Any given moment - no matter how casual, how ordinary - is poised, full of gaping life.

History and memory share events; that is, they share time and space. Every moment is two moments.

The dead leave us starving with mouths full of love.” from “Memoriam

Hold a book in your hand and you're a pilgrim at the gates of a new city.

When you are alone - at sea, in the polar dark - an absence can keep you alive. The one you love maintains your mind. But when she's merely across the city, this is an absence that eats you to the bone.

The shadow past is shaped by everything that never happened. Invisible, it melts the present like rain through karst.

...when we say we're looking for a spiritual adviser, we're really looking for someone to tell us what to do with our bodies. Decisions of the flesh. We forget to learn from pleasure as well as pain.