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I'm viewed as this weird, crippled character. But you got to take your lumps.

quote by Billy Corgan
Added by Lucian Velea
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Weird World

It's a Weird World...Weird World
Hey, hey, hey!
The sun is over the city but it's an orange day
There is reason for looking up but I'm feeling down
You see Ive got to catch a plane, won't buy a ticket
'Cause it's hard to just stop when you're spinning around
Its a weird world dont you know it?
Its a weird world and it wont slow down
Its a weird world no matter how you roll it
Hey, hey, hey! Sweet baby
Theres a way
Just stand up and fight it
Hey, hey, hey!
Never give up, and dont let it wear out (now)
Your love
It's a weird world...Yeah
Sent a message to a G.I.
In the desert
Said thank you man for bringing another dawn
Back here it's her and me
And we're having our first baby
And he's out there taking them on (on)
Its a weird world and I know you know it
Its a weird world and it wont slow down
Its a weird world no matter how you roll it
Hey, hey, hey! Sweet baby
Theres a way
Just stand up and fight it
Hey, hey, hey!
Never give up, dont let it wear out (now)
Your love
Im closing my eyes but Im starting to see
While hes looking at you, shes looking at me
The only thing he does is just keep me away from you
Sure part of this place would cheer if I died
Dont let them take away your beautiful smile
Take away your beautiful smile
Take away your beautiful smile
Hey, hey, hey! Sweet baby
Theres a way
Just stand up and fight it (Yeah, ye-ah!)
Hey, hey, hey! (sweet baby!) Sweet baby
Theres a way
For you to decide it
Hey, hey, hey!
Never give up, dont let it wear out (now)
Your love
Hey, hey, hey!
Its a weird world dont you know it?
Hey, hey, hey!

[...] Read more

song performed by Backstreet Boys
Added by Lucian Velea
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Some Weird Sin

Pop/bowie
Well, I never got my license to live
They wont give it up
So I stand at the worlds edge
Well, Im trying to break in
Oh no, its not for me
And the sight of it all
Makes me sad and ill
Thats when I want
Some weird sin
Things get too straight
I cant bear it
I feel stuck
Stuck on a pin
Well Im trying to break in
And I know its not for me
And the sight of it all
Makes me sad and ill
Thats when I want
Some weird sin
Thats when I want
Some weird sin
Just to relax with
Thats some dumb weird sin
For a while anyway
With my head on the ledge
Thats what you get out on the edge
Some weird sin
Things get too straight
I cant bear it
I feel stuck
Stuck on a pin
Im trying to break in
Oh, I know its not for me
Well, the sight of it all
Makes me sad and ill
Thats when I want
Some weird sin
Thats when I want
Some weird sin
Just to relax with
.
Thats some dumb weird sin
For a while anyway
With my head out on the ledge
Thats what you get out on the edge
Some weird sin
Some weird sin, some weird sin

song performed by Iggy Pop
Added by Lucian Velea
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My Humps

(trumpets)
*sighs*
What you gon do with all that junk, all that junk inside your trunk?
Imma get-get-get-get you drunk, get you love drunk off my hump.
My hump my hump, my hump my hump my hump.
My hump my hump my hump. My lovely little lumps.
Check it out
I drive these brothers crazy; I do it on the day
Look, they treat me really nicely; they buy me all these ices:
Dolce and Gabbana, Vinny and Nedonna.
Caring, they be sharing all their money, got me wearing fly
Brother I aint asking, they say they love my ass and
Seven jeans to religion, I say no but they keep giving
So I keep on taking, and no I aint taking,
We can keep on dating, I keep on demonstrating my love.
My love my love my love. You love my lady lumps.
My hump my hump my hump. My humps, they got you
Shes got me spending(ooh)
Spending all your money on me, and spending time on me [x2]
On, on me, on me.
What you gon do with all that junk, all that junk inside that trunk?
Imma get-get-get-get you drunk, get you love drunk off my hump.
What you gon do with all that ass, all that ass inside them jeans?
Imma make-make-make-make you scream, make you scream make you scream!
Cuz of my hump, my hump my hump my hump,
My hump my hump my hump, my lovely lady lumps.
Check it out
I met a girl down at the disco, she said:
Hey, hey-hey yeh lets go. I could be your baby; you could be my honey, lets spend time, not money and:
Mix your milk with my cocoa, puh - milky, milky cocoa, mix your milk with my cocoa, huh - milky, milky right
They say Im really sexy. Them boys, they wanna sex me,
They always standing next to me, always dancing next to me.
Trying to feel my hump, hump, looking at my lump, lump,
You can look but you cant touch it, if you touch it
Imma start some drama, you dont want no drama.
Nono drama, nononono drama.
So dont pull on my hand boy, you aint my man boy
Im just trying to dance boy, and move my hump, my hump,
My hump my hump my hump, my hump my hump my hump,
My hump my hump my hump, my lovely lady lumps,
My lovely lady lumps, my lovely lady lumps,
In the back and in the front, my loving got you
Shes got me spending(ooh)
Spending all your money on me, and spending time on me [x2]
On, on me, on me.
What you gon do with all that junk, all that junk inside that trunk?
Imma get-get-get-get you drunk, get you love drunk off my hump.
What you gon do with all that ass, all that ass inside them jeans?
Imma make-make-make-make you scream, make you scream make you scream!
What you gon do with all that junk, all that junk inside that trunk?

