Contributor: Judy Moskowitz

- -
The kiss has a mind of it's own
always knowing here it wants to go
if it could talk, would it tell me
where it's been feeding
with breath fresh as spearmint
getting lost inside a ballad
the slow dance with no conscience
but the promise that I will be the last
or am I just an idea
that can smooth and soothe away
the sting of reality
in the face of things dear
this life so fragile
has changed even the smallest freckle
in a garden of weeds


- - -
Judy Moskowitz, a professional jazz musician, has been published in Poetry Life And Times, Michael Lee Johnson's anthology, Indiana Voice Journal, Whispers Of The Wind. Her poem Modigliani was nominated best of the net.

Contributor: Cynthia Pitman

- -
Dedicated to Rebecca Pitman

After the silence,
after the stillness,
after the emptiness,
small sounds begin
to creep back in.
They come one by one,
an insistent procession:
the clock ticking,
the faucet dripping,
the heater humming,
the dogs barking --
all of them, just the same,
just like before.
Step by step,
they steal their way
into my tomb,
the sarcophagus of silence
in which I try to seal myself
from their persistent call to life.
They surround me,
shout at me,
“Breathe!”
And I breathe.


- - -
I am a retired high school English teacher who, after a 30-year hiatus, has begun to write poetry again. I have had poetry and fiction published in several publications.

Contributor: Bruce Levine

- -
(For Jane)

Home can be
Anywhere
Any place
Any town or
City
Any size or
Shape
A palace
Or a two room
Flat
Home isn’t
Four walls
A kitchen
And a bath
Home only
Exists
When it is
Filled with
Love
Filled with
Life
And
Laughter
A haven where
Warmth and safety
Prevails
Where storms and
Pestilence
Can’t reach
Home is where
Simple things
Are important
And big things
Are taken in stride
Home is when
Two
Defies mathematics
Where two hearts
And two souls
Become
One
Home is where
Love can
Flourish
And sadness is
Banished
Home is an
Intangible
That defies
Definition
Except by those
Who
Feel alive
Because they are
Home
Where anything
And everything
Can happen
Dreams can come
True
And life is
Joyous
Simply because
There is
A place called
Home


- - -
Bruce Levine, a native Manhattanite, has spent his life as a writer of fiction and poetry and as a music and theatre professional. His literary catalogue includes four novels, short stories, humorous sketches, flash fiction, poetry, essays, magazine articles and a screenplay His works are published in over twenty-five on-line journals, over twenty books, his shows have been produced in New York and around the country and he’s the author of the novellas Reinvented and An Accidental Journey. He lives with his rescued Australian Shepherd, Daisy.
His work is dedicated to the loving memory of his wife, dancer/actress, Lydia Franklin.

Contributor: Ann Christine Tabaka

- -
I can no longer say
“when I grow old.”
I am here.
I have reached the
point of life where
penumbras close in,
where night follows day
leaving evening behind.

Looking in the mirror,
a stranger stares back
at me with vacant eyes
and pewter hair.
Once stylish clothes
now hang limp and twisted,
on a body of the same -
limp and twisted.

My words now jejune,
I write for the dust.
Parlor games and puzzles
fill my muddled day,
as memories lapse,
and I doze into a dream.

Brittle bones and
aching joints
join the heartache
of lost loves.
All crumble out of an
existence that once
held vibrant joy.

What used to matter,
no longer does.
Pretty is just a word.
Youth a distant fantasy.
A life of repentance
follows me as I enter
the shadowed years.


- - -
Ann Christine Tabaka was nominated for the 2017 Pushcart Prize in Poetry, has been internationally published, and won poetry awards from numerous publications. She lives in Delaware, USA. She loves gardening and cooking. Chris lives with her husband and three cats.

Contributor: Cynthia Pitman

- -
The lights dim.
The film strip starts to flutter.
The images flash.
Memories, forged from frozen fire,
burn frostbite into my fists
as I grip them,
grapple with them,
struggle to strangle them.
One by one, they retell
the same old story.
They burn it again and again
into my ice-cold soul.

I’m tired of this show.
I've seen it so many times,
watched it over and over,
this perpetual rerun,
this skip on the vinyl record,
this Candyland ice cream bar
that sends me down the slide
to start my Sisyphean task all over again.


