Fear

Passages

Every passage tagged with this emotion in the Vela corpus. Search the body text, narrow by source or register, click through to a book’s profile to see how the passage sits with the rest of the work.

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• From The Things They Carried (1990)

  We hiked over to the EM club and worked our way through a six-pack. Mitchell Sanders was there, at another table, but he pretended not to see me. Around closing time, I nodded at Azar. "Well, goody gum drop," he said. We went over to my hootch, picked up our gear, and then moved through the night down to the wire. I felt like a soldier again. Back in the bush, it seemed. We observed good field discipline, not talking, keeping to the shadows and joining in with the darkness. When we came up on Bunker Six, Azar lifted his thumb and peeled away from me and began circling to the south. Old times, I thought. A kind of thrill, a kind of dread. Quietly, I shouldered my gear and crossed over to a heap of boulders that overlooked Jorgenson's position. I was directly behind him. Thirty-two meters away, exactly. Even in the heavy darkness, no moon yet, I could make out the kid's silhouette: a helmet, a pair of shoulders, a rifle barrel. His back was to me. He gazed out at the wire and at the paddies beyond, where the danger was. I knelt down and took out ten flares and unscrewed the caps and lined them up in front of me and then checked my wristwatch. Still five minutes to go. Edging over to my left, I groped for the ropes I'd set up that afternoon. I found them, tested the tension, and checked the time again. Four minutes. There was a light feeling in my head, fluttery and taut at the same time. I remembered it from the boonies. Giddiness and doubt and awe, all those things and a million more. It's as if you're in a movie. There's a camera on you, so you begin acting, you're somebody else. You think of all the films you've seen, Audie Murphy and Gary Cooper and the Cisco Kid, all those heroes, and you can't help falling back on them as models of proper comportment. On ambush, curled in the dark, you fight for control. Not too much fidgeting. You rearrange your posture; you measure out your breathing. Eyes open, be alert—old imperatives, old movies. It all swirls together, clichés mixing with your own emotions, and in the end you can't tell one from the other. There was that coldness inside me. I wasn't myself. I felt hollow and dangerous. I took a breath, fingered the first rope, and gave it a sharp little jerk. Instantly there was a clatter outside the wire. I expected the noise, I was even tensed for it, but still my heart took a hop. Now, I thought. Now it starts.

• From The Things They Carried (1990)

  The butterfly was making its way along the young man's forehead, which was spotted with small dark freckles. The nose was undamaged. The skin on the right cheek was smooth and fine-grained and hairless. Frail- looking, delicately boned, the young man would not have wanted to be a soldier and in his heart would have feared performing badly in battle. Even as a boy growing up in the village of My Khe, he had often worried about this. He imagined covering his head and lying in a deep hole and closing his eyes and not moving until the war was over. He had no stomach for violence. He loved mathematics. His eyebrows were thin and arched like a woman's, and at school the boys sometimes teased him about how pretty he was, the arched eyebrows and long shapely fingers, and on the playground they mimicked a woman's walk and made fun of his smooth skin and his love for mathematics. The young man could not make himself fight them. He often wanted to, but he was afraid, and this increased his shame. If he could not fight little boys, he thought, how could he ever become a soldier and fight the Americans with their airplanes and helicopters and bombs? It did not seem possible. In the presence of his father and uncles, he pretended to look forward to doing his patriotic duty, which was also a privilege, but at night he prayed with his mother that the war might end soon. Beyond anything else, he was afraid of disgracing himself, and therefore his family and village. But all he could do, he thought, was wait and pray and try not to grow up too fast. "Listen to me," Kiowa said. "You feel terrible, I know that." Then he said, "Okay, maybe I don't know." Along the trail there were small blue flowers shaped like bells. The young man's head was wrenched sideways, not quite facing the flowers, and even in the shade a single blade of sunlight sparkled against the buckle of his ammunition belt. The left cheek was peeled back in three ragged strips. The wounds at his neck had not yet clotted, which made him seem animate even in death, the blood still spreading out across his shirt. Kiowa shook his head. There was some silence before he said, "Stop staring."

• From The Things They Carried (1990)

  "No," I said. "All that's finished." The Ghost Soldiers I was shot twice. The first time, out by Tri Binh, it knocked me against the pagoda wall, and I bounced and spun around and ended up on Rat Kiley's lap. A lucky thing, because Rat was the medic. He tied on a compress and told me to ease back, then he ran off toward the fighting. For a long time I lay there all alone, listening to the battle, thinking I've been shot, I've been shot: all those Gene Autry movies I'd seen as a kid. In fact, I almost smiled, except then I started to think I might die. It was the fear, mostly, but I felt wobbly, and then I had a sinking sensation, ears all plugged up, as if I'd gone deep under water. Thank God for Rat Kiley. Every so often, maybe four times altogether, he trotted back to check me out. Which took courage. It was a wild fight, guys running and laying down fire and regrouping and running again, lots of noise, but Rat Kiley took the risks. "Easy does it," he told me, "just a side wound, no problem unless you're pregnant." He ripped off the compress, applied a fresh one, and told me to clamp it in place with my fingers. "Press hard," he said. "Don't worry about the baby." Then he took off. It was almost dark when the fighting ended and the chopper came to take me and two dead guys away. "Happy trails," Rat said. He helped me into the helicopter and stood there for a moment. Then he did an odd thing. He leaned in and put his head against my shoulder and almost hugged me. Coming from Rat Kiley, that was something new. On the ride into Chu Lai, I kept waiting for the pain to hit, but in fact I didn't feel much. A throb, that's all. Even in the hospital it wasn't bad. When I got back to Alpha Company twenty-six days later, in mid- December, Rat Kiley had been wounded and shipped off to Japan, and a new medic named Bobby Jorgenson had replaced him. Jorgenson was no Rat Kiley. He was green and incompetent and scared. So when I got shot the second time, in the butt, along the Song Tra Bong, it took the son of a bitch almost ten minutes to work up the nerve to crawl over to me. By then I was gone with the pain. Later I found out I'd almost died of shock. Bobby Jorgenson didn't know about shock, or if he did, the fear made him forget. To make it worse, he bungled the patch job, and a couple of weeks later my ass started to rot away. You could actually peel off fillets of meat with your fingernail.