[...] Read more

song performed by Black Eyed Peas
Added by Lucian Velea
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Weird Science

(weird science)
Plastic tubes and pots and pans
Bits and pieces and
Magic from the hand
Were makin
(weird science)
Things Ive never seen before
Behind bolted doors
Talent and imagination
(weird science)
Not what teacher said to do
Makin dreams come true
Living tissue, warm flesh
(weird science)
Plastic tubes and pots and pans
Bits and pieces (and)
Bits and pieces (and)
Chorus
(bits of) my creation--is it real?
Its my creation--i do not know
No hesitation--no heart of gold
Just flesh and blood--i do not know
From my heart and from my hand
Why dont people understand
My intentions . . . . oooh, weird . . . .
Weird science!!
(weird science)
Magic and technology
Voodoo dolls and chants
Electricity
Were makin
(weird science)
Fantasy and microchips
Shooting from the hip
Something different
Were makin
(weird science)
Pictures from a magazine
Diagrams and charts
Mending broken hearts (and makin)
(weird science)
Something like a recipe
Bits and pieces . . . .
Bits and pieces . . . .

song performed by Oingo Boingo
Added by Lucian Velea
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Crippled Inside

You can shine your shoes and wear a suit
You can comb your hair and look quite cute
You can hide your face behind a smile
One thing you cant hide
Is when youre crippled inside
You can wear a mask and paint your face
You can call yourself the human race
You can wear a collar and a tie
One thing you cant hide
Is when youre crippled inside
Well now you know that your
Cat has nine lives
Nine lives to itself
But you only got one
And a dogs life aint fun
Mamma take a look outside
You can go to church and sing a hymn
You can judge me by the color of my skin
You can live a lie until you die
One thing you cant hide
Is when youre crippled inside
Well now you know that your
Cat has nine lives
Nine lives to itself
But you only got one
And a dogs life aint fun
Mamma take a look outside
You can go to church and sing a hymn
You can judge me by the color of my skin
You can live a lie until you die
One thing you cant hide
Is when youre crippled inside
One thing you cant hide
Is when youre crippled inside
One thing you cant hide
Is when youre crippled inside

song performed by Lennon John
Added by Lucian Velea
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Crippled Inside

You can shine your shoes and wear a suit,
You can comb your hair and look quite cute,
You can hide your face behind a smile.
One thing you cant hide;
Is when youre crippled inside.
You can wear a mask and paint your face,
You can call yourself the human race,
You can wear a collar and a tie.
One thing you cant hide;
Is when youre crippled inside.
Well, now you know that your cat has nine lives, babe,
Nine lives to itself.
But you only got one
And a dogs life aint fun,
Mama, take a look outside.
Go!
You can go to church and sing a hymn,
You can judge me by the colour of my skin,
You can live a lie until you die.
One thing you cant hide;
Is when youre crippled inside.
Take it, brother!
Well, now you know that your cat has nine lives, babe,
Nine lives to itself.
But you only got one
And a dogs life aint fun,
Mama, take a look outside.
You can go to church and sing a hymn,
You can judge me by the colour of my skin,
You can live a lie until you die.
One thing you cant hide;
Is when youre crippled inside.
One thing you cant hide;
Is when youre crippled inside.
One thing you cant hide;
Is when youre crippled inside.

song performed by Yoko Ono
Added by Lucian Velea
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Crippled Inside

