To understand a literary style, consider what it omits.
Wisdom knows when to return death's embrace.
Spirituality now wanders from sex to drugs to art to revolution to violence--whatever seems to promise deliverance from the quotidian.
The dignified catastrophes of tragedy bear little resemblance to the slow ruin inflicted by life.
Rereading, we find a new book.
Healthy vanity sweeps through life. Sickly vanity lies in bed.