• From The Things They Carried (1990)

  On my last full day, the sixth day, the old man took me out fishing on the Rainy River. The afternoon was sunny and cold. A stiff breeze came in from the north, and I remember how the little fourteen-foot boat made sharp rocking motions as we pushed off from the dock. The current was fast. All around us, there was a vastness to the world, an unpeopled rawness, just the trees and the sky and the water reaching out toward nowhere. The air had the brittle scent of October. For ten or fifteen minutes Elroy held a course upstream, the river choppy and silver-gray, then he turned straight north and put the engine on full throttle. I felt the bow lift beneath me. I remember the wind in my ears, the sound of the old outboard Evinrude. For a time I didn't pay attention to anything, just feeling the cold spray against my face, but then it occurred to me that at some point we must've passed into Canadian waters, across that dotted line between two different worlds, and I remember a sudden tightness in my chest as I looked up and watched the far shore come at me. This wasn't a daydream. It was tangible and real. As we came in toward land, Elroy cut the engine, letting the boat fishtail lightly about twenty yards off shore. The old man didn't look at me or speak. Bending down, he opened up his tackle box and busied himself with a bobber and a piece of wire leader, humming to himself, his eyes down. It struck me then that he must've planned it. I'll never be certain, of course, but I think he meant to bring me up against the realities, to guide me across the river and to take me to the edge and to stand a kind of vigil as I chose a life for myself. I remember staring at the old man, then at my hands, then at Canada. The shoreline was dense with brush and timber. I could see tiny red berries on the bushes. I could see a squirrel up in one of the birch trees, a big crow looking at me from a boulder along the river. That close—twenty yards— and I could see the delicate latticework of the leaves, the texture of the soil, the browned needles beneath the pines, the configurations of geology and human history. Twenty yards. I could've done it. I could've jumped and started swimming for my life. Inside me, in my chest, I felt a terrible squeezing pressure. Even now, as I write this, I can still feel that tightness. And I want you to feel it—the wind coming off the river, the waves, the silence, the wooded frontier. You're at the bow of a boat on the Rainy River. You're twenty-one years old, you're scared, and there's a hard squeezing pressure in your chest. What would you do?

• From The Things They Carried (1990)

  Leaking to death, I thought. Like a genie swirling out of a bottle—like a cloud of gas—I was drifting upward out of my own body. I was half in and half out. Part of me still lay there, the corpse part, but I was also that genie looking on and saying, "There, there," which made me start to scream. I couldn't help it. When Bobby Jorgenson got to me, I was almost gone with shock. All I could do was scream. I tightened up and squeezed, trying to stop the leak, but that only made it worse, and Jorgenson punched me and told me to knock it off. Shock, I thought. I tried to tell him that. I tried to say, "Shock," but it wouldn't come out right. Jorgenson flipped me over and pressed a knee against my back, pinning me there, and I kept trying to say, "Shock, man, treat for shock." I was lucid—things were clear—but my tongue wouldn't fit around the words. Then I slipped under for a while. When I came back, Jorgenson was using a knife to cut off my pants. He shot in the morphine, which scared me, and I shouted something and tried to wiggle away, but he kept pushing down hard on my back. Except it wasn't Jorgenson now—it was that genie—he was smiling down at me, and winking, and I couldn't buck him off. Later on, things clicked into slow motion. The morphine, maybe. I focused on Jorgenson's brand-new boots, then on a pebble, then on my own face floating high above me—the last things I'd ever see. I couldn't look away. It occurred to me that I was witness to something rare. Even now, in the dark, there were indications of a spirit world. Azar said, "Hey, you awake?" I nodded. Down at Bunker Six, things were silent. The place looked abandoned. Azar grinned and went to work on the ropes. It began like a breeze, a soft sighing sound. I hugged myself. I watched Azar bend forward and fire off the first illumination flare. "Please," I almost said, but the word snagged, and I looked up and tracked the flare over Jorgenson's bunker. It exploded almost without noise: a soft red flash. There was a whimper in the dark. At first I thought it was Jorgenson. "Please?" I said. I bit down and folded my hands and squeezed. I had the shivers. Twice more, rapidly, Azar fired up red flares. At one point he turned toward me and lifted his eyebrows. "Timmy, Timmy," he said. "Such a specimen." I agreed. I wanted to do something, stop him somehow, but I crouched back and watched Azar pick up a tear-gas grenade and pull the pin and stand up and throw. The gas puffed up in a thin cloud that partly obscured Bunker Six. Even from thirty meters away I could smell it and taste it.

• From The Things They Carried (1990)

  To an extent, though, everybody was feeling it. The long night marches turned their minds upside down; all the rhythms were wrong. Always a lost sensation. They'd blunder along through the dark, willy-nilly, no sense of place or direction, probing for an enemy that nobody could see. Like a snipe hunt, Sanders said. A bunch of dumb Cub Scouts chasing the phantoms. They'd march north for a time, then east, then north again, skirting the villages, no one talking except in whispers. And it was rugged country, too. Not quite mountains, but rising fast, full of gorges and deep brush and places you could die. Around midnight things always got wild. All around you, everywhere, the whole dark countryside came alive. You'd hear a strange hum in your ears. Nothing specific; nothing you could put a name on. Tree frogs, maybe, or snakes or flying squirrels or who-knew-what. Like the night had its own voice—that hum in your ears—and in the hours after midnight you'd swear you were walking through some kind of soft black protoplasm, Vietnam, the blood and the flesh. It was no joke, Sanders said. The monkeys chattered death-chatter. The nights got freaky. Rat Kiley finally hit a wall. He couldn't sleep during the hot daylight hours; he couldn't cope with the nights. Late one afternoon, as the platoon prepared for another march, he broke down in front of Mitchell Sanders. Not crying, but up against it. He said he was scared. And it wasn't normal scared. He didn't know what it was: too long in-country, probably. Or else he wasn't cut out to be a medic. Always policing up the parts, he said. Always plugging up holes. Sometimes he'd stare at guys who were still okay, the alive guys, and he'd start to picture how they'd look dead. Without arms or legs—that sort of thing. It was ghoulish, he knew that, but he couldn't shut off the pictures. He'd be sitting there talking with Bowker or Dobbins or somebody, just marking time, and then out of nowhere he'd find himself wondering how much the guy's head weighed, like how heavy it was, and what it would feel like to pick up the head and carry it over to a chopper and dump it in. Rat scratched the skin at his elbow, digging in hard. His eyes were red and weary. "It's not right," he said. "These pictures in my head, they won't quit. I'll see a guy's liver. The actual fucking /iver. And the thing is, it doesn't scare me, it doesn't even give me the willies. More like curiosity. The way a doctor feels when he looks at a patient, sort of mechanical, not seeing the real person, just a ruptured appendix or a clogged-up artery." His voice floated away for a second. He looked at Sanders and tried to smile. He kept clawing at his elbow.

• From The Things They Carried (1990)