- - -
I'm a retired English teacher from Orlando. I have had or will have poetry and fiction published in Right Hand Pointing, Literary Yard, Amethyst Review, Saw Palm, and others.

Contributor: Jun Lit

- -
I know you’re there, and there’s no sense
in trying to explain the unexplained.
It just sets in, seeps in, like a ghostly presence,
just outside the door but not knocking,
just waiting for the door to open
and I knew the door was like a lid
of an ancient Egyptian sarcophagus -
no lock but only I got that key,
no knob but boulders heavily seal it.
A mummy lies inside, tied, bound -
the face shown in the burial mask
is not the rotten cheek and bone
and leathered skin within.

You prophesy the end of days
- times when the tired Sun would insist
that it prefers to shine in the West and not in the East
or the ambitious Moon stealing scenes
and photobombing the stars, it seems.

The hermit of a physicist argues -
No work is done without displacement.
The spiritist turned alchemist proposes -
Solve problems with corrosive solutions.
And presto!
All clogs of mental pipes go!

The soul-less pastor raises the cup
that apathy filled with martyrs’ blood.
The faithful then partake of the eucharist,
sanctified by the butcher’s bullets that pierced
the hearts of innocent kids and maligned priests.

We then offer each other the sign of sinful impunity,
for peace is a lie, when blind loyalty breathes tyranny.


- - -
Jun Lit (Ireneo L. Lit, Jr.) teaches biology and studies insects at the University of the Philippines Los Baños and writes poems about nature, people, and society

Contributor: Bruce Levine

- -
Slaying the dragon
And opening the heart
Like wind-swept hair
Tousled by the hand of fate

Offering solace in a turbulent world
Remembering happy moments
Long ago and past
While dreaming of happy moments
Yet to come


- - -
Bruce Levine, a native Manhattanite, has spent his life as a writer of fiction and poetry and as a music and theatre professional. His literary catalogue includes four novels, short stories, humorous sketches, flash fiction, poetry, essays, magazine articles and a screenplay His works are published in over twenty-five on-line journals, over twenty-five books and his shows have been produced in New York and around the country. His work is dedicated to the loving memory of his late wife, Lydia Franklin. He lives in New York with his dog, Daisy.

Contributor: Bruce Mundhenke

- -
No longer do millers swarm street lamps in summer,
And honey bees are seldom seen,
The choir of crickets is silent in fall,
The leafhoppers, that once were sometimes a plague,
Also are seldom seen.
You can drive up and down hills in the country at night,
And still look out your windshield and see.
Monarchs no longer pass through like before,
Where is the bumble bee?
The geese that used to fill the skies,
Are now, small flocks when seen,
That go south, then north, then south again,
Like they don't know where they should be.
Many are aware of these changes,
No one is sure what they mean.


- - -
Bruce Mundhenke writes in Illinois, where he lives with his wife and their dog and cat.

Contributor: Jane Briganti

- -
Second chances
don't always come
We want them
we need them
but still sometimes
opportunity leaves us
behind

We look
to the Universe
to guide us as we go
waiting for a sign

To open
a new door
one must close an old
This is often
painful
as stories
do unfold

A second chance
must not
be ignored
It may never
come again

Show the Universe
you have faith
move forward
without looking
back
Trust your destiny
to keep you
on track

Close the door
behind you
and throw
away the key
Bury the past
it wasn't meant
to last

Second chances
don't come
easy
One must
search their
heart and mind
putting their
soul out on the line

Face fear
and uncertainty
of the unknown
Accept the truth
where you are now
is a place you have
out grown


- - -
A Native New Yorker, she's been writing poetry for as long as she can remember. It is her hope that someone may find solace in her words.

Contributor: Sheshu Babuu

- -
For centuries
They bowed to male hegemony
Exploitation, ignominy
Perpetual suppression
Human rights violation

Suffered in silence
Waited with patience
'Til they mustered strength
Mobilized themselves at length

Now with vigor and enthusiasm
They are busting male chauvinism
Entering uncharted territories
Churches mosques or temples
Every prominent position
Which was denied due to staunch opposition

After consistent oppressive action
They learned ways of affirmative reaction


- - -
The writer from everywhere and anywhere when ponders on the question 'who am I?' finds some response in a lyric by Bhupen Hazarika (Assamese) 'ami ekti jajabor' (I am a gypsy.)

