I became what I am today at the age of twelve, on a frigid overcast day In the winter of 1975. I remember the precise moment, crouching be hind a erumbling mud wall peeking into the alley near the lezen creek That was a long time ago, but it's wrong what they say about the past, Dve learned, about how you can bury it. Because the past claws its way our Looking back now. I realize I have been peeling into that deserted alley for the last twenty-six years.