  Psychology—that was one thing I knew. You don't try to scare people in broad daylight. You wait. Because the darkness squeezes you inside yourself, you get cut off from the outside world, the imagination takes over. That's basic psychology. I'd pulled enough night guard to know how the fear factor gets multiplied as you sit there hour after hour, nobody to talk to, nothing to do but stare into the big black hole at the center of your own sorry soul. The hours go by and you lose your gyroscope; your mind starts to roam. You think about dark closets, madmen, murderers under the bed, all those childhood fears. Gremlins and trolls and giants. You try to block it out but you can't. You see ghosts. You blink and shake your head. Bullshit, you tell yourself. But then you remember the guys who died: Curt Lemon, Kiowa, Ted Lavender, a half-dozen others whose faces you can't bring into focus anymore. And then pretty soon you start to ponder the stories you've heard about Charlie's magic. The time some guys cornered two VC ina dead-end tunnel, no way out, but how, when the tunnel was fragged and searched, nothing was found except a pile of dead rats. A hundred stories. Ghosts wiping out a whole squad of Marines in twenty seconds flat. Ghosts rising from the dead. Ghosts behind you and in front of you and inside you. After a while, as the night deepens, you feel a funny buzzing in your ears. Tiny sounds get heightened and distorted. The crickets talk in code; the night takes on an electronic tingle. You hold your breath. You coil up and tighten your muscles and listen, knuckles hard, the pulse ticking in your head. You hear the spooks laughing. No shit, /aughing. You jerk up, you freeze, you squint at the dark. Nothing, though. You put your weapon on full automatic. You crouch lower and count your grenades and make sure the pins are bent for quick throwing and take a deep breath and listen and try not to freak. And then later, after enough time passes, things start to get bad. "Come on," Azar said, "let's do it," but I told him to be patient. Waiting was the trick. So we went to the movies, Barbarella again, the eighth straight night. A lousy movie, I thought, but it kept Azar occupied. He was crazy about Jane Fonda. "Sweet Janie," he kept saying. "Sweet Janie boosts a man's morale." Then, with his hand, he showed me which part of his morale got boosted. It was an old joke. Everything was old. The movie, the heat, the booze, the war. I fell asleep during the second reel—a hot, angry sleep—and forty minutes later I woke up to a sore ass and a foul temper. It wasn't yet midnight.

• From Martin Luther (2016)

  Everything looked set for him to return to Mansfeld in a couple of years, perhaps to marry into the local elite of mine owners as his brother and sisters would eventually do, and use his legal knowledge to advance his family’s interests. — I T was not to be. Luther’s life was about to change forever. Three incidents from his time in Erfurt stand out, hinting at some of the anguish that this young man, apparently destined for a successful career, was suffering. First a fellow student and friend fell ill and died; his death affected Luther deeply and appears to have plunged him into melancholy. Then while traveling home to Mansfeld, about half a mile out of Erfurt he somehow managed to injure himself with his sword, severing an artery at the top of his leg. He pressed his finger on the wound to stop the bleeding but the leg began to swell up massively. Luther could easily have bled to death. Seized with terror, he prayed: “O Mary, help!” A doctor was summoned who treated the wound, but that evening, while Luther was lying in bed, the wound burst and again he called on Mary to save him. It looked as if his prayers were answered, for the wound healed. When he told it years later at table he neatly inverted the story, so that the true miracle was not that Mary saved his life, but that God preserved him from dying trusting in Mary, and not putting faith in Christ as the Christian should. 47 A similar incident happened not long after, but with far more serious consequences. Again, Luther was on the road, this time returning to Erfurt from Mansfeld on a summer’s day. He was near Stotternheim when a terrible thunderstorm broke. Terrified, Luther called on St. Anna—the patron saint of miners—vowing to enter a monastery if she saved him. His response might seem extreme, but storms were believed to be caused by the Devil or by witches, and church bells were rung during tempests to ward them off. As before, Luther called not to Jesus but to a woman saint. When he told the story in 1539, he again gave it a twist: God had kindly taken the word Anna to be the Hebrew word for “grace,” rather than the name of the saint. This tongue-in-cheek interpretation allowed him to maintain that the vow in the storm had indeed been another divine intervention, but once more without female intercession. 48 When the thunderstorm passed Luther kept his vow: He joined the Augustinian order in Erfurt on July 17, 1505. This was a momentous step. At a stroke, it destroyed his father’s plans. Hans Luder’s investment in his son’s education had been for nothing.

• From Martin Luther (2016)

  20 In another letter to Thomas Neuenhagen in Eisenach, whom he hardly knew, Luther admonished him not to follow the Eisenach preacher Jacob Strauss. “You should serve Christ, he has served Satan,” he wrote. 21 Shortly afterward, he wrote to Nikolaus Hausmann that the heresies were Satan’s “ragings,” for “the Last Days are at the door.” He felt “sorry” for Oecolampadius, “such a man, captured by such frivolous and worthless arguments.” 22 The same phrases recur again and again in his letters: Satan “rages,” Luther’s opponents suffer from furia and “rage” against him, the Last Days are at hand. There are lurid warnings about backsliders, injunctions to remain firm, heartfelt requests that the recipient pray for Luther in his fight against Satan, and often a final confident proclamation that Luther is on Christ’s side. “Now I understand what it means that the world has gone to the bad and that Satan is the Prince of the World,” he wrote to Michael Stifel in May 1527. “Up until now I thought these were mere words, but now I see that it is reality, and that the Devil truly rules in the world.” 23 Then, on July 6, 1527, Luther suffered a complete physical and spiritual collapse, experiencing an Anfechtung so severe that he fell and lost consciousness. It was like a “rushing” in the ears, he later described it, but outside, not inside the head. He felt that Satan was beating him with his fists, a sensation that reminded him of what Paul described in Corinthians. He was utterly without color and lay as if dead. When he came to, he worried that he had been too bitter in his polemics—just as he had worried in Worms in 1521—fretting that he wanted to write on baptism, and against Zwingli, but God had evidently decided he should not. Then he turned to Jonas and Bugenhagen, sobbing bitterly and speaking “gravely” against the “sacramentarians” and about the many sects that had arisen to pervert God’s Word. Bugenhagen and Jonas wrote a full account of what had occurred, based on notes at the time. 24 It is a remarkable document, not least because it was written at all. As both men would have known, it was highly likely that Luther’s enemies would interpret such an incident as possession by the Devil; indeed, Luther’s opponent Cochlaeus would later allege that Luther had been possessed by the Devil all his life. Yet their response to the event was not to suppress what took place, but to record it in the fullest detail possible. The account was published in German in the very first editions of Luther’s works, in confident disregard of what opponents of the Reformation might do with it.

• From The Things They Carried (1990)

  without any hurry up the center of the trail. There was no sound at all— none that I can remember. In a way, it seemed, he was part of the morning fog, or my own imagination, but there was also the reality of what was happening in my stomach. I had already pulled the pin on a grenade. I had come up to a crouch. It was entirely automatic. I did not hate the young man; I did not see him as the enemy; I did not ponder issues of morality or politics or military duty. I crouched and kept my head low. I tried to swallow whatever was rising from my stomach, which tasted like lemonade, something fruity and sour. I was terrified. There were no thoughts about killing. The grenade was to make him go away—ust evaporate—and I leaned back and felt my head go empty and then felt it fill up again. I had already thrown the grenade before telling myself to throw it. The brush was thick and I had to lob it high, not aiming, and I remember the grenade seeming to freeze above me for an instant, as if a camera had clicked, and I remember ducking down and holding my breath and seeing little wisps of fog rise from the earth. The grenade bounced once and rolled across the trail. I did not hear it, but there must've been a sound, because the young man dropped his weapon and began to run, just two or three quick steps, then he hesitated, swiveling to his right, and he glanced down at the grenade and tried to cover his head but never did. It occurred to me then that he was about to die. I wanted to warn him. The grenade made a popping noise—not soft but not loud either—not what I'd expected—and there was a puff of dust and smoke—a small white puff—and the young man seemed to jerk upward as if pulled by invisible wires. He fell on his back. His rubber sandals had been blown off. He lay at the center of the trail, his right leg bent beneath him, his one eye shut, his other eye a huge star-shaped hole. For me, it was not a matter of live or die. I was in no real peril. Almost certainly the young man would have passed me by. And it will always be that way. Later, I remember, Kiowa tried to tell me that the man would've died anyway. He told me that it was a good kill, that I was a soldier and this was a war, that I should shape up and stop staring and ask myself what the dead man would've done if things were reversed. None of it mattered. The words seemed far too complicated. All I could do was gape at the fact of the young man's body.

