This was once Mazama, I kept reminding myself. This was once a mountain that stood nearly 12,000 feet tall and then had its heart removed. This was once a wasteland of lava and pumice and ash. This was once an empty bowl that took hundreds of years t...
I didn't mean to tell you," Mrs. Whatsit faltered. "I didn't mean ever to let you know. But oh, my dears, I did so love being a star!" "Yyouu are sstill verry yyoungg," Mrs Witch said, her voice faintly chiding. The Medium sat looking happily at the ...
Under the ground seep the toxins of the population that lives above. If you have to, you will eat roots and earthworms. It is always night. Candles burn in lanterns made from tin cans. When it is nighttime up above, you can crawl out, but only for a ...
She looks at me, square in the eye. Taking aim. And then she pulls the trigger. “Because I hated you.” The wind, the noise, it all just goes quiet for a second, and I’m left with a dull ringing in my ear, like after a show, like after a heart m...
I told you it would be difficult! If I were you I would just not bother trying these tasks! They are great challenges, clearly too great for you.” said Guya, but there was a certain sparkle in his eye as he said it. “I shall complete your tasks, ...
When your children arrive, the best you can hope for is that they break open everything about you. Your mind floods with oxygen. Your heart becomes a room with wide-open windows. You laugh hard every day. You think about the future and read about glo...
If you want the light, like you say you do, then why do you keep it strangled in the dark? If you preach love, like you strive to, why do you run away from practising? My love, the universe you fumble for doesn’t exist, if you don’t start from wi...
In war," answered the weaver, "the strong make slaves of the weak, and in peace the rich make slaves of the poor. We must work to live, and they give us such mean wages that we die. We toil for them all day long, and they heap up gold in their coffer...
Committing suicide essentially said to friends and loved ones and the world at large that you were the only thing that mattered, that your problems were hopeless that you deserved to escape from them and to hell with everyone else. Suicide was nothin...
There were adventure stories supplied with cloths for mopping your brow, thrillers containing pressed leaves of soothing valerian to be sniffed when the suspense became too great, and books with stout locks sealed by the Atlantean censorship authorit...
I am back in my beloved city. The scene of desolation fills my eyes with tears. At every step my distress and agitation increases. I cannot recognize houses or landmarks I once knew well. Of the former inhabitants, there is no trace. Everywhere there...
I opened the door and stepped in. Raw pain filled me at the sight of my painting. 'Show me what it looked like, before the fire.' His request surprised me, but I did as he asked. With eyes closed, I projected the exact details of the painting I had p...
I believe in making my potential models comfortable,’ he explained when she shot a surprised look at him. ‘I’m considerate, unlike some artists who bend their sitters into difficult positions and expect them to stay there for hours. My demands ...
Lovers and madmen have such seething brains, Such shaping fantasies, that apprehend More than cool reason ever comprehends. The lunatic, the lover and the poet Are of imagination all compact: One sees more devils than vast hell can hold, That is, the...
I had also pled, the whole year, to be wholly relieved of my romantic attachment; begged to stop loving so much. But I had finally been given to see that my desire was what made me human; that desire was my glory and my cross; that desire had given m...
I haven’t had the chance to look at too many men’s faces up close. And I noticed how his skin was thicker than mine, and a gorgeous shade of toast. The stiff blond hairs on his cheeks and chin seemed to be growing before my eyes. He smelled like ...
My hair is not the shiniest of bobs My eyes are not the brightest in the room My figure will not get me modeling jobs My smile will not bring young boys to their doom. But do I cry and mourn my average face? Or wish that I had boyfriends at the ready...
[The thief-taker] was conspicuous by his age, I should estimate he is in his middle fifties, and by a bearing, I am tempted to call it dignity, wanting in the others. He has a good head of hair, only a bit thin on top, blond going grey, and sea green...
...crossed the room to where a selection of implements was arranged on a table top. These could have been mistaken for the trade tools of a cook, physician, or torturer, save for the fact that the surface on which they rested was a slab of polished p...
The art of sensuality encompassing the exploration and experiencing of all our senses... Those images are being born from and through living the moments of eating favorite chocolate cake with ice-cream, tranquil meditating, walking the beach and feel...
When you're traveling you need to take care of yourself to get by, you have to keep an eye on yourself and your place in the world. It means concentrating on yourself, thinking about yourself and looking after yourself. So when you travel all you rea...