Contributor: Judy Moskowitz

- -
When It Comes
will you be ready for a flash flood
as sea levels rise, landmarks left behind
will you be ready for the inevitable, unacceptable.
earth continues to turn moving time
everything that blooms will catch the bullet
just when you become uncluttered and clear
seems so unfair to disappear
into the salt of nothingness
it happens when you're not looking
will I be ready?
there, I've said it


- - -
Judy Moskowitz, a professional jazz musician, has been published in Poetry Life And Times, Michael Lee Johnson's anthology, Indiana Voice Journal, Whispers Of The Wind. Her poem Modigliani was nominated best of the net.

Contributor: Jordan Corley

- -
there's a comfort in the sadness
a quiet longing in the happiness
that can only come from knowing
there is no place further down to go.

there's a sanctity in the depression
and repression
of the unwanted emotions.
they only surface when the sunlight
shines bright enough
for them to grow too

manifesting into something larger than
what is comfortable
at the bottom of a hole
only large enough
for one person
to grow.


- - -
Jordan Corley is a student at Penn State with a passion for the art of poetry and creative writing. She published her debut poetry collection, “battle scars”, in 2018 at the age of 19. She hopes that through her writing she can reach others dealing with physical and mental illness and spread the message that they are not alone in their fight.

Contributor: Sheshu Babu

- -
When you sowed seeds
I thought
My love started to germinate

When you watered the saplings
I thought
My love had good foundation

When you were elated
Watching the harvest
And exclaimed
"I am the tiller!
this is the result
Of my effort!"
I thought
My love was perfect

Now,

We stand on the same soil
With similar Chemistry!


- - -

Contributor: Bruce Levine

- -
Love is special – unique
Something that can’t be
Bought in a store
Or on-line
Love can’t be found
Just because you’re
Looking for it
Love finds you
Sometimes through
Incomprehensible means
Love is destiny
Founded by two souls
Meeting in Heaven
And molded into one
As the angels
Return it to the
Original owners
But it’s
A new life
Because love
Has joined the beings
Forever as one


- - -
Bruce Levine, a native Manhattanite, has spent his life as a writer of fiction and poetry and as a music and theatre professional. His literary catalogue includes four novels, short stories, humorous sketches, flash fiction, poetry, essays, magazine articles and a screenplay His works are published in over twenty-five on-line journals, over twenty books, his shows have been produced in New York and around the country and he’s the author of the novellas Reinvented and An Accidental Journey. He lives with his rescued Australian Shepherd, Daisy.
His work is dedicated to the loving memory of his wife, dancer/actress, Lydia Franklin.

Contributor: Ann Christine Tabaka

- -
Words that do not say a thing,
spout vague persuasions,

dancing around on a tongue
of fire. Heads tilting, nodding,

turning, What was that you
said? Writing a thesis of the

damned, we follow bread crumbs
of doubt. Ring around the Rosie,

time has all but passed. Sweet
garlands of discovery, upon

the ocean cast. A breath held
blue, a quandary spent, we

plunge ahead anew. Devoid of
sense, we seek the prize, a

lanced boil. Meanwhile paintings
of colorful decent adorn a contrived

world. Rising from the throng,
visions of disbelief profess to be

real. Fabricated phrases fill our
lives with words that say but nil.

Alas, all is smoke and mirrors,
… and smoke


- - -
Ann Christine Tabaka was nominated for the 2017 Pushcart Prize in Poetry, has been internationally published, and won poetry awards from numerous publications. She lives in Delaware, USA. She loves gardening and cooking. Chris lives with her husband and three cats.

Contributor: Joselyn Colby Rastecov

- -
When the fury of a lost god
comes howling through the house
and the ghosts of the forgotten dead
the ghosts of an age
scream bleeding rebirth
and revenge
for lost lives
for times
when all souls were oppressed
for control
for cash
by psychopaths
hiding in the shadow of a cross
they professed
guided every axe
guided every stick
that built every pyre
defiled every unwilling temple
until none remained
until all the stolen gold
glittered on swollen fingers
fat with savage scarfing.

The ghosts of the wronged do howl
and even the staunchest houses do crumble
for nothing lasts forever
nothing, but the howling of the angry wind
nothing lasts forever.


- - -
Those who do not learn from the past are doomed to repeat it.