You can shine your shoes and wear a suit,
You can comb your hair and look quite cute,
You can hide your face behind a smile.
One thing you cant hide;
Is when youre crippled inside.
You can wear a mask and paint your face,
You can call yourself the human race,
You can wear a collar and a tie.
One thing you cant hide;
Is when youre crippled inside.
Well, now you know that your cat has nine lives, babe,
Nine lives to itself.
But you only got one
And a dogs life aint fun,
Mama, take a look outside.
Go!
You can go to church and sing a hymn,
You can judge me by the colour of my skin,
You can live a lie until you die.
One thing you cant hide;
Is when youre crippled inside.
Take it, brother!
Well, now you know that your cat has nine lives, babe,
Nine lives to itself.
But you only got one
And a dogs life aint fun,
Mama, take a look outside.
You can go to church and sing a hymn,
You can judge me by the colour of my skin,
You can live a lie until you die.
One thing you cant hide;
Is when youre crippled inside.
One thing you cant hide;
Is when youre crippled inside.
One thing you cant hide;
Is when youre crippled inside.

song performed by Yoko Ono
Added by Lucian Velea
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Feeling Like A Crippled With No Wings

Crippled and no wings, acid in the eye oh how it stings. How much did you bring. I'll tell you right now it will never be enough. To break through shell in which is someone's hell. The skin is tough, rough almost irritable. I want to stand but can't, I want to see but I m so blind, I want to hear but you screams are so silent, crippled and no wings. The demons encircle me, they point and laugh, pick and prod, hey say the fisherman's son look what we caught I think its a cod, look at it flop, so helpless breathless. To hell with ya and you deformed view of what I am. Don't you know it ain't nice to melt the ice before their ready for their drink, do you even use that head and think. Comformity, fitting in amongst those not welcome. A criminal by tributes and scars. Just cause you say you are. Never can you remove the gun from under you pillow. Always looking towards the shadows. I'm just another crippled with no wings. Still don't treat me any differently, common courtesy, common respect, I m not a reject, I know exactly what is being said, I have had enough of it. Ill show you rabid dog, watch out for that bite. It can be nasty. Crippled and no wings, oh the anger it brings. To hell with what you think. Your just mad cause I wasn't the loser you were use too. You like to be told what to do. Well here's one f*ck you. What do you think I was doing their. Making cookies for the boy scouts. Ugly are my eyes. When I how I wasted my time on someone who didn't really want me. You faker, you disease, you brought me knees, then stepped on me. Now I m crippled with no wings, but no longer that foolish to fall for such tricks again. So come on lets see what you got, bet you have no luck. Cause you just ain't that hot. It was about more than that. You broke a contract. I hope you go to hell an rot. For creating the crippled with no wings.

poem by Ace Of Black Hearts
Added by Poetry Lover
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Weird

I like the way you never sleep
And the promises you never keep
I like the way you say hello
And make it sound like time to go
I like the scar above your lip
The way you let your feelings slip
But they are never what you feel
Oh so fake but completely real
Dont you think its weird
Weirder then weird
Thats what you are
Thats what you are to be
What I like about you
Is what you like about me
Dont you think its weird
I like the rules that multiply
And make the good things
Pass you by
Standing here without a plan
Thats why your such a happy man
Dont you think its weird
Weirder then weird
Thats what you are
Thats what you are to be
What I like about you
Is what you like about me
Dont you think its 1,2
I wanna make some changes
I want my money back
I wanna start up with you
I wanna talk to strangers
I wanna be with you
But I just dont know
Where or When
Thats what you are
Thats what you are to be
What I like about you
Is what you like about me
Dont you think its weird
Weirder then weird
Thats what you are
Thats what you are to be
What I like about you
Is what you like about me
Dont you think its weird

song performed by Hilary Duff
Added by Lucian Velea
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Nature

Weather constantly changes.
No character, only dynamic.
Dull and dreary,
Or bitter and cold,
Or bright and shiny.
This is mother nature.
She is of this world.
She dictates the mood.
She affects mine.

Emotions, constantly changing.
Personality has dynamic,
But lacks character.
It is constantly changing.
Bitter and resentful,
Frustrated and annoyed
Happy & joyous.
This is human nature.
It is of this world.
It dictates our mood.
It affects another.

Mother nature cannot be controlled.
For she is not ours.
Yet mother nature controls me,
Though I am not hers.
Together, we must exist.
We must accept each as we both are.
Though one affects the other.
Based on emotion, not character.