• From Lit: A Memoir (2009)

  In my old life, I never kept liquor in my apartment, for—while I could go without for weeks—I never knew when I’d wind up draining anything around. And around the punk bars where I hung out in grad school, if I got lured into the alley and offered cocaine, I could snuffle up the stuff, but I lacked both the money and the recklessness to be a bona fide cokehead. Only once did I incur a debt, and having to sell a TV to pay it back curbed future coke binges. At a few all night parties, I sat among half-strangers in a screaming sweat on a sagging couch—jaw clenched, eyelids stapled to my forehead—while some leering dealer suggested I go back to his place. A small point of pride: I never said yes. The scene scared me. I scared me. I wouldn’t call my pre-Warren drinking out of control because I had control. So long as I didn’t leave my apartment, I didn’t drink. In Cambridge, that person no longer exists. With an invisible eraser, I’m internally rubbing hard at the core of her, and Warren’s steady, unwavering gaze is lasering away her external edges. Soon she’ll be mist. I stand at the bar, its tiered bottles like a shiny choir about to burst into song. With only five or six dollars in tips, how much trouble can I get in? Warren will pick me up soon, and the bar’s on the cusp of closing early. At one end, a man in evening clothes with long gray hair swept back sits behind a sherry glass. On the stool next to him, a tipped violin case. Across from him is the despicable waiter, cradling a brandy snifter. His normally pony-tailed hair’s undone. The waiter says, Buy you a farewell cognac? I say thanks and settle in with coat covering my grease-spattered uniform. The waiter downs his own drink. Standing, he slides spare bills across the bar, adding—before he flips his cashmere scarf around his neck Lautrec-style—At least I’ve helped you to master the fish knife. I hold the glass globe in my hand as the dim yellow lights slide off its perimeter, and boy, does that drink slide down like scorched sunshine. I’m just draining it when the manager—no doubt eager to see me leaving—flies up and buys me another. And right before Warren comes, I ponder a third. What the hell, right? I’m unemployed, with school loans I can’t pay, an invalid dad whose nursing I need to start chipping in on. When I lift my index finger, the barman wipes his hands and refills my snifter. I’m the sole customer—the barman having just covered his olives and cherries with cling film—when he nonchalantly slides a white slip of paper to me. I nonchalantly flip it over. The bill comes to twenty dollars. Hold it, I say, those two bought my other drinks. I’m well buzzed by then, wavering. I know, he says. This is for the third one.

• From Lit: A Memoir (2009)

  We face a final door whose long glass window is embedded with chicken wire. Through it, I see people move as in slow motion. The door swings open, and their heads turn curiously to stare at me, and stepping onto the ward, I smell piss. Piss is the territorial marking of the predatory animal. It also signals the uncontrolled release of fear in terrorized prey. I know people pissing in hospital corridors is frowned on and must be quickly mopped up. But the smell persists anyway, and as I enter that urinous climate, the kernel of fear I’d kept buried in my center cracks through its shellac casing. Terror begins to sprout its black ivy up my spine and down along the insides of my arms. I become very small then, telescoping down in some inner tunnel as the world shrinks and gets far away. And pumping through me like methamphetamine is the screaming message that I’ve lost Dev, lost Dev, lost Dev… I sit woodenly before the next intake nurse, water coursing down my mask face. She has an open face—Italian, maybe—round as a skillet. And she’s tiny. She could be in fourth grade, except for being pregnant enough to use her belly as an armrest. By the time she asks, Did you have a plan?, I’ve already told so many strangers, I forget to be embarrassed. I was gonna spirit away our rusting car to a town called, metaphorically enough, Marblehead—the very name seemed apt—like I have a big, swirly marble on my shoulders where a human face should sit. There I’d suck off a garden hose purchased for that purpose. We can take care of the insomnia starting tonight, she says. I don’t want any barbiturates, I say. Nothing addictive. No valium. No ambien. I’m almost crying again. It’s as if some paper-thin membrane in my head holds back this flood, and any discomfort tears through, cranking the sob machine to full bore. The nurse looks up from her notes to describe some old antidepressant I can take as a sleeping pill—only if I need to. Not addictive at all. No side effects other than dry mouth in the morning. She sets down her pen, saying people who are sober take it all the time. (She pronounces it sobah, in the manner of the inner-city Bostonians at the halfway house.) Do you mind if I talk to somebody about it? I mean even tonight—on the phone. Before I take it. She fixes me with her almond eyes, and the calm she gives off reaches me. Maybe it’s some pregnancy hormone juju, for her skin is dewy in the manner of the seriously knocked up. But just sitting there, I sense a warm light the color of faded violets settling around us. She asks, Are you in some kind of recovery?

• From A Greek-English Lexicon (Liddell-Scott) (1957)

