pleased with me, and strive anew
To sing me sagas of your late delights.
Thus do you want me — marveling, gay, and true,
Nor do you see my staring eyes of nights.
And when, in search of novelty, you stray,
Oh, I can kiss you blithely as you go ….
And what goes on, my love, while you’re away,
You’ll never know.

Song in a Minor Key

There’s a place I know where the birds swing low,
And wayward vines go roaming,
Where the lilacs nod, and a marble god
Is pale, in scented gloaming.
And at sunset there comes a lady fair
Whose eyes are deep with yearning.
By an old, old gate does the lady wait
Her own true love’s returning.

But the days go by, and the lilacs die,
And trembling birds seek cover;
Yet the lady stands, with her long white hands
Held out to greet her lover.
And it’s there she’ll stay till the shadowy day
A monument they grave her.
She will always wait by the same old gate, –
The gate her true love gave her.

This last poem about a lover that never came to the gate, captured my heart.  In Dorothy Parker’s work, you will find an aura of pessimism hovering over her words, and yet her want for love never ceased, until she closed her eyes for the last time. Good Day.

Additional Reading:  Dorothy Rothschild Parker 1893-1967

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Poems of the Reclusive Poetess, Emily Dickinson

Emily Dickinson (1830-1886) Credit: Wikipedia Encyclopedia

Emily Dickinson’s life has always fascinated people, even before she was famous for her poetry.   Emily spent almost all of her life in her parents’ home in Amherst, with the exception of the year she spent in boarding school—she left ostensibly because of illness, although it is more likely that it was homesickness.

After she studied at the Amherst Academy for seven years in her youth, she spent a short time at Mount Holyoke Female Seminary before returning to her family’s house in Amherst.  As a young woman, she was very active socially, and was considered well-liked and attractive. In her late twenties, though, she suddenly cut herself all from all society, never leaving her family’s home, and started ferociously writing poetry.

Thought of as an eccentric by the locals, she became known for her penchant for white clothing and her reluctance to greet guests or, later in life, even leave her room. Most of her friendships were carried out by correspondence.

Although there is a long-standing myth that the catalyst for this was her falling in love with a man who rejected her, it is more likely that it was a combination of several factors.

“Austin Dickinson married Emily’s very close friend, Susan Gilbert, but the marriage soon became an unhappy one, and Emily’s friendship with Susan eventually dissolved because of it. In addition, in late 1855, Emily’s mother fell ill with an undiagnosed illness, and from then until her death in 1882, she was essentially bedridden, and Emily and Lavinia had to devote a great deal of time to caring for her. This was especially taxing on Emily, who found all domestic chores stifling, and who was not very close to her mother. Finally, between 1851 and 1854, as many as thirty-three young acquaintances of Emily’s died, including her good friend and cousin, Emily Lavinia Norcross.

Emily began to dress only in white, and would see no one but her family, meeting visitors only through screens or behind doors. She wrote prolifically, writing almost 1800 poems in her lifetime, but her genius was never recognized in her lifetime. She published only seven poems while alive, all anonymously, and all heavily edited. Only after her death from kidney disease in 1886 did her sister find her poems. Recognizing their genius, she convinced her brother’s mistress, Mabel Loomis Todd, to help her publish them. The first book was published in 1890, and met with great success.” (Biography of Emily Dickinson - GradeSaver Online)

Until the 1955 publication of Dickinson’s Complete Poems by Thomas H. Johnson, her poems were considerably edited and altered from their manuscript versions. Since 1890 Dickinson has remained continuously in print.

Below are four small poems authored by Emily Dickinson which depicts the delicate and exquisite style of her work.  (Emily Dickinson (1830–1886).  Complete Poems.  1924.)

I

A Word is dead
When it is said,
Some say.
I say it just
Begins to live
That Day.

II

HOPE is the thing with feathers    
That perches in the soul,    
And sings the tune without the words,    
And never stops at all,    
 
And sweetest in the gale is heard;           
And sore must be the storm    
That could abash the little bird    
That kept so many warm.    
 
I’ve heard it in the chillest land,    
And on the strangest sea;           
Yet, never, in extremity,    
It asked a crumb of me.

III

Unto my books so good to turn    
Far ends of tired days;    
It half endears the abstinence,    
And pain is missed in praise.    
 
As flavors cheer retarded guests           
With banquetings to be,    
So spices stimulate the time    
Till my small library.    
 