During the storm,
The sky is still the sky,
The ground, is still the ground
The sun is still the sun.
This is the character of mother nature.
The snow may cover the ground,
But the ground remains.
The clouds may cover the sun,
But the sun remains.
Character is always constant.

Nature affects character.
Character is patience, kindness,
Compassion, empathy, forgiving.
Plain and simple,
Our character is love.
Human nature covers human character,
Although it might not be seen,
It still remains.

[...] Read more

poem by Ryan Lee Morris
Added by Poetry Lover
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Some Thing New

Everyday we are blessed to live,
There is...
Some 'thing' new.
Something we hadn't thought,
Would be interesting enough to do.

But if we,
Choose that some 'thing' viewed...
As a pick up to keep us lifted.
While pursuing that some 'thing' viewed,
Our minds will broaden to accept and receive.

Everyday,
There is...
Some thing new.
There is...
Something we hadn't thought,
But could find...
Interesting enough to do.

And if we thought about that yesterday,
When we refused...
The experience.
And dismissed it as a foolish event,
We might have discovered,
Just how much we grew.

Everyday we are blessed to live,
There is...
Some 'thing' new.
Something we hadn't thought,
Would be interesting enough to do.

But if we,
Choose that some 'thing' viewed...
As a pick up to keep us lifted.
While pursuing that some 'thing' viewed,
Our minds will broaden to accept and receive.

And if we thought about that yesterday,
When we refused...
The experience.
And dismissed it as a foolish event,
We might have discovered,
Just how much we grew.

But if we,
Choose that some 'thing' viewed...
As a pick up to keep us lifted.
And make that the rule that is meant...

[...] Read more

poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
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Hiding Behind Ignorance

The beauty within you,
Is crippled by your mind.
Aggressive, hostile, selfish and shy.
The intelligence within you,
Is crippled by your mind.
Greed, dishonesty, prejudice and pride.
The love within you,
Is crippled by your mind.
Anger, hurt, cruelty and hate.
The happiness within you,
Is crippled by your mind.
Depression, envy, fear and regret.
The acceptance within you,
Is crippled by your mind.
Racism, violence, horror and crime.

poem by Dina Raven
Added by Poetry Lover
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Weird

Weird...
is not...
Life...
Life is

Not weird...
some time life
Weird...
Some time not

Weird...
Don't woory
weird is not life...
Life also....

Some time weird....
cry...
woory...
sad...

sin...
happy...
Is all weird...?

poem by Otteri Selvakumar
Added by Poetry Lover
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Weird Nightmare

Weird nightmare
You haunt my every dream
Weird nightmare
Tell me whats your scheme?
Can it be that youre a part
Of a lonely broken heart?
Weird nightmare
Why must you torment me?
Weird nightmare
Pain and misery
In a heart thats loved and lost
Take away the grief youve caused
Cant sleep at night
Twist, turn in fright
With the fear that Ill live it all again
In my dreams
Youre there to haunt me
When you say she doesnt want me
Ive been hurt
Do you know what that means?
Weird nightmare
Take away this dream youve born
Weird nightmare
Mend a heart thats torn
That has paid the price of love
A thousand fold
Bring me a love
With a heart of gold
Weird nightmare

song performed by Elvis Costello
Added by Lucian Velea
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Weird

Isnt it weird. isnt it strange.
Even though were just two strangers on this runaway train
Were both trying to find a place in the sun
Weve lived in the shadows, but doesnt everyone
Isnt it strange how we all feel a little bit weird sometimes
Isnt it hard. standing in the rain.
Youre on the verge of going crazy and your hearts in pain
No one can hear though youre screaming so loud
You feel all alone in a faceless crowd
Isnt it strange how we all get a little bit weird sometimes.
Sitting on the side. waiting for a sign. hoping that my luck will change.
Reaching for a hand that can understand, someone who feels the same.
When you live in a cookie cutter world being different is a sin.
So you dont stand out. and you dont fit in. weird.
Sitting on the side. waiting for a sign. hoping that my luck will change.
Reaching for a hand that can understand, someone who feels the same.
When you live in a cookie cutter world if youre different you cant win.
So you dont stand out and you dont fit in. weird.
Isnt it strange how we all feel a little bit weird
Strange, how we all get a little bit.
Strange, cause were all just a little bit weird sometimes.

song performed by Hanson
Added by Lucian Velea
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Is She Weird