  ἐπιπίπτω, fut. -πεσοῦμαι, to fall upon or over, ἐπέπιπτον ἀλλήλοις Thuc. 7.84; ἐπί τι Xen. Oec. 18, 7, Theophr. C. P. 5. 4, 5 :—metaph. like Lat. incidere, ἐπί τι Isocr. IOOA; λογισμὸς ἐπιπίπτει τινί Plut. Otho : II. to fall upon in hostile sense, to attack, assail, τινί Hat. 4. 105, Thuc. 3. 112; ἀφυλάκτῳ αὐτῷ ἐπ. Hdt. 9. 116; ἀφράκτῳ τῷ στρατοπέδῳ Thuc. 1.117; ἀπαρασκεύοις Tots ἐναντίοις Xen. Cyr. 7. 4, 3; also, ἐς τοὺς Ἕλληνας Hdt. 7. 10 :—of storms, τοῖσι βαρβάροισι ὃ βορῆς ἐπέπεσε Id. 7.1893; χειμὼν ἐπιπεσών Plat. Prot. 344 Ὁ ; of winds meeting one another, Arist. Meteor. 2. 6, 17; of diseases, Hipp. Aér. 281; ἡ νόσος ἐπ. τοῖς ᾿Αθηναίοις Thuc. 3. 87, cf. 2. 48; so of grief, misfor- tunes, etc, οὐχὶ σοὶ μόνᾳ ἐπέπεσον λῦπαι Eur. Andr. 1042, εἴς. ; ἐπέπεσε πολλὰ καὶ χαλεπὰ ταῖς πολέσι Thuc. 3. 82, etc. 2. to come on after, ἐπ. plyos πυρετῷ Hipp. Aph. 1251. ἐπιπίστωσις, ews, ἡ, (πιστόω) a confirmation of the πίστωσις, in Rhe- toric, cf. Plat. Phaedr. 266 E. ἔπιπλα, τά, implements, utensils, furniture, moveable property (τὰ ἐξ ἐπι- πολῆς ὄντα τῶν κτημάτων Poll. 10.10; σκεύη TA μὴ ἔγγαια GAN ἐπιπο- λαῖα Hesych.), Lat. swpellex, as opp. to fixtures, Hdt. 1.150, 164..7.110, al., Soph. Fr. 7, Thuc. 3, 68, Isae. 72. 41, cf. omn. Xen. Oec. 9, 6, Arist. Pol. 2. 7, 21. (The longer form ἐπίπλοα occurs in Mss. of Hdt. 1. 94, prob. by an error of the Copyist, for elsewhere he uses ἔπιπλα ; at all events the word is prob. derived from ἐπί (as διπλά, διπλόα, from δίς), and not shortened from ἐπίπλοος.) ἐπιπλαδάω, to be loose, flabby at the surface, Philo 2. 418. ἐπιπλάζομαι, fut. - πλάγξομαι : aor. ἐπεπλάγχθην : Pass. To wander about over, πόντον ἐπιπλαγχθείς Od. 8. 14; πόντον ἐπιπλάγξασθαι Ap. Rh. 3. 1066.—The Act. is used in the same sense by Nic. Al. 127. ἐπιπλἄνάομαι. = ἐπιπλάζομαι, γῆν Democrit. ap. Clem. Al. 357; δα- κρύων τοῖς ὄμμασιν ἐπιπλανωμένων Heliod. 7.17, cf. 3.5: absol., κιττὸς ἐπιπλανώμενος Longus 1. 2. ἐπιπλᾶνήτης. ov, 6, a wanderer, Welck. Syll. Ep. 32. 11. ἐπίπλασις, ἡ. the application of a plaster, Aretae. Cur. M. Ac. 1. 9. ἐπίπλασμα, τό, a plaster, Hipp. Art. 805. ἐπιπλάσσω, Att.-Trw; fut. dow [ἃ] :---ἰο spread a plaster on, "γῆν σημαντρίδα ἐπιπλάσας Hdt. 2. 38 ; τι ἐπί τι Theophr. H. P. 9. 13, 2; τί τινι Galen. II. to plaster up, τὰ ὦτα Arist. Probl. 3. 27; τοὺς πόρους Theophr. Sens. 8. ἐπιπλαστέον, verb. Adj. one must plaster over, Geop. 16. 18. ἐπίπλαστος, ov, plastered over, Alciphro 3. 11, Galen. :—metaph. feigned, false, like πλαστός, Luc. D. Mort. 27. 7, Amor. 3. Adv. —-Tws, M. Anton. 2. 16. ἐπιπλᾶταγέω, to applaud by clapping, τινί Theocr. 9. 22. ἐπιπλᾶτύνω, to expand yet more, Arist. Mund. 3, 8, in Pass.

• From A Greek-English Lexicon (Liddell-Scott) (1957)

  ἀναγκαίων, etc., Ib. 119 E, etc. 6. of a country, to spread, extend, ἐπὶ .. Dion. P. 809, cf. 1092. Til. to run close afler, ἅρματα εν ἵπποις ὠκυπόδεσσιν ἐπέδραμον 1]. 23. 504; ἐπ: τὰ ἴχνη, of hounds, Xen. Cyn. 3, 6: also c. dat. to follow, Arat. 316; ἐπ. τοῖς θήλεσιν, of the male, Plut. 2. 965 E. ἐπίτρησιξ, ews, ἡ, a piercing downwards, Oribas. p. 98. 12. ἐπιτριαπκοστον δεύτερος: πτριτοβ, -τέταρτος, -πέμπτος λόγος, the ταῖϊο of 22, 83. ὁ Bg, 83, Aristid. Quint. p. 115. ἐπιτρίβη, ἡ, a fretting, Schol. Soph. Aj. 103: violence, injury, Eccl. ἐπιτρίβω [1], fut. po: aor, 2 pass. ἐπετρίβην [i]: fut. med. in pass. sense, Luc, Icarom. 33 (where Cobet restores ἐπιτετρίψονται, as in Ar. Pax 246). To rub on the surface, to crush, κἄπνιγε κἀπέτριβεν Id. Nub. 1376, cf. Ran. 571%:—Pass., τυπτόμενον ἐπιτριβῆναι lb. 1408 ; ἐπιτριβόμενος τὸν ὦμον galled by the weight, Id. Ran. 88. 2. metaph. to affiict, distress, destroy, ruin, ἥλιος καίων ἐπιτρίβει τούς τε ἀνθρώπους καὶ τὴν χώρην Hdt. 4. 184; γάμος μ᾽ ἐπέτριψε Ar. Nub. 438, cf. 243; ταῦτά με ἐπιτρίβει πόθῳ Id. Lys. 888; ὀδύναις τινὰ ἐπιτρ. Xen. Mem. 1. 3,12; ἐπ. τοὺς ἀπόρους Dem. 260. fin: simply, ¢o kill, Lys. 135.17: of an actor, to murder a character, Dem. 288. 20, Plut. 2. 531 B:—Pass. to be utterly destroyed or undone, Solon 32. 7, Ar. Ach. 1022, Pax 369; ἐπιτριβείης be hung! Ar. Av.1530, Thesm. 5573 ἐπιτριβείην εἴ τι ἐψευσάμην Luc. D. Meretr. 2. 3. II. in Med. to rub paint on one’s cheeks, of women, A.B. 40, Schol. Ar. Thesm, 389. III. to inflame by friction, ἐπ. τὴν νόσον to Rf es its App. Civ. 5. 59, 62: to irritate, excite, Twa Polyb. 4. 84, 8; τινὰ ἐς πόλεμον App. Maced, 4. ἐπιτριηραρχέω, to be trierarch beyond the legal time, Dem. 1214. 16., 1223. 13, etc.; ἐπ. τέτταρας μῆνας 1218. 13 :—Pass., ἐπιτετριηραρχη- μένων ἤδη δυοῖν μηνοῖν two months beyond my term of office having elapsed, and my successor not having relieved me, 1212. 27; see the whole speech (adv. Polyclem). ἐπιτριηράρχημα, τό, the burden of a trierarchy continued beyond the legal term, Dem. 1206. I1., 121g. 23, etc.: see foreg. emiTpipepys, és, containing 1 + #, Nicom. Ar. p. gg: cf. ἐπίτριτος. ἐπίτριμμα, τό, (ἐπιτρίβω) anything rubbed on, a cosmetic, Nicet. Ann, 37 C, Jo. Chr. 2. anything worn out; metaph., ἐπ. ἐρώτων, of a prostitute, Nicet. Ann. 335 D: cf. περίτριμμα. ἐπίτριπτοϑ, ον, (ἐπιτρίβω) rubbed down, well worn: metaph. of persons, practised, hackneyed, τοὐπίτριπτον κίναδος the cunning fox, Soph. Aj. 103, cf. Andoc. 13. 23; ἐπ. ψωμοκόλακες Sannyr. Iw 1; i οὑπίτριπτος the rogue, Ar.Pl. 275, cf.619; ὠπίτριπτε Id. Ach. 557; ἡ νῦν ἐπ. .. μουσική hackneyed, Sext. Emp. Μ. 6. 14. Cf. ἐπιτρίβω. ἐπιτρίς, Adv. unto three times, Diosc. 5.4. ἔπι- τρι-τέταρτος, ov, containing τ -- ἡ, Nicom, Ar. p. 101: cf. 54.