It may be wilderness without,    
Far feet of failing men,            
But holiday excludes the night,    
And it is bells within.    
 
I thank these kinsmen of the shelf;    
Their countenances bland    
Enamour in prospective,           
And satisfy, obtained.

IV

Hope is a subtle glutton;    
He feeds upon the fair;    
And yet, inspected closely,    
What abstinence is there!    

His is the halcyon table           
That never seats but one,    
And whatsoever is consumed    
The same amounts remain.

For more gorgeous poems written by Emily Dickinson, please click here.   Today is Sunday, a day to worship the Good Lord, meditate, and to read soothing literature for the soul.  Good Day.

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Poems: Fall and Autumn Nature

FALL

golden, orange and yellow leaves glimmer in the setting sun
this is one of the first signs that summertime is done
I can hear the soft rustling as they fall from the trees
soaring and gliding as they are blown through the breeze
masses of leaves form into one

plants are decaying,
lifeless and swaying
shadows are growing,
less light is showing
animals sleeping,
no sound or peeping

the whole world knows that fall has begun

By:  sabrina ryans

AUTUMN NATURE

Rustling leaves echo
Branches sway as the wind gathers speed and
Scares the birds away

Thick clouds move
Across the sky
Shadows move with them

Icy wind cuts into skin
Catching breath is a struggle
Doors slam, windows rattle

But suddenly the clouds
Disappear
The screams of the wind fade

The sun is allowed to shine
People step outside
The birds return

By:  Poppy J.

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The Triangle Shirtwaist Fire of 1911

Photograph of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire on March 25, 1911 at 4:40 p.m. (local time) in Manhattan, New York City. Injuries 71. Deaths 146. Credit: Wikipedia Encyclopedia.

Over one hundred years ago, a tragic fire in New York City took the lives of 146 innocent young workers.  That horrendous afternoon, 275 girls started to collect their belongings as they were leaving work at 4:45 p.m. on Saturday.  At 4:46 p.m. the  NYFD Company 72 arrives at the Asch Building.  The fire is spreading towards the ninth and tenth floors, also the workplace for Triangle Shirtwaist Company employees.  Employees on the eighth floor head down, those on the tenth head to the roof, many on the ninth floor have nowhere to go.

Pauline Cuoio Pepe was a nineteen-year-old sewing machine operator at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory. “It was all nice young Jewish girls who were engaged to be married. You should see the diamonds and everything. Those were the ones who threw themselves from the window,” Pepe told a Manhattan historian. “What the hell did they close the door for? What did they think we were going out with? What are we gonna do, steal a shirtwaist? Who the heck wanted a shirtwaist?” asked Pepe.

 At the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory, some of the doors were locked. Usually the doors were locked so that clothing could not be stolen through unwatched doors.  Pauline Cuoio Pepe recounted that the workers didn’t even use the regular doors to leave the factory. “…we never went out the front door. We always went one by one out the back. There was a man there searching, because the people were afraid we would take something, so that door was always locked.”

Even the doors that were not locked were of no use to the workers. The doors in the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory only opened in. When the girls tried to escape through the doors, the girls in front could not open the doors because of all the girls pushing from behind. If the door opened out, the onrush of girls would have opened the door.

This is how Janet Zandy described the sad event in her book dubbed, “Fire Poetry on the Triangle Shirtwaist Company Fire of March 25, 1911″:

“It was March 25, 1911, a late Saturday afternoon, and nearly spring.  One short block from Washington Square Park in New York’s Greenwich Village a fire raged on the 8th, 9th, and 10th floor occupied by the Triangle Shirtwaist Co.

A passerby along busy Washington Place and Green Street noticed a ‘bale of dark dress goods’ come out a top floor window.  He thought that someone was trying to save expensive cloth.  But then another bale came down, and another.  One caught the wind and opened.  It was not a bale of goods, it was a young woman.

The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire took the lives of 146 workers, 20 men and 126 women; the average age was nineteen.  Most of the workers were Italian and Jewish immigrant women whose families depended on their wages.”

For your information, shirtwaists were blouses of lightweight fabric, depicted as the uniform of modern womanhood in the illustrations of Charles Dana Gibson.

The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire in New York City on March 25, 1911, was the deadliest industrial disaster in the history of the city of New York and resulted in the fourth highest loss of life from an industrial accident in U.S. history. It was also the second deadliest disaster in New York City—after the burning of the General Slocum on June 15, 1904—until the destruction of the World Trade Center 90 years later.