I know youre rich in
Good clothes and little things
Your mind is fancy
(and your car is bitchin)
Is she weird
Is she weird, is she white
Is she promised to the night
And her head has no room
And her head has no room
Your heart is ripshit
Your mouth is everywhere
Im lyin in it
Is she weird
Is she over me
Like the stars and the sun
Like the stars and the sun
Is she weird
Is she weird, is she white
Is she promised to the night
And her head has no room!
No more of this girl cryin
Im here, your big man
Youre mine
Is she weird, is she white
Is she promised to the night
And her head has no room

song performed by Pixies
Added by Lucian Velea
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I used to think that anyone doing anything weird was weird. I suddenly realized that anyone doing anything weird wasn't weird at all and it was the people saying they were weird that were weird.

quote by Paul McCartney
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I Was Made To Think It

First and foremost you've been the ultimate friend
But you know that's not a passport to me
It's seems secondary to the official reasons I have
But you know they're not right
They're not supposed to be right
Such a royal misfit
You demand the highest respect
Such a royal misfit
Your demands should be higher
It wasn't weird it wasn't nothing
Curious at all but nothing so high
It wasn't weird it wasn't nothing
It wasn't nothing
Moments follow one another without belonging
Moments follow one another without belonging
Moments follow one another without belonging
Moments follow one another without belonging
First and foremost what you know isn't everything you are
Or everything you know it to be
It seems secondary that the real real reason I have
When you know it's not right
It's not supposed to be right
Such a royal misfit
You demand the highest respect
Such a royal misfit
Your demands should be higher
It wasn't weird it wasn't nothing
Curious at all but nothing so high
It wasn't weird it wasn't nothing
Curious at all but nothing so high
It wasn't weird it wasn't nothing
Curious at all but nothing so high
It wasn't weird it wasn't nothing
It wasn't nothing
Moments follow one another without belonging
Moments follow one another without belonging
Moments follow one another without belonging
Moments follow one another without belonging
Everything you are won't last longer
Everything you are won't last longer
Won't last longer
Won't last longer

song performed by Idlewild
Added by Lucian Velea
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Berenice by edgar allan poe

MISERY is manifold. The wretchedness of earth is multiform. Overreaching the wide horizon as the rainbow, its hues are as various as the hues of that arch, -as distinct too, yet as intimately blended. Overreaching the wide horizon as the rainbow! How is it that from beauty I have derived a type of unloveliness? -from the covenant of peace a simile of sorrow? But as, in ethics, evil is a consequence of good, so, in fact, out of joy is sorrow born. Either the memory of past bliss is the anguish of to-day, or the agonies which are have their origin in the ecstasies which might have been.

My baptismal name is Egaeus; that of my family I will not mention. Yet there are no towers in the land more time-honored than my gloomy, gray, hereditary halls. Our line has been called a race of visionaries; and in many striking particulars -in the character of the family mansion -in the frescos of the chief saloon -in the tapestries of the dormitories -in the chiselling of some buttresses in the armory -but more especially in the gallery of antique paintings -in the fashion of the library chamber -and, lastly, in the very peculiar nature of the library's contents, there is more than sufficient evidence to warrant the belief.

The recollections of my earliest years are connected with that chamber, and with its volumes -of which latter I will say no more. Here died my mother. Herein was I born. But it is mere idleness to say that I had not lived before -that the soul has no previous existence. You deny it? -let us not argue the matter. Convinced myself, I seek not to convince. There is, however, a remembrance of aerial forms -of spiritual and meaning eyes -of sounds, musical yet sad -a remembrance which will not be excluded; a memory like a shadow, vague, variable, indefinite, unsteady; and like a shadow, too, in the impossibility of my getting rid of it while the sunlight of my reason shall exist.

In that chamber was I born. Thus awaking from the long night of what seemed, but was not, nonentity, at once into the very regions of fairy-land -into a palace of imagination -into the wild dominions of monastic thought and erudition -it is not singular that I gazed around me with a startled and ardent eye -that I loitered away my boyhood in books, and dissipated my youth in reverie; but it is singular that as years rolled away, and the noon of manhood found me still in the mansion of my fathers -it is wonderful what stagnation there fell upon the springs of my life -wonderful how total an inversion took place in the character of my commonest thought. The realities of the world affected me as visions, and as visions only, while the wild ideas of the land of dreams became, in turn, -not the material of my every-day existence-but in very deed that existence utterly and solely in itself.