• From A Greek-English Lexicon (Liddell-Scott) (1957)

  ἐπικίνδυνος, ov, in danger, insecure, precarious, Hdt.6.86; ἐπ. ἣν μὴ λαμφθείη Id. 7. 239; πρόσοδοι Dem. 948. 2; ἐν ἐπικινδύνῳ, opp. to ἐν τῷ ἀσφαλεῖ, Thuc. 1. 137 :—Comp. --ότερος Xen. An. I. 3, 19. 2. dangerous, στρατεία Plat. Rep. 467 Ὁ ; δεινὴ καὶ ἐπ. ἔρις Plat. Legg. 736 Ὁ, οἴ. Xen. Mem. 4. 6, το; τινι to one, Hipp. Aph.1249, Thuc. 3. 54:-ἐπικίνδυνόν [ἐστι] there is danger, Arist. H. A. 7. 12, 2. 3. Ady. —vws, in a precarious or critical state, Hipp. Aph. 1255; ἐπ. κεῖσθαι Soph. Ph. 502; ἐπ. ἔχειν Eur. Fr. 683: at one’s risk, Thuc. 3. 37. emikiwdivodys, es, (εἶδοΞ) =foreg., Schol. Soph. El. 222. ἐπικϊνέομαι, Pass. to gesticulate at a thing, v. 1. Epict. Enchir. 33. 10: to be moved, zealous, ἐπί τινι LXX (3 Esdr. 8. 74). ἐπικίνυμαι, =foreg., Q. Sm. 12. 145. ἐπικίρνημι, Ion. for ἐπικεράννυμαι, Heracl. All. Hom. p. 117 :—Pass., ἐπικίρναται [ὃ xpnrnp| Hdt. 1. 51, cf. Plut. 2. 270 A. ἐπικιχλίδες, ai, a poem ascribed to Homer, so called because he was rewarded by a present of κίχλαι, fieldfares, cf. Ath. 65 A, 639 A, Bentl. Ep. Mill. p. 63. ἐπικίχρημι, aor. ἐπέχρησα, to lend, τινί τι πρὸς τὸν πόλεμον Plut. Pomp. 52; ἑαυτὸν εἰς ἀπαλλοτρίωσιν ἐπιχρήσας C. 1. 3281. ἐπικλάζω, fut. --κλάγξω, to sound to, θαλάσσῃ Opp. H. 5. 295 ; ἐπί οἱ ἔκλαγξε βροντάν let thunder sound in answer to him, Pind. P. 4. 41. ἐπικλαίω, Att. -KAdw: fut. -cAavoopat:—to weep in answer or still more, Ar. Thesm. 1063 ; τινί at a thing, Nonn, D. 30. 114. émixAdpos, -κλᾶρόω, Dor. for ἐπικληρ--. ἐπίκλαυτος, ον, tearful, νόμος Ar. Ran. 684. ἐπικλάω, fut. dow [ἃ]. to bend to or besides :—Pass. to bend double, ἡ δεξιὰ περὶ τὴν κεφαλὴν ἐπὶ τὸ ἄνω ἐπικεκλασμένη Luc. D. Deor. 11. 2; ἐπικεκλ. τὸν αὐχένα Id, Rhet. Praec. 11; ὕδωρ ἐπικλώμενον broken water, Id. Tox. 20. II. metaph. to bow down, break the spirits of, Twa Plut. Pericl. 37, Oth. 15; ἐπ. τινα εἰς οἶκτον Ael. N. A. το. 36: —Pass., ἐπικλασθῆναι τῇ γνώμῃ to be broken in spirit, lose courage, Lat. frangi animo, Thuc. 4. 37; but also, to be bent or turned to pity, Id. 3.59; or without τῇ γνώμῃ, Id. 3.67; τὸ ἐπικεκλασμένον τῶν μελῶν effeminate, unmanly music, Luc. Demon, 12. ἐπι-κλάω, Att. for --κλαίω. emuchens, ἔς, (xA€os) famed, famous, Ap. Rh. 4. 1472, Ὁ, 1.2613. OF. named, called after, τινι Opp. H. 2. 130, in shortd. Ep, acc. ἐπικλέᾶ. ἐπικλείω, Ep. -KAnio, Att. κλω :---ἴο shut to, close, as a door, Ar. Pax 101; θύραν ἐπεκλήϊσε Tryph. 200:—Med., Luc. Tox. 50:—Pass. to be shut to, opp. to ἀναπτύσσομαι, Xen. Eq. 12, 6.

• From A Greek-English Lexicon (Liddell-Scott) (1957)

  ἐπιπέλομαι, Dep. (πέλωλ) to come to or upon, οὐδέ τις ἄλλη νοῦσος ἐπὶ στυγερὴ πέλεται .. βροτοῖσι Od. 13. 60., 15. 408 :—elsewhere only in Ep. syncop. part. aor. ἐπιπλόμενος, coming on, approaching, ἀλλ᾽ ὅτε δὴ ὄγδοόν μοι ἐπιπλόμενον ἔτος ἦλθεν when the eighth coming year was nigh, Od. 7. 261., 14. 287; ἐπιπλομένων ἐνιαυτῶν Hes. Sc. 87, cf. Th. 493 (v. sub ἐνιαυτός) ; ἐπιπλ. νυκτί, ἐπιπλ. ἠοῦς Ap. Rh. 2.1231, etc. ; of persons, Id. 3. 25,127; in hostile sense, attacking, assaulting, just like ἐπερχύμενος, Id. 1. 465., 3.127; so of a storm, like Lat. ingruens, νέφος ον ἐπιπλ., ἄφατον Soph. O. T. 1314. ἐπίπεμπτος, oy, =1+4, of loans bearing interest at the rate of ἃ of the principal, or 20 per cent., ναυτικὸν ἐπ. Xen. Vect. 3, g, cf. Bockh P. E. 1. 164-186, and y. sub ἐπίτριτος. 11, -- πέμπτος, Eupol., al., ap. Harp.; τοὐπίπεμπτον one-fifth of the votes in a trial, Ar. Fr. 17. ἐπίπεμπω, to send after or again, ἀγγελίας, ἀγγέλους ér., c. inf., Hdt. 1, 160., 4. 83. 2. of the gods, to send upon or to, ὄψιν Id. 7.15; χάριν Pind. Fr. 45; ἔρωτά τινι Plat. Phaedr. 245 B: but esp. by way of punishment, ¢o send upon or against, let loose upon, Lat. immittere, τὰν .."Atbas Καδμείοις ἐπ. Eur. Phoen. 811; κινδύνους τινί Lys. 105.9; δεσμοὺς καὶ θανάτους Plat. Crito 46 C; ἀνάγκην τινά Id. Phaedo 620 : to send against, τινί App. Pun. 49. ΤΙ. to send besides, ἄλλην oTpa- τιάν Thuc. 7.15; πρὸς τὸ στράτευμα ἄλλην ὠφέλειαν 14. 6. 73. 2. to send by way of supply, Ar. Eccl. 235, cf. Polyb. 6. 15, 4. ἐπίπεμψις, ews, 9, a sending to a place, διὰ τὴν .. ἐπὶ πολλὰ ἡμῶν αὐτῶν ἐπ. Thue. 2. 39, cf. Luc. Phal. Pr. 3, Diog. L. 10. 100. ἐπι-πένθ-εκτος, ον, = ἐπιπενταμερής, Nicom. Introd. Arithm. 1. 21. ἐπι-πεντα-μερής, és, =1+ 5, Id.: cf. ἐπιμόριος. ἐπι-πεντ-ένατος, ov, =1 +2, Id. ἐπιπεραίνω, = ἐπιπείρω, dub. in Artemid. ἐπίπερθεν, Adv. = ἐφύπερθεν, v. 1. for ἐπίπεδα, Pind. Fr. 226. ἐπιπεριελίσσω, to wrap round a second time, τι περί τι Hipp. Art. 803. ἐπιπεριτρέπω, to convert to a purpose, M. Anton. 8. 35. ἐπιπερκάζω, to turn dark, of grapes ripening ; ἐπιπερκάζειν τριχί to begin to get a dark beard, Anth. P. 11. 36. ἐπίπερκνος, ov, somewhat dark, of grapes Tipening : hence of the colour of certain hares, Xen. Cyn. 5, 22 (inferior Mss. ἐπίπερκος), Poll. 5. 67. ἐπιπετάννῦμι, fut. -πετάσω, to spread over, τι ἐπί τι Xen. Cyn. 5, 10: —Pass., τέφρη ἐπιπέπτατο, Q. Sm. 14. 25.

