lovers, of course, are notoriously frantic epistemologists, second only to paranoiacs (and analysts) as readers of signs and wonders.

Long-worn, tattle-taled, wonder-struck, of course you were full of spite the minute you saw me again. All these months of preparation for absence in a single moment: dissolved, disregarded. I felt some kind of disrespect although there was hardly enough time to calibrate a reaction as such. You and me, we're all sentiment, you said, we're soft as sand, we're slipped off. Well! It isn't the worst to be seen by you; I can imagine many worse fates. For instance, the forest in the morning. For instance, waking up unable to lift my hand.

“I obey your absence, I break and maul; I destroy the kitchen, myself, the bed. For you, I learn the art of staying dead.”

“Part of having a body means whatever can be felt can be forgotten. Forgetting is like sleep, like water. Heavy wet brain. Clear swollen dreams. It is some kind of relief, I guess, that whatever I am will be gone one day.”