Berenice and I were cousins, and we grew up together in my paternal halls. Yet differently we grew -I ill of health, and buried in gloom -she agile, graceful, and overflowing with energy; hers the ramble on the hill-side -mine the studies of the cloister -I living within my own heart, and addicted body and soul to the most intense and painful meditation -she roaming carelessly through life with no thought of the shadows in her path, or the silent flight of the raven-winged hours. Berenice! -I call upon her name -Berenice! -and from the gray ruins of memory a thousand tumultuous recollections are startled at the sound! Ah! vividly is her image before me now, as in the early days of her light-heartedness and joy! Oh! gorgeous yet fantastic beauty! Oh! sylph amid the shrubberies of Arnheim! -Oh! Naiad among its fountains! -and then -then all is mystery and terror, and a tale which should not be told. Disease -a fatal disease -fell like the simoom upon her frame, and, even while I gazed upon her, the spirit of change swept, over her, pervading her mind, her habits, and her character, and, in a manner the most subtle and terrible, disturbing even the identity of her person! Alas! the destroyer came and went, and the victim -where was she, I knew her not -or knew her no longer as Berenice.

Among the numerous train of maladies superinduced by that fatal and primary one which effected a revolution of so horrible a kind in the moral and physical being of my cousin, may be mentioned as the most distressing and obstinate in its nature, a species of epilepsy not unfrequently terminating in trance itself -trance very nearly resembling positive dissolution, and from which her manner of recovery was in most instances, startlingly abrupt. In the mean time my own disease -for I have been told that I should call it by no other appelation -my own disease, then, grew rapidly upon me, and assumed finally a monomaniac character of a novel and extraordinary form -hourly and momently gaining vigor -and at length obtaining over me the most incomprehensible ascendancy. This monomania, if I must so term it, consisted in a morbid irritability of those properties of the mind in metaphysical science termed the attentive. It is more than probable that I am not understood; but I fear, indeed, that it is in no manner possible to convey to the mind of the merely general reader, an adequate idea of that nervous intensity of interest with which, in my case, the powers of meditation (not to speak technically) busied and buried themselves, in the contemplation of even the most ordinary objects of the universe.

To muse for long unwearied hours with my attention riveted to some frivolous device on the margin, or in the topography of a book; to become absorbed for the better part of a summer's day, in a quaint shadow falling aslant upon the tapestry, or upon the door; to lose myself for an entire night in watching the steady flame of a lamp, or the embers of a fire; to dream away whole days over the perfume of a flower; to repeat monotonously some common word, until the sound, by dint of frequent repetition, ceased to convey any idea whatever to the mind; to lose all sense of motion or physical existence, by means of absolute bodily quiescence long and obstinately persevered in; -such were a few of the most common and least pernicious vagaries induced by a condition of the mental faculties, not, indeed, altogether unparalleled, but certainly bidding defiance to anything like analysis or explanation.

Yet let me not be misapprehended. -The undue, earnest, and morbid attention thus excited by objects in their own nature frivolous, must not be confounded in character with that ruminating propensity common to all mankind, and more especially indulged in by persons of ardent imagination. It was not even, as might be at first supposed, an extreme condition or exaggeration of such propensity, but primarily and essentially distinct and different. In the one instance, the dreamer, or enthusiast, being interested by an object usually not frivolous, imperceptibly loses sight of this object in a wilderness of deductions and suggestions issuing therefrom, until, at the conclusion of a day dream often replete with luxury, he finds the incitamentum or first cause of his musings entirely vanished and forgotten. In my case the primary object was invariably frivolous, although assuming, through the medium of my distempered vision, a refracted and unreal importance. Few deductions, if any, were made; and those few pertinaciously returning in upon the original object as a centre. The meditations were never pleasurable; and, at the termination of the reverie, the first cause, so far from being out of sight, had attained that supernaturally exaggerated interest which was the prevailing feature of the disease. In a word, the powers of mind more particularly exercised were, with me, as I have said before, the attentive, and are, with the day-dreamer, the speculative.

My books, at this epoch, if they did not actually serve to irritate the disorder, partook, it will be perceived, largely, in their imaginative and inconsequential nature, of the characteristic qualities of the disorder itself. I well remember, among others, the treatise of the noble Italian Coelius Secundus Curio 'de Amplitudine Beati Regni dei'; St. Austin's great work, the 'City of God'; and Tertullian 'de Carne Christi, ' in which the paradoxical sentence 'Mortuus est Dei filius; credible est quia ineptum est: et sepultus resurrexit; certum est quia impossibile est' occupied my undivided time, for many weeks of laborious and fruitless investigation.