• From A Greek-English Lexicon (Liddell-Scott) (1957)

  καταπλήσσω, Att. -ττω, fut. éw, properly, to strike down, but mostly metaph. ¢o strike with amazement, astound, terrify, κατέπλησσεν ἐπὶ τὸ φοβεῖσθαι Thuc. 2.65; ὁ φόβος κ. τὰς ψυχάς Xen. Cyr. 3.1, 253 κατα- πλήξειν ᾧετο τὸν δῆμον Dem. 577.11; κ. τοὺς ἀκροατάς, of orators, Arist. Rhet. 3.7, 5.1: so in Med., Polyb. 3. 80, 1, εἴς. :—Pass. to be panic- stricken, amazed, astounded, κατεπλήγη φίλον ἦτορ 1]. 3.31; καταπλήτ- τομαι Eupol. Κόλακ. 1. το; but in this sense the Att. mostly used the aor. 2 and pf., καταπλαγῆναι τῷ πολέμῳ Thuc. 1. 81, cf. 4. το; μὴ καταπέπληχθε Id. 7. 77 ; also c.acc., πάνυ τοῦτ᾽ ἐπαινῶ καὶ καταπλήτ- Towa Eupol. KoA. 1. 10; τὴν ἀπειρίαν τὴν αὑτοῦ καταπεπλῆχθαι Isocr. 415 Ε, εἴο. ; μηδὲν καταπλαγέντες τὸν Φίλιππον Dem. 290. 10; so also, καταπεπλῆχθαι τὸν βίον Id. 970. 5 :—the part. pf. καταπέπληγα is also used intr. by late writers, as App. Mithr. 18, Paus. 10. 22, 8; esp. in part., Dion. H. 6. 25, etc.; τὸ καταπεπληγός abject condition, Plut. Comp. Pel. c. Marc. 1. καταπλίσσομαι, Pass. to be tripped up, ἡμῶν ἴσως ov καταπλῖγήσει (fut. 2) τῷ χόρῳ will be tripped up, beaten by our chorus (as emended by Dind.), Ar. in Meineke Com. Gr. 2. p. 1035, ubi v. Bgk. καταπλοκή, 7, an entwining, interlacing, τοῦ νεύρου Plat. Tim. 76 D: complication, τῶν χρημάτων Artemid. 2. 5. II. in Music, the connexion of notes descending in regular succession, opp. to ἀναπλοκή, Ptol. Harm, 2.12. κατάπλοος, contr.—hous, 6, a sailing down to land, a putting ashore, ! g Ud KaTaTAavaw — καταπόρεω. | from Sicily, Dem, 1285. 21; ἐκ κατάπλου immediately after landing, ε Polyb. 15. 23, 3. II. a sailing back, return, 6 οἴκαδε κ. Xen. ἘΠΕῚ] Sire 45, Dis καταπλουτέω, to be very rich in, Tt Jo. Damasc. sq., Theophyl. Sim. 46 C. καταπλουτίζω, fut. ἐῶ, ἐο enrich greatly, τινά Hdt.6.132, Xen. Oec. 4,7. καταπλουτομἄχέω, to conquer by money, Diod. 5. 38. κατάπλῦμα, τό, -- κατάπλυσις, Synes. Med. de Febr. p. 234. καταπλυντηρίζω, to drench with foul abuse, Com. Anon. 170; cf. πλύνω II, πλυνός II. καταπλύνω [Ὁ], fo wash by pouring over, to drench, Ar. Fr. 546; ὕδατι τὴν κεφαλήν Xen. Eq. 5, 6. ΤΙ. to wash out, remove by washing, τὸ ὑγρόν Arist. Meteor. 2, 3, 13:—Pass., καταπλὔθείσης τῆς ἅλμης Theophr. C. P. 3. 24, 3; metaph., τὸ πρᾶγμα καταπέπλὕῦται the affair is washed out, i.e. forgotten, Aeschin. 79.19, cf. Poll. 7. 38. κατάπλῦσις, 7, a bathing in water, τῶν σκελῶν Xen. Eq. 5, 9. καταπλώω, Ion. for καταπλέω, Hdt.

• From A Greek-English Lexicon (Liddell-Scott) (1957)

  ὀττεύομαι, Att. for ὀσσεύομαι (which does not occur), to divine from an ominous voice or sound (daca), ὀττευομένη δὲ κάθηται she sits look- ing for omens, of a lover, Ar. Lys. 597; ὁττ. ταῖς τούτων κληδόσι by the cries of children, Plut. 2. 356 E; ὀττ. πρὸς [ὀρνίθων] βοήν Ael. N. A. 1. 48:—generally, to have forebodings of a thing, τὸ μέλλον Polyb. 27.14, 5; περὶ τῶν ὅλων Id. 1. 11, 5:—c. acc. et inf. to augur that .., Porph. Antr. Nymph. 33, cf. Luc. Lexiph. 19. 11. to regard as ominous, τὴν τύχην, TO ἔργον Dion. H. 1. 23, 55 :—hence, to deprecate as ill-omened, Lat. abominari, πάντα τῦφον Id. 2. 19.—The Act. érrevovow in Ael. N. A. 3. 9.—#Andovigopar was the equiv. Hel- lenic form, acc. to Moeris. ὅττϊ, Ep. for ὅτι (the Conjunction), Hom., and Hes. 6 ττι, Ep. for 6 τι, neut. of ὅστις, Hom. ὄττις, 7, = ὄψις, Hesych.; ὄττιες ἀχλυώδεες Aretae. Caus. M. Diut. 2.13. ὀττοτοῖ, f.1. for ὀτοτοῖ. ὅτῳ, Att. dat. of ὅστις. ov, as a Diphthong, is regularly long, except in Aeol. where it is not seldom short, v. Priscian. 1. 6, Schol. Dion. Thrax. in A. B. 779, Buttm, Lexil. 5. ν. βούλομαι 7-9. Later Poets make it short when it represents the Lat. ἃ in pr. names, as in Πόστουμος ( = Postiimus), ‘Podrovados, Jac. Anth. P. p. 631, 926. οὐ (cf. Zd. ava, Lat. haud) is the negative of fact, statement, as μή of the will and thought; οὐ denies, μή rejects; ov is absolute, μή relative ; ov objective, μή subjective. The same differences hold for all compds. of οὐ and μή. Note especially that, in contradistinction to μή, οὐ readily adheres to single words with which it forms a quasi-compd. As to the Form, v. infr. 6. A. UsacE. The uses of οὐ will be considered, T. as the negative of single words, IT. as the negative of the sentence.

