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and the days of my youth are dispersed: here a flower, there a scream; and yet, I do not die!

They butchered me on the doorstep like a lamb for the feast – thrombosis in the veins of petroleum. In God’s name they slit my throat from ear to ear a thousand times, and each time my dripping blood would swing back and forth like the feet of a man hanged from a gallows, and come to rest, a large, crimson mallow blossom – a beacon to guide ships and mark the site of palaces and embassies.

Aldeburgh