Contributor: Cynthia Pitman

- -
When they said there was a “window” of time
for the space shuttle to leave the atmosphere,
I thought they meant that a big window
would open in the surface of the earth,
and the shuttle would emerge from inside.

When they said “burning at the stake,”
I thought they meant laying someone on a grill
and cooking him outdoors, just like you would a steak.

When they said “convergence of the twain,”
I thought they meant “twain” as in “Mark Twain,”
never knowing it meant “two.”

When they said she was “drawing on her gloves,”
I thought they meant she was drawing pictures
on her gloves with a crayon.

All of these things I thought.
I saw no reason to think otherwise.

But when they said
“everything happens for a reason,”
I thought they meant for a good reason.
Now I see the one real reason to think otherwise:
human suffering.
What is a good reason for that?


- - -
I'm a retired English teacher from Orlando. I have had or will have poetry and fiction published in Right Hand Pointing, Literary Yard, Amethyst Review, Saw Palm, and others.

Contributor: Bruce Mundhenke

- -
When the lights in the heavens
No longer shine,
And an ocean of darkness pervades,
No sunrise to chase the darkness away,
No spoken words to be heard,
Nothing to touch and no one to touch,
And no scenery ever to see,
Only darkness; oblivion;
The absense of anything.


- - -
Bruce Mundhenke writes in Illinois, where he lives with his wife and their dog and cat.

Contributor: Cooper Shea

- -
I’m six years old, it’s Sunday.
Mom kneels at her garden,
which isn’t really one,
just a small patch of soil by the driveway for Hosta plants.
She stops, takes her pack of Marlboro Ultra-Lights from her sock,
lights one and says to me:

If you ever want to experience the hardest thing in your life,
start smoking.

I’m 14, it’s a Friday night
after the football game, behind the tennis court.
She wears ripped jeans, converse, a Pink Floyd t-shirt
and smokes a Methol Pall-Mall.
No girl has ever touched the back of my neck like this.
I don’t know how I muster the strength
but I kiss her and it tastes like broken rules and burnt cough drops.
After, she offers me the pack:

Have one.

I’m 16, a hot Wednesday night.
Mom sits on the porch.
She barely has time to snub out a butt before lighting another.
I come out, like she asked.
She’s smoking from my pack.

Recognize these?

She says but there’s no scold in her voice.
I just sit down
and she gives me a light.

I’m 10, it’s summer on my grandparents farm.
Grandpa teaches me how to chuck feed into the trough for the cattle.
When they’re all fed,
he takes his Winston’s out of the pocket if his snap button shirt.
He looks like a cowboy off a billboard,
hardworking man having a smoke at the end of a tough day.
He lights one,
coughs and says:

Goddamn, I outta quit.

I’m 21 and it’s winter.
Mom invites me out to the porch
to talk about how serious things are with my girlfriend.
She lights what she says is her first all day,
coughs
and offers me the pack.
I want it, God knows.
I say:

I’m good.


- - -

Contributor: Jane Briganti

- -
The commemoration
of a marriage
In other words - anniversary
a celebration of love,
a marriage -
two people committed
one to another
wanting to journey
through life together
A day which most
care to remember

Unlike others
who bask in the joy
of such occasion
she wonders why this word
'anniversary'
in all its glory
powerful and sentimental
causes her such
disappointment?
Why this date in time
holds so much significance
with its twin
from so many years before?

Why has he forgotten their
anniversary - again?
How callous of him
Negative thoughts
now cloud her mind
Why did he not remember?
Is his action or lack of
conscious or accidental?
Is it deserving of
tolerance?
Should she remain
silent -
so the day just passes
like any other?

Have they drifted so far astray
that he deems their marriage
frivolous?
Why should she feel
envious
of the woman who receives
a flower with a tender kiss,
an invite for dinner,
a song, a dance or
a lover's tete-a-tete?

Consequently,
this day of celebration
turns into a day of
quiet deliberation

A day of sorrow and emptiness
an acceptance of the truth
the bond between them
a cosmic, passionate love
is slowly dissipating
A flame of irresistible passion
once burning out of control
has burned the candlewick black

Their anniversary
a day she remembers
with endearment
has become nothing more
than a day of reflection
A day of quiet deliberation


- - -
A Native New Yorker, she's been writing poetry for as long as she can remember. It is her hope that someone may find solace in her words.