• From A Greek-English Lexicon (Liddell-Scott) (1957)

  &, exclamation used to express various emotions, like Lat. and Engl, ah! in Hom. always ἃ δειλέ, ἃ δειλώ, ἃ δειλοί, 1]. 11. 441, 452., 17. 443, Od. 20. 355, al.; also in Trag., Aesch. Ag. 1087, etc.; ὦ, μηδαμῶς... Soph. Ph. 1300, cf. O. T. 1147; ἃ μάκαρ C. 1. 401 ; sometimes doubled, ἃ ἃ Aesch. Pr. 114, 566, etc.; rare in Prose, Plat. Hipp. Ma. 295 A. ἃ ἅ or ἃ G, to express laughter, like our ha ha, Eur. Cycl. 157, Ar., etc.; ἃ ἃ δασυνθὲν γέλωτα δηλοῖ Hesych. and Phot.; cf. Meineke Plat. Com. Γρυπ. 2. ἃ, Dor. for Artic. 77. Dor. for 7, dat. of ὅς. ἀάατος, ov, (daw) in Il. with penult. long, zot to be injured or violated, inviolable, viv μοι ὄμοσσον ἀάᾶτον Στυγὸς ὕδωρ, because the gods swore their most binding oaths thereby, 14. 271. II. in Od. with penult. short, μνηστήρεσσιν ἄεθλον ἀάδτον 21. 91; ἄεθλος ἀάᾶτος ἐκτε- τέλεσται 22.5, where it is commonly rendered by hurtful, dangerous ; but here also Buttm., Lexil., attempts to retain a kindred sense, zot fo be hurt, not to be treated lightly or slighted. TIT. in Ap. Rh. 2.77, κάρτος dadrov invincible strength. (Originally ἀάξατος, which is implied in the Lacon. form ἀάβακτος cited by Hesych.; cf. daw, ἄτη.) ἀᾶγής, és, wnbroken, not to be broken, hard, strong, Od. 11. 575, Theocr. 24. 121, etc. (Originally ἀξαγής ; cf. ἄγνυμι.) [The first a short in Od. and Theocr., but long in Ap. Rh. 3. 1251, Q. Sm. 6. 596.] ἀάζω, f. cw, to breathe through the mouth, breathe out, Arist. Probl. 34. 7. (For the Root, v. sub ap.) ἄανθα, ἡ, a kind of earring, Aleman 113, Ar. Fr. 567, Hesych. ἀάπλετος, ov, lengthd. Ep. for ἄπλετος, Q. Sm. 1. 675. ἄ-απτος, ov, (dmropat) not to be touched, resistless, invincible, χεῖρες ἄαπτοι Hom. (mostly in IL, as 1. 567), Hes. Op. 147; κῆτος ἄαπτον Opp. H. 5, 629. das, tomorrow or the day after tomorrow, genit. of ἄα, -- ἠώς, as Zenod. read for ἠοῦς in Il. 8. 470 (v. Schol. Ven.) ; used in Boeot. as Ady., Hesych, ἀασιφροσύνη, ἀασίφρων, in Gramm. for deaupp-. ἀασμός, 6, (ἀάζω) a breathing out, Arist. Probl. 34. 7. ἀάσπετος, ἀάσχετος, v. sub ἄσπετος, ἄσχετος. ἄαται, Ep. for ἄεται, from ἄω, satio, Hes. Sc. 1ol. ἄ-ἅτος, contr. Gros, ov, (dw, doar) insatiate, c. gen., datos πολέμοιο Hes. Th. 714; “Apns dros πολέμοιο Il. 5. 388; μάχης τόν περ ἐόντα 22. 218: cf. Buttm. Lexil. s. v.:—absol., datos ὕβρις Ap. Rh. 1. 459. [The first syll. in datos is short in Hes., but long in Ap. Rh.] Gatos, ov, in Q. Sm. I. 217, -- ἄητος, q. Vv.

• From The Things They Carried (1990)

  On ambush, or other night missions, they carried peculiar little odds and ends. Kiowa always took along his New Testament and a pair of moccasins for silence. Dave Jensen carried night-sight vitamins high in carotene. Lee Strunk carried his slingshot; ammo, he claimed, would never be a problem. Rat Kiley carried brandy and M&M's candy. Until he was shot, Ted Lavender carried the starlight scope, which weighed 6.3 pounds with its aluminum carrying case. Henry Dobbins carried his girlfriend's pantyhose wrapped around his neck as a comforter. They all carried ghosts. When dark came, they would move out single file across the meadows and paddies to their ambush coordinates, where they would quietly set up the Claymores and lie down and spend the night waiting. Other missions were more complicated and required special equipment. In mid-April, it was their mission to search out and destroy the elaborate tunnel complexes in the Than Khe area south of Chu Lai. To blow the tunnels, they carried one-pound blocks of pentrite high explosives, four blocks to a man, 68 pounds in all. They carried wiring, detonators, and battery-powered clackers. Dave Jensen carried earplugs. Most often, before blowing the tunnels, they were ordered by higher command to search them, which was considered bad news, but by and large they just shrugged and carried out orders. Because he was a big man, Henry Dobbins was excused from tunnel duty. The others would draw numbers. Before Lavender died there were 17 men in the platoon, and whoever drew the number 17 would strip off his gear and crawl in headfirst with a flashlight and Lieutenant Cross's .45-caliber pistol. The rest of them would fan out as security. They would sit down or kneel, not facing the hole, listening to the ground beneath them, imagining cobwebs and ghosts, whatever was down there—the tunnel walls squeezing in—how the flashlight seemed impossibly heavy in the hand and how it was tunnel vision in the very strictest sense, compression in all ways, even time, and how you had to wiggle in—ass and elbows—a swallowed-up feeling—and how you found yourself worrying about odd things: Will your flashlight go dead? Do rats carry rabies? If you screamed, how far would the sound carry? Would your buddies hear it? Would they have the courage to drag you out? In some respects, though not many, the waiting was worse than the tunnel itself. Imagination was a killer.