Meditation,” said his teacher, “hasn’t got a damn thing to do with anything, ‘cause all it has to do with is nothing. Nothingness. Okay? It doesn’t develop the mind, it dissolves the mind. Self-improvement? Forget it, baby. It erases the se...
That word. I would have given anything to hear her say it over the summer, to have had the chance to say it back, but now, more than ever, I understand its true power. How it can make you ache as much as it can make you soar. How it shouldn't be said...
There will come a time when all of us are dead. All of us. There will come a time when there are no human beings remaining to remember that anyone ever existed or that our species ever did anything. There will be no one left to remember Aristotle or ...
When I am an old man and I can remember nothing else, I will remember this moment. The first time my eyes beheld an angel in the flesh. “I will remember your body and your eyes, your beautiful face and breasts, your curves and this.” He traced hi...
I started toward the barn and was grateful that the wind was still. About halfway up the drive, my heart began to beat an irregular rhythm as I caught sight of Cricket coming toward me. My breath caught in my throat. This girl. This tiny little girl ...
Nobody wanted to hear about all the Preterite, the many God passes over when he chooses a few for salvation. William argued holiness for these "second Sheep," without whom there'd be no elect. You can bet the Elect in Boston were pissed off about tha...
I haven't done anything you're supposed to do. Like get so drunk you puke and don't remember the rest of the night." "Overrated, I swear." She looked at me, that deadly look on her face, and I held up my hands. "Fine. You wanna get drunk and puke, I'...
Who told you you couldn't come back when you're grown? Was it the same person who told you grown-ups don't cry or blush or clap their hands when they're happy? Don't try to say otherwise, I've seen you fighting like a boxer to change your face so tha...
At the end of the day, no amount of investing, no amount of clean electrons, no amount of energy efficiency will save the natural world if we are not paying attention to it - if we are not paying attention to all the things that nature give us for fr...
That's right. You'll like Owl. He flew past a day or two ago and noticed me. He didn't actually say anything, mind you, but he knew it was me. Very friendly of him. Encouraging." Pooh and Piglet shuffled about a little and said, "Well, good-bye, Eeyo...
He could not blame the Army, Angelo could blame the Army; Angelo hated the Army. But he didnt hate the Army, not even now. He remembered what Maureen had told him once that it was the system that was at fault. But he could not even blame the system, ...
The way sadness works is one of the strange riddles of the world. If you are stricken with a great sadness, you may feel as if you have been set aflame, not only because of the enormous pain, but also because your sadness may spread over your life, l...
Aunt Prue was holding one of the squirrels in her hand, while it sucked ferociously on the end of the dropper. 'And once a day, we have ta clean their little private parts with a Q-tip, so they'll learn ta clean themselves.' That was a visual I didn'...
Yet Anthony knew that there were days when they hurt each other purposely—taking almost a delight in the thrust. Incessantly she puzzled him: one hour so intimate and charming, striving desperately toward an unguessed, transcendent union; the next,...
Micah showed up shortly thereafter and was happy to meet our other “brother.” He shook Adrian’s hand and smiled. “Now I see some family resemblance. I was starting to wonder if Jill was adopted, but you two kind of look like each other.” �...
Just because I’ve been gone from this country for most of my life doesn’t mean I understand it any less. When I was fifteen I left Jamaica. I knew that I was a lesbian then and, because of what I looked like, I was an out lesbian. It was hard for...
What’s interesting is that most free-marketers don’t seem to want a free market at all, but a status quo market. The market in the United States is anything but free. If it were, big business would have to survive without corporate welfare to the...
Do you think Bubbles wants Chinese food because it's made out of cats?" Genevieve questioned, shoveling a big bite into her mouth. "Genevieve, that's just gross and wrong. Don't say things like that. Bubbles is a dog, and their stomachs are bottomles...
But isn't that what love is, Clarissa? Ownership? 'I am my beloved's and my beloved is mine,' as the Song of Songs goes." "No. And don't quote the Bible at me. I don't think you get it...It's not just that someone belongs to you, it's that you give y...
Finished in a frenzy that reminded me of our last night in Cambridge. Watched my final sunrise. Enjoyed a last cigarette. Didn’t think the view could be any more perfect until I saw that beat-up trilby. Honestly, Sixsmith, as ridiculous as that thi...