Thus it will appear that, shaken from its balance only by trivial things, my reason bore resemblance to that ocean-crag spoken of by Ptolemy Hephestion, which steadily resisting the attacks of human violence, and the fiercer fury of the waters and the winds, trembled only to the touch of the flower called Asphodel. And although, to a careless thinker, it might appear a matter beyond doubt, that the alteration produced by her unhappy malady, in the moral condition of Berenice, would afford me many objects for the exercise of that intense and abnormal meditation whose nature I have been at some trouble in explaining, yet such was not in any degree the case. In the lucid intervals of my infirmity, her calamity, indeed, gave me pain, and, taking deeply to heart that total wreck of her fair and gentle life, I did not fall to ponder frequently and bitterly upon the wonder-working means by which so strange a revolution had been so suddenly brought to pass. But these reflections partook not of the idiosyncrasy of my disease, and were such as would have occurred, under similar circumstances, to the ordinary mass of mankind. True to its own character, my disorder revelled in the less important but more startling changes wrought in the physical frame of Berenice -in the singular and most appalling distortion of her personal identity.

During the brightest days of her unparalleled beauty, most surely I had never loved her. In the strange anomaly of my existence, feelings with me, had never been of the heart, and my passions always were of the mind. Through the gray of the early morning -among the trellised shadows of the forest at noonday -and in the silence of my library at night, she had flitted by my eyes, and I had seen her -not as the living and breathing Berenice, but as the Berenice of a dream -not as a being of the earth, earthy, but as the abstraction of such a being-not as a thing to admire, but to analyze -not as an object of love, but as the theme of the most abstruse although desultory speculation. And now -now I shuddered in her presence, and grew pale at her approach; yet bitterly lamenting her fallen and desolate condition, I called to mind that she had loved me long, and, in an evil moment, I spoke to her of marriage.

And at length the period of our nuptials was approaching, when, upon an afternoon in the winter of the year, -one of those unseasonably warm, calm, and misty days which are the nurse of the beautiful Halcyon*, -I sat, (and sat, as I thought, alone,) in the inner apartment of the library. But uplifting my eyes I saw that Berenice stood before me.

*For as Jove, during the winter season, gives twice seven days of warmth, men have called this clement and temperate time the nurse of the beautiful Halcyon -Simonides.

Was it my own excited imagination -or the misty influence of the atmosphere -or the uncertain twilight of the chamber -or the gray draperies which fell around her figure -that caused in it so vacillating and indistinct an outline? I could not tell. She spoke no word, I -not for worlds could I have uttered a syllable. An icy chill ran through my frame; a sense of insufferable anxiety oppressed me; a consuming curiosity pervaded my soul; and sinking back upon the chair, I remained for some time breathless and motionless, with my eyes riveted upon her person. Alas! its emaciation was excessive, and not one vestige of the former being, lurked in any single line of the contour. My burning glances at length fell upon the face.

The forehead was high, and very pale, and singularly placid; and the once jetty hair fell partially over it, and overshadowed the hollow temples with innumerable ringlets now of a vivid yellow, and Jarring discordantly, in their fantastic character, with the reigning melancholy of the countenance. The eyes were lifeless, and lustreless, and seemingly pupil-less, and I shrank involuntarily from their glassy stare to the contemplation of the thin and shrunken lips. They parted; and in a smile of peculiar meaning, the teeth of the changed Berenice disclosed themselves slowly to my view. Would to God that I had never beheld them, or that, having done so, I had died!