Contributor: By Betal P.K. Pelario

- -
The trending trendy
say the silence is coming
mobs of jobless masses
the joining rivers of refuse humans
one into another
eating each other
endlessly
while the machines make
everything we want
nothing we need

Oh, to be gold toilet royalty
riding the rivers of the indigent
when it all falls down
when it all comes crumbling down
leaving nothing but the sick of heart
the lords of glittering trash
with everything they want
and nothing they need.


- - -

Contributor: Holly Day

- -
I come in from the garden and I’m covered
in slugs. Tiny slabs of snot with antennae waving
slowly moving over my sandaled
feet, pausing in confusion at trying to pass
a particularly thick black ankle hair
navigating the rough etched surface
of a heavy Tibetan silver bracelet.
I don’t touch my hair because
I don’t want to know they’re there, wrapped in tangles
dreadlocks with chewy centers.

I pull my clothes off by the washing machine
and start the hot rinse cycle immediately, reconciling
my guilt at running the washing machine
with only two items of clothing in it
with images of hordes of horrible soft bodies
tumbling through the soapy water with my clothes
hopefully boiled alive. If there were more clothes
in the mashing machine, the slugs would be trapped
throughout the load, might find sanctuary
in sweater pockets and socks
might make it out
alive.


- - -
Holly Day’s poetry has recently appeared in The Cape Rock, New Ohio Review, and Gargoyle.

Contributor: Ann Christine Tabaka

- -
Under the blazing African sun
lies Kenya, land of the equator,
torn between present and
past. Proudly flying colors of
red, black and green. A
half century of independence
from Britain’s Union Jack.

Words fail what emotions
perceives. Awe inducing vistas,
mountains, forests, the bush,
and lakes, wildlife beyond any
imagination, all a touch away.
Love and despair wrapped
in a blanket of anticipation.

On the savannah wind excites.
Thunder, a roaring lion rushing
across the terrain. Lightning and
downpour at his heels. Day becomes
night in a single breath, as darkness
swallows the sun. Racing for
shelter, eyes widen, heartbeats
quicken. Forthwith, altercation
over, the sun emerges victorious.

Land old as the beginning
and modern as today,
intertwined in a collage of
smiling faces, vast wilds,
and high-rise edifices.
Beckoning tourists for a
livelihood of meager means.
Selling trinkets and dreams.


- - -
Ann Christine Tabaka was nominated for the 2017 Pushcart Prize in Poetry, has been internationally published, and won poetry awards from numerous publications. She lives in Delaware, USA. She loves gardening and cooking. Chris lives with her husband and three cats.

Contributor: Maria-Theresa Zehendstrom

- -
In my arms, you were always elemental
ice in your eyes
fire in your thighs
an earthiness between them

airy in your summer dress
and cutting all the same
cutting me down
dropping me amidst the leaves
like so much wheat
to take me
to bury me
and make me soft
pliant
to all of your hard needs
the husk of me
discarded
always discarded
beneath a sky
the same color
as your eyes.


- - -
Inspired by the writings of Herne, Norris and Moreno, I write the song that splashes from my hands when I pour my soul on paper.

Contributor: Bruce Levine

- -
When love
Transcends time, distance and space
And takes hold of two people
Brought together by destiny and fate
The universe is renewed

Golden threads
Stitch the planets into a ring
And Saturn gives up its rings
As baguettes to surround the diamond
That once was the sun

And then
The moons and the stars
Shine down on the love
Like a rainbow of light
Catching moonbeams in its path
In a spiral of sparkles
Like fireworks on the Fourth of July

When love
Is so strong that it can
Overcome all obstacles
And join two people
Like an umbilical chord
Gives life to a baby
And each
Nurtures the other
With their hearts and their souls
As love unites them
For eternity

When love
Is so strong that the past disappears
And only the future remains
To be seen among the stars and the planets
In a universe of their own


- - -
Bruce Levine, a native Manhattanite, has spent his life as a writer of fiction and poetry and as a music and theatre professional. His literary catalogue includes four novels, short stories, humorous sketches, flash fiction, poetry, essays, magazine articles and a screenplay His works are published in over twenty-five on-line journals, over twenty books, his shows have been produced in New York and around the country and he’s the author of the novellas Reinvented and An Accidental Journey. He lives with his rescued Australian Shepherd, Daisy.
His work is dedicated to the loving memory of his wife, dancer/actress, Lydia Franklin.

