You mean that because I have no name I cannot die and that you cannot be held answerable for death even if you kill me?" "That is about the size of it," said the Sergeant. I felt so sad and so entirely disappointed that tears came into my eyes and a ...
Frodo raised his head, and then stood up. Despair had not left him, but the weakness had passed. He even smiled grimly, feeling now as clearly as a moment before he had felt the opposite, that what he had to do, he had to do, if he could, and that wh...
The horror of what I saw chilled me to the bone. Blood glistened on my friend's lips. He knelt down and whispered something I could not hear. Star then stopped attacking, and to lay down to sleep. What the hell had he done to my dog? Just how much of...
Laurel look up at him in question, but he wouldn't meet her eyes. She always wished she had more time to draw secrets from him. "I'll wear it always," she said. "And think of me?" His eyes held her captive, and she knew there was only one answer. "Ye...
She was a free bird one minute: queen of the world and laughing. The next minute she would be in tears like a porcelain angel, about to teeter, fall and break. She was brave, and I never once saw her cry out of fear. She never cried because she was a...
The trick here is arbitrary word assignment: that is, any violence engaged in by ourselves or our friends is ipso facto retaliation and counter-terrorism; whatever the enemy does is terrorism, irrespective of facts.’10 We might say, then, that the ...
Here I was just thinking all these wonderful things about you and now you’re trying to strip down before we can have sex.” His hands casually held in the air, he explained, “I was hot.” “It’s seventy degrees in here.” His hands went to ...
A man journeyed to a place Where the road caused him to ponder, Should he travel the wide, clear road? Or should he venture up the other? The wide road was more often traveled, It was level and easy and clear. The narrow one seemed barely a path, Wit...
The bed we loved in was a spinning world of forests, castles, torchlight, clifftops, seas where we would dive for pearls. My lover’s words were shooting stars which fell to earth as kisses on these lips; my body now a softer rhyme to his, now echo,...
Of course, he showed me this one afternoon when he was skipping class. When trolls cut classes, you think they are losers. When the beautiful and/or reasonably erudite do the same thing to sit on the library steps and read poetry, you think they are ...
I once knew a fellow who committed robbery with violence, and he was sentenced to a long prison stretch and 12 strokes of the cat. He'd been injured during the robbery, so they put him in hospital to make him better so that they could make him worse....
In an earlier stage of our development most human groups held to a tribal ethic. Members of the tribe were protected, but people of other tribes could be robbed or killed as one pleased. Gradually the circle of protection expanded, but as recently as...
Language is my whore, my mistress, my wife, my pen-friend, my check-out girl. Language is a complimentary moist lemon-scented cleansing square or handy freshen-up wipette. Language is the breath of God, the dew on a fresh apple, it's the soft rain of...
When he came home early, he was dreary. There, he'd sit by the fireplace, his worn hands gripping the newspaper a bit too tight, his eyes held to it, unseeing, towards the words, the meaningless grouping of letters on that newspaper. The fire would c...
In this world, the thing people fear the most, and what pains people the most— is giving more than they receive. God forbid I cut off more of my fingernail for you than you cut from your fingernail, for me! Heaven forbid I hold my breath in longer ...
Would you like me to court you?” the earl finally asked. YES. She smoothed her hands over her skirts to keep from confessing it aloud. “I would like to know if you are,” she replied. “Or what your intentions are, if you aren’t.” “My int...
She was a spiky teenager rebelling against the soul-suck mirror reflected back at her in her mother’s blank stare, her question mark of a spine. Determined to beat the odds, she completed high school with distinction. But there was a caveat. Beydan...
I surrendered my identity in your eyes. Now I'm just like everybody else, and it's so funny, the way monogamy is funny, the way someone falling down in the street is funny. I entered a revolving door and emerged as a human being. When you think of me...
She did not respond, only clung harder to my embrace, and I held her with all the afflictions of a man torn by love. What a miracle she was, what a truly exquisite paragon of beauty and virtue so incredibly combined. And all perhaps wrenched from my ...
Bishop Gardiner: [Walsingham comes down the stairs into the holding area where the Catholic bishops are being held] Walsingham! I would know by what authority you have kept us locked up here! Sir Francis Walsingham: Your Graces must forgive me, but y...
Walter 'Monk' McGinn: I've got forty-four notches on my club. Do you know what they're for? They're to remind me what I owe God when I die. My father was killed in battle, too. In Ireland, in the streets, fighting those who would take as their privil...