The shutting of a door disturbed me, and, looking up, I found that my cousin had departed from the chamber. But from the disordered chamber of my brain, had not, alas! departed, and would not be driven away, the white and ghastly spectrum of the teeth. Not a speck on their surface -not a shade on their enamel -not an indenture in their edges -but what that period of her smile had sufficed to brand in upon my memory. I saw them now even more unequivocally than I beheld them then. The teeth! -the teeth! -they were here, and there, and everywhere, and visibly and palpably before me; long, narrow, and excessively white, with the pale lips writhing about them, as in the very moment of their first terrible development. Then came the full fury of my monomania, and I struggled in vain against its strange and irresistible influence. In the multiplied objects of the external world I had no thoughts but for the teeth. For these I longed with a phrenzied desire. All other matters and all different interests became absorbed in their single contemplation. They -they alone were present to the mental eye, and they, in their sole individuality, became the essence of my mental life. I held them in every light. I turned them in every attitude. I surveyed their characteristics. I dwelt upon their peculiarities. I pondered upon their conformation. I mused upon the alteration in their nature. I shuddered as I assigned to them in imagination a sensitive and sentient power, and even when unassisted by the lips, a capability of moral expression. Of Mad'selle Salle it has been well said, 'que tous ses pas etaient des sentiments, ' and of Berenice I more seriously believed que toutes ses dents etaient des idees. Des idees! -ah here was the idiotic thought that destroyed me! Des idees! -ah therefore it was that I coveted them so madly! I felt that their possession could alone ever restore me to peace, in giving me back to reason.

And the evening closed in upon me thus-and then the darkness came, and tarried, and went -and the day again dawned -and the mists of a second night were now gathering around -and still I sat motionless in that solitary room; and still I sat buried in meditation, and still the phantasma of the teeth maintained its terrible ascendancy as, with the most vivid hideous distinctness, it floated about amid the changing lights and shadows of the chamber. At length there broke in upon my dreams a cry as of horror and dismay; and thereunto, after a pause, succeeded the sound of troubled voices, intermingled with many low moanings of sorrow, or of pain. I arose from my seat and, throwing open one of the doors of the library, saw standing out in the antechamber a servant maiden, all in tears, who told me that Berenice was -no more. She had been seized with epilepsy in the early morning, and now, at the closing in of the night, the grave was ready for its tenant, and all the preparations for the burial were completed.

I found myself sitting in the library, and again sitting there alone. It seemed that I had newly awakened from a confused and exciting dream. I knew that it was now midnight, and I was well aware that since the setting of the sun Berenice had been interred. But of that dreary period which intervened I had no positive -at least no definite comprehension. Yet its memory was replete with horror -horror more horrible from being vague, and terror more terrible from ambiguity. It was a fearful page in the record my existence, written all over with dim, and hideous, and unintelligible recollections. I strived to decypher them, but in vain; while ever and anon, like the spirit of a departed sound, the shrill and piercing shriek of a female voice seemed to be ringing in my ears. I had done a deed -what was it? I asked myself the question aloud, and the whispering echoes of the chamber answered me, 'what was it? '

On the table beside me burned a lamp, and near it lay a little box. It was of no remarkable character, and I had seen it frequently before, for it was the property of the family physician; but how came it there, upon my table, and why did I shudder in regarding it? These things were in no manner to be accounted for, and my eyes at length dropped to the open pages of a book, and to a sentence underscored therein. The words were the singular but simple ones of the poet Ebn Zaiat, 'Dicebant mihi sodales si sepulchrum amicae visitarem, curas meas aliquantulum fore levatas.' Why then, as I perused them, did the hairs of my head erect themselves on end, and the blood of my body become congealed within my veins?

There came a light tap at the library door, and pale as the tenant of a tomb, a menial entered upon tiptoe. His looks were wild with terror, and he spoke to me in a voice tremulous, husky, and very low. What said he? -some broken sentences I heard. He told of a wild cry disturbing the silence of the night -of the gathering together of the household-of a search in the direction of the sound; -and then his tones grew thrillingly distinct as he whispered me of a violated grave -of a disfigured body enshrouded, yet still breathing, still palpitating, still alive!

He pointed to garments; -they were muddy and clotted with gore. I spoke not, and he took me gently by the hand; -it was indented with the impress of human nails. He directed my attention to some object against the wall; -I looked at it for some minutes; -it was a spade. With a shriek I bounded to the table, and grasped the box that lay upon it. But I could not force it open; and in my tremor it slipped from my hands, and fell heavily, and burst into pieces; and from it, with a rattling sound, there rolled out some instruments of dental surgery, intermingled with thirty-two small, white and ivory-looking substances that were scattered to and fro about the floor.

poem by Erie Morganmaples
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Crippled!

when you take the crippled hand,
and put it to the plow...
a healing takes place!

when you take the crippled heart,
and put it with other wounded hearts,
compassion begins!

when you take the crippled spirit,
and teach it the words of freedom,
wings are loosed!

when you take the crippled man,
and restore his dignity...
he changes the world!

poem by Eric Cockrell
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