To see God everywhere is to see Him nowhere.

Ever step you take is forever. You cant make it go away. None of it. You understand what I'm sayin?

Books lie, he said. God dont lie. No, said the judge. He does not. And these are his words. He held up a chunk of rock. He speaks in stones and trees, the bones of things. The squatters in their rags nodded among themselves and were soon reckoning him correct, this man of learning, in all his speculations, and this the judge encouraged until they were right proselytes of the new order whereupon he laughed at them for fools.

Lying under such a myriad of stars. The sea’s black horizon. He rose and walked out and stood barefoot in the sand and watched the pale surf appear all down the shore and roll and crash and darken again. When he went back to the fire he knelt and smoothed her hair as she slept and he said if he were God he would have made the world just so and no different.

Every day is a lie. But you are dying. That is not a lie.

He can give me what you cannot. Death is not a lover. Oh yes, he is.

He thought that in the history of the world it might even be that there was more punishment than crime but he took small comfort from it.