The fire caused the deaths of 146 garment workers, who died from the fire, smoke inhalation, or falling to their deaths. Most of the victims were recent Jewish and Italian immigrant women aged sixteen to twenty-three; of the victims whose age is known, the oldest victim was Providenza Panno at 48, and the youngest was 11-year-old Mary Goldstein

Because the managers had locked the doors to the stairwells and exits—a common practice at the time to prevent pilferage and unauthorized breaks—many of the workers who could not escape the burning building jumped from the eighth, ninth, and tenth floors to the streets below.

The factory was in the Asch Building, at 23-29 Washington Place, now known as the Brown Building, which has been designated a National Historic Landmark and a New York City landmark

Elizabeth Ballou, a 19-year-old blogger, and a busy college student, wrote an inspiring and powerful poem about this tragic event.  The name of her poem is “The Dressmaker, 1911.”  Ms. Ballou is also the author of the literary-oriented blog, “Letters of Mist”, a portfolio of fiction, poetry and assorted miscellany.  Other than writing, she plays the flute and sings.

THE DRESSMAKER, 1911

“days she spends with her matchstick fingers caught
between bobbin and thread, foot jammed against the treadle, craving
high heels and nacreous strings of pearls and frothy hats
that sail down streets like the prows of ocean liners
and sings, too, a snatch of notes she heard issuing
from the tall mullioned windows of Ladies’ Mile, the violin curled catlike
around a coloratura soprano. this she will remember in winter,
when snow clogs the grates of la cittá grande and needles her cheeks,
and will grasp it close to her like a scrap of old Guipure lace.

nights she is allowed to speak Italian
and treasures the rippling sensation of the words on her tongue.
il cucchiaio.  la finestra.  il ditale.
the spoon.  the window.  the thimble.
she dreams of shirtwaists and limestone and guttering
candles that once adorned rough-hewn pews
and wakes with an Ave Maria in her throat.

spring brings her an ending wreathed
in smoke and cotton motes.
on the window sash of the ninth floor she will quaver,
lungs ash-blacked and ears
filled with prayers in Yiddish and Polish and Gaeilge.
the ladies of Washington Square crane their necks
from below, their faces pale and indistinct,
silver coins left at the bottom of the ocean.
when she jumps, her hair streams flames,
the tails of a comet falling eternally away from Earth.”

by Elizabeth Ballou

Before I close this post, I would like to thank Ms. Ballou, for kindly allowing me to publish her magnificent poem in Lingua Franca.  Her literary work honors the 146 lives that were lost during that lamentable Saturday afternoon on March 25, 1911.  Good Day.

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“Six Honest Serving Men”

Linda Leinen is a thought-provoking blogger who authors the literary-oriented blog, The Task at Hand.  She writes one blog post per week.  I can’t emphasize enough how wonderful her works is; you should read it to convince yourself how good she really is.

In her excellent article dubbed, Chase Jarvis & A New Paradigm, Linda includes a few lines of a poem written by Rudyard Kipling which captivated me.  Kipling was a blur in my mind, so I Googled the name to refresh my memory. I was interested in reading the full poem.  Sure enough, I obtained the information I was looking for, and a lot more I might add.

Joseph Rudyard Kipling (1865-1936) was an English short-story writer, poet, and novelist chiefly remembered for his tales and poems of British soldiers in India, and his short stories for children.  One of his books for children is Just So Stories, originally published by Rudyard Kipling in 1902.  The book includes twelve interesting stories in its Table of Contents:

1. How the Whale Got His Throat
2. How the Camel Hot His Hump
3. How the Rhinoceros Got His Skin
4. How the Leopard Got His Skin
5. The Elephant’s Child
6. The Sing-Song of Old Man Kangaroo
7. The Beginning of the Armadillos
8. How the First Letter was Written
9. How the Alphabet was Made
10. The Crab that Played With the Sea
11. The Cat that Walked by Himself
12. The Butterfly that Stamped

The fifth story of the book—The Elephant’s Child—is where you will find the full poem that I mentioned before.  I could not resist the temptation of sharing it with you.  I firmly believe that great literature should be shared.

Credit: Rudyard Kipling, The Elephant’s Child, originally published in 1902.

I Keep six honest serving-men:
    (They taught me all I knew)
Their names are What and Where and When
    And How and Why and Who.
I send them over land and sea,
    I send them east and west;
But after they have worked for me,
    I give them all a rest.

