These last few days I've felt Godless. I've felt cleaner, less muddled, less blind. I still believe in a God. But he's so remote, so cold, so mathematical. I see that we have to live as if there is no God. Prayer and worship and singing hymns-all silly and useless.

The moon hung over the planet Earth, a dead thing over a dying thing.

Medieval theologians used to dispute how the angels in the heaven spent their time, when not balancing on needle points and singing anthems to the Lord. I know. They slump glued to their clouds, glasses at the ready, as the Archangel Micheal (that well-known slasher) and stonewalling St Peter open against the Devils XI. It could not be Heaven, otherwise.

The most important questions in life can never be answered by anyone except oneself.

I must fight with my weapons. Not his. Not selfishness and brutality and shame and resentment.

Edith Sitwell's interest in art was largely confined to portraits of herself.

Alive. Alive in the way that death is alive.