I often think about this, that is, I imagine to myself that here is Vera, dead, totally motionless, lying on the table, in a coffin... and I too, of course can no longer live. But for some reason this gives me pleasure, a terrible amount of pleasure ...
Meditation practice is like piano scales, basketball drills, ballroom dance class. Practice requires discipline; it can be tedious; it is necessary. After you have practiced enough, you become more skilled at the art form itself. You do not practice ...
What sorts of books are placed by garbage cans on garbage night in the town of Sterns? Mainly they're old class books, the kind people carry around in boxes in their basements for twenty years and then one day think: I will never again in my entire l...
I've always felt that the performance of a raag resembles a novel - or at least the kind of novel I'm attempting to write. You know,' he continued, extemporizing as he went along, 'first you take one note and explore it for a while, then another to d...
Often I lose myself in the constellation of my own ideas, forever searching for point of illumination. But no matter where I look, I find you, shinning and bright, offering me what ever it is I seek, you are my one single star. My sun, my moon, my gu...
I had always had a little problem looking out for myself in love. I was afraid people would leave me. So I sort of clung and did everything possible to keep someone around. I didn't have a hard talk with myself about who I was keeping around. Doesn't...
How did it happen that now he could see everything so clearly. Something had given him leave to live in the present. Not once in his entire life had he come to rest in the quiet center of himself but had forever cast himself from some dark past he co...
Even if the intelligent design of some structure has been established, it still is a separate question whether a wise, powerful, and beneficent God ought to have designed a complex, information-rich structure one way or another. For the sake of argum...
Soon he was online every night until one or two a.m. Often he would wake up at three of four a.m. and go back online. He would shut down the computer screen when I walked in. In the past, he used to take the laptop to bed with him and we would both b...
People told me not to get married; I didn´t listen. No one ever listens, it seems to me now. Perhaps people should stop trying to communicate. N was not a communicator; early on, I´d insisted on communication. Now I see his point acutely. I would l...
Saying something is “meant to be” is a cop out. It’s a way for people to deal when they screw up or when life hands them a bowl of shit stew. The things that are meant to be are the things we can’t control, the things we don’t cause, the th...
The Shulamite lives by a different set of values. One of the most horrible frauds perpetrated on western couples is 'trust your feelings' or 'follow your heart.' Solomon's family must never be left to whims. A wise Shulamite does not make life decisi...
Every friend, every neighbor, and every family member wishes that you retain your golden heart. No one wants to see your love sullied. Yet, they all know a dark circumstance will find you eventually. Know this: You are being hunted--like game. Life w...
I stepped between him and the window so I was inches from his face. “There’s only one Ophi I’ve ever been interested in.” I tugged on his arm, making him face me again. I reached up on my toes and pressed my lips against his. He wrapped his a...
I must be getting back to my rooms,” Silence said and stood. Mick frowned with displeasure. “Why?” “Because of Mary Darling.” He shrugged. “One o’ the maids is watchin’ her.” “But if Mary wakes she’ll want me.” “Why?” he a...
Maybe instead of strings it's stories things are made of, an infinite number of tiny vibrating stories; once upon a time they all were part of one big giant superstory, except it got broken up into a jillion different pieces, that's why no story on i...
One man thinks justice consists in paying debts, and has no measure in his abhorrence of another who is very remiss in this duty and makes the creditor wait tediously. But that second man has his own way of looking at things; asks himself Which debt ...
Sadness pulses out of us as we walk. I almost expect the trees to lower their branches when we pass, the stars to hand down some light. I breathe in the horsy scent of eucalyptus, the thick sugary pine, aware of each breath I take, how each one keeps...
This one time in Year Eight we had to write on butcher’s paper how we’d like people to see us. Remember ours? We were like, ‘We don’t want people to see us as leaders or heroes or anything out of the ordinary. We just want them to see us as o...
See, admit it, you need my help.” “Fine. I need you… your help.” My admission made Ace’s half smile bloom into a full one. He really was devastatingly handsome. And so very, very unattainable. “What makes you say that, Riles?” His thumb...
[S]ocial order displays not the absolute presence or absence of intolerance to difference but a spectrum of intolerance. Each of us bears responsibility to some degree for maintaining these protocols of intolerance, which could not be kept in place i...