I let them rest from nine till five.
    For I am busy then,
As well as breakfast, lunch, and tea,
    For they are hungry men:
But different folk have different views:
    I know a person small–
She keeps ten million serving-men,
    Who get no rest at all!
She sends ‘em abroad on her own affairs,
    From the second she opens her eyes–
One million Hows, two million Wheres,
    And seven million Whys!

Rudyard Kipling was born in Bombay, in the Bombay Presidency of British India, and was taken by his family to England when he was five years old.  He received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1907.

Of the city where he was born—Bombay— he wrote:

Mother of Cities to me,
For I was born in her gate,
Between the palms and the sea,
Where the world-end steamers wait.

It is to be noted that Bombay is presently called Mumbai.

According to Bernice M. Murphy, “Kipling’s parents considered themselves ‘Anglo-Indians’ (a term used in the 19th century for people of British origin living in India) and so too would their son, though he spent the bulk of his life elsewhere. Complex issues of identity and national allegiance would become prominent features in his fiction.”

Kipling referred to such conflicts; for example: “In the afternoon heats before we took our sleep, she (the Portuguese ayah or nanny) or Meeta (the Hindu bearer, or male attendant) would tell us stories and Indian nursery songs all unforgotten, and we were sent into the dining-room after we had been dressed, with the caution ‘Speak English now to Papa and Mamma.’ So one spoke ‘English’, haltingly translated out of the vernacular idiom that one thought and dreamed in”.

Before I finish this story of Kipling’s honest serving men, I would like to include an interesting aspect of the life of this remarkable writer.  It is related to his use of the Nazi swastika.

Many older editions of Rudyard Kipling’s books have a swastika printed on their covers associated with a picture of an elephant carrying a lotus flower. Since the 1930s this has raised the suspicion of Kipling being a Nazi-sympathizer, which is not true at all. Kipling used the swastika as it was an Indian sun symbol conferring good luck and well-being. He used the swastika symbol in both right—and left-facing orientations, and it was in general use at the time. Even before the Nazis came to power, Kipling ordered the engraver to remove it from the printing block so that he should not be thought of as supporting them.

And now you know the story behind the “six honest serving men” of Rudyard Kipling.  Adieu!

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Poem: “Life”

Life

“Life is an opportunity, benefit from it.
Life is beauty, admire it.
Life is a dream, realize it.
Life is a challenge, meet it.
Life is a duty, complete it.
Life is a game, play it.
Life is a promise, fulfill it.
Life is sorrow, overcome it.
Life is a song, sing it.
Life is a struggle, accept it.
Life is a tragedy, confront it.
Life is an adventure, dare it.
Life is luck, make it.
Life is too precious, do not destroy it.
Life is life, fight for it.”

By:  Mother Theresa of Calcutta

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Poem: Recognizing Beauty

Recognizing Beauty

When you recognize her beauty
The eye applauds
The heart stands in ovation
And the tongue….
When she is near, is on its best behavior!
It speaks more like light…
What does light speak about?
I asked a plant that once…
She said,
“I’m not sure, but it makes me grow!”

By:  Kiesha Crowther

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Roses Are Red, Violets Are Blue…

Below are some poems using the theme of roses and violets which have become classics in the United States.  Almost everyone of us has written his own version of this theme when we were growing up and we had a crush on a classmate.  I know I did my own version, albeit I never captured the heart of Isabel—that was her name.

Roses are red,
Violets are blue,
Sugar is sweet,
But not as sweet as you.

Roses are red,
Violets are blue,
Please, lets get married
Tomorrow at 2:00.

Roses are red,
Violets are blue,
You are my best friend,
I’m glad I met you.

Roses are red,
Violets are blue,
I didn’t start living,
Until I met you.

In order to entice today’s blog post with flowers, last week I shot several pictures of red roses which are synonymous of love and friendship; two attributes the world is hungry for.  Lay back, take a deep breath of fresh air and enjoy.

Snapshot of a bouquet of red roses which we displayed in our living room for a short time. They lost their charm in three days. But the days were joyful while the flowers had their charm. Photo by ©Omar Upegui R.

Photo by ©Omar Upegui R.

Photo by ©Omar Upegui R.

Photo by ©Omar Upegui R.

Photo by ©Omar Upegui R.

Photo by ©Omar Upegui R.

Did I put a smile on your face and a feeling of bliss in your heart?  If the answer is “Yes”, I feel content.  If the answer is “No”, I’ll try something else next time.  Anyway, have a great week end, and drive safely.  Au revoir!

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