Contributor: Lyla Sommersby

- -
You were always my dragon
you were always my fire
I hate you
I love you
I need you
and yet I never want to see you
I never want to see you again
and yet I do
and yet I always do
and yet I'd throw open the door
if I saw your shadow in the porthole
I'd take your cruel hands in mine
I'd kiss your cold fingers
I'd kiss your lips
despite all the vicious things
you've said
I'd take you back in a heartbeat
regretting every minute of it
knowing viscerally
it's all a great mistake
knowing viscerally
that the love I feel is always one way
and this was only ever about sex for you
this was only ever about sex for you.


- - -
I am a student in Miami, Florida. Painting is my other love. My first book, Sketches of Someone, is available through Thunderune Publishing.

Contributor: John Ogden

- -
We still keep him
keep him as a reminder
of who we were
before.

I like looking back
few do
most want only the now
only the new, the more,
listless for novelty
balloons on the winds
of progress.

I am not immune
I am a harem of Nagels
porcelain skin, blue eyes, black hair
serving only myself
servicing
a recursive loop
of endless echo chamber dynamics
spun between future
and past
but never the one
no longer the other.

Like a curiosity
we keep him in our midst
safe and sated
hivemind self-gratification
achieved with workings
of a sea of same and subtle parts

Nostalgia gives him context
all else has been ripped away.
his friends are lizards now, foxes
brass dragons
with solar-sail wings
soaring gas-giant skylines
all elegant and delicate
complex in body
infinite in mind.

Gone are the tenuous connections
of unshackled minds
simple skins
simple illusions
simple ideas and simple needs

The faustian bargain has paid in Nagels
in dragons, in flight
in a thousand awe-inspiring ways

The faustian bargain has paid in Nagels
and taken its own toll with shackles
with depression's venom
and novelty's constant bite.


- - -
John Ogden was conceived of a government form and a passing mailbox. He lives somewhere out in the woods of a rural land more akin to the fantasy realms of literature than real life, and his favorite dirt bikes will always be the broken ones.

Contributor: J. White Welchev

- -
Last days of what was
and all I can think of is you.

Standing at the edge
pushed to the precipice
pushed to take flight
before I'm ready
as if I'd ever be ready
as if I'd ever want to fly away
from this
from you
from what we built
from what I sacrificed so much for.

Last days of what was
and all I want is another moment
and another
and another

Last days of what was
and all I want is a push against the inevitable
a push against the push
that gives
that just for once
just once
actually gives.


- - -

Contributor: Curtis Long Cole

- -
Dusty porch
Grandad's farm
Silverbottom clouds
Shadowing grain's gold
Pigs and chickens
Picking scratch from grass
Pastoral
Well lived
Well loved
All gone
Long gone
Now.


- - -

Contributor: Oles Karg Campbell

- -
I crawled into the depths of your heart
titanic and cold
all packed ice
all packed with screaming faces
packed with pain
all glacial,
all razor crystalline.

I thought I could warm you
I thought I could see heat
just waiting to be released
a heart in need
of tenderness
of touch
of love

You crushed me in those cold caverns
You sealed me in a tomb of ice
added me to the faces
locked away, screaming
forever desiring
forever desiring Iapetus.


- - -
Terrible relationships make terrible people. I write poetry to break the cycle.

Contributor: Jane Briganti

- -
She sleeps
the sweetest sleep
Her head lies gently
upon her pillow
Clutched in her arms
is his pillow nestled
under her cheek and chin
Kneeling alongside the bed
he watches and wonders
"Is she dreaming of me?"
Quietly he watches over her
like a Guardian Angel
Slowly he moves in closer
placing his face in front
of hers upon the pillow
she holds so tightly
His lips just millimeters
from hers
His breath warms her face
He moves yet even closer
Kissing her ever so gently
his lips on hers so soft
He pauses and she wakes
to keep their kiss alive
Time stands still for both
face to face, gazing
into one another's eyes
His palm touches gently
upon her cheek
He whispers...
Sleep my darling,
the sweetest sleep
Dream of me for
I am here and
I love you


- - -
A Native New Yorker, I've been writing poetry for as long as I can remember. It is my hope that someone may find solace in my words.