amphichon

Been reading a lot lately. I thought I’d take a minute to summarize what I’ve recently finished and what’s on deck. (I’ll come back and put links together, and maybe some further comments, at some point.)
Finished:
A Short History of Nearly Everything, by Bill Bryson
House of Leaves, by Mark Z. Danielewski
Sexing the Cherry, by [...]

Above me the gulls burst in white battalions, and ahead of me the tall rocks loom. To the north of this tiny island is a tract of sand where the sea cuts through like a tongue. I will pull up my boat at this deeply divided shore and see what signs of life [...]

The earth is round and flat at the same time. This is obvious. That it is round appears indisputable; that it is flat is our common experience, also indisputable. The globe does not supercede the map; the map does not distort the globe.
Maps are magic. In the bottom corner are whales; [...]

I went to a church not far from the gardens. A country church famed for its altar window where our Lord stood feeding the five thousand. Black Tom Fairfax, with nothing better to do, had set up his cannon outside the window and given the order to fire. There was no window [...]

He called me Jess because that is the name of the hood which restrains the falcon.
I was his falcon. I hung on his arm and fed at his hand. He said my nose was sharp and cruel and that my eyes had madness in them. He said I would tear him to [...]

Your breath is now still
no warmth to your skin.
Do not be afraid.
Everyone before you has died.
You cannot stay
any more than a baby can stay forever in the womb.
Leave behind all you know,
all you love.
Leave behind pain and suffering.
This is what death is. – from a Tibetan jhator ceremony

Dans le doute, mon cher… abstiens-toi.

“He wanted to go to bed with her immediately, pull the sheets around them, dig his toes into the mattress, her heals pushing against his calves, her fingers running like rivers along his sides. But these days fantasies flourish and die like summer flies.” – “House of Leaves”, Mark Danielewski, pg 544.

Vision is not enough; it must be combined with venture. It is not enough to stare up the steps; we must step up the stairs. – Vaclav Havel or, to put it in a more sibilant imperative: stop staring up the steps and start stepping up the stairs.

I believe in the rule of opposites
that the two sides of the coin
are loss and greater loss, that grief dribbles
out of the bottle as effortlessly as joy
and if you scoop up everything sad, your hands
will discover the texture of hope. – Jane Bailey, “Philosophy – for Larry” (excerpt)
spotted on Portland’s Blue Line train, as part of [...]