• “I hadn't planned on speaking her name, but the thought welled up in me and spilled out. ”
• “If she never came back everything would be lost to me forever. All meaning, all direction. Everything. I know this, but I go ahead and risk it anyway, and call her name. Of their own accord, almost automatically, my tongue and lips form her name, over and over.”
• “I'm in her field of vision.
• “Clouds move outside and the moonlight flickers. ”
• “But this heavy, just-before-three-a. m. darkness has snatched away all meaning. It's hard to breathe, and I close my eyes. There's a hard lump of air in my chest, like I've swallowed a raincloud whole. ”
• “I get out of bed, go over to the window, and look at the night sky. And think about time that can never be regained. I think of rivers, of tides. Forests and water gushing out. Rain and lightning. Rocks and shadows. All of these are in me.”
• “But there is one thing. For me, inside this physical body—this defective container—the most important job is surviving from one day to the next. It could be simple, or very hard. It all depends on how you look at it. Either way, even if things go well, that's not some great achievement. Nobody's going to give me a standing ovation or anything”
• “Oshima, to tell you the unvarnished truth, I don't like the container I'm stuck in. Never have. I hate it, in fact. My face, my hands, my blood, my genes... I hate everything I inherited from my parents. I'd like nothing better than to escape it all, like running away from home.”
• “Still, inside here, this is what I think: If we reverse the outer shell and the essence—in other words, consider the outer shell the essence and the essence only the shell—our lives might be a whole lot easier to understand.”
• “I think about my own essence, my own shell. The essence of me, surrounded by the shell that's me. But these thoughts are driven away by one indelible image: all that blood.”
• “Both hands resting on the desk, she's staring off into space. Not like she's looking at anything, just gazing at a place that isn't there. She seems tired. The window behind her is open, the early summer breeze rustling the white lace curtain. The scene looks like some beautiful allegorical painting.”
• “She smiles faintly, and it continues to hover around her lips. This puts me in mind of how refreshing water looks after someone's sprinkled it in a tiny hollow outside on a summer day.”
• “The boundary line separating the two has started to waver, to fade, and I can't focus. And that confuses me. I close my eyes and try to find some center inside to hold on to. But you know, she's right. Every single day, each time I see her face, see her, it's utterly precious.”
• “You're employing the status quo and the cheap phallocentric logic that supports it to reduce the entire female gender to second-class citizens, to limit and deprive women of the rights they're due. You're doing this unconsciously rather than deliberately, but that makes you even guiltier. You protect vested male interests and become inured to the pain of others, and don't even try to see what evil your blindness causes women and society. I realize that problems with restrooms and card catalogs are mere details, but if we don't begin with the small things we'll never be able to throw off the cloak of blindness that covers our society. Those are the principles by which we act.”
• “I'm just a regular person, not some monster. I feel the same things everyone else does, act the same way. Sometimes, though, that small difference feels like an abyss. But I guess there's not much I can do about it”
• “Only people who've been discriminated against can really know how much it hurts. Each person feels the pain in his own way, each has his own scars. So I think I'm as concerned about fairness and justice as anybody. But what disgusts me even more are people who have no imagination. The kind T. S. Eliot calls hollow men. People who fill up that lack of imagination with heartless bits of straw, not even aware of what they're doing. Callous people who throw a lot of empty words at you, trying to force you to do what you don't want to”
• “Narrow minds devoid of imagination. Intolerance, theories cut off from reality, empty terminology, usurped ideals, inflexible systems. Those are the things that really frighten me. What I absolutely fear and loathe. Of course it's important to know what's right and what's wrong. Individual errors in judgment can usually be corrected. As long as you have the courage to admit mistakes, things can be turned around. But intolerant, narrow minds with no imagination are like parasites that transform the host, change form, and continue to thrive. They're a lost cause, and I don't want anyone like that coming in here.”
• “Look—what I'm getting at is no matter who or what you're dealing with, people build up meaning between themselves and the things around them. The important thing is whether this comes about naturally or not. Being bright has nothing to do with it. What matters is that you see things with your own eyes.”
• “The sky was cloudless, the surface of the moon clearly visible.
• unperturbed
• “His heart surged blood to his extremities as night enveloped him.”
• “My voice seems weak, lacking in authority. Unsure of where they're headed, my words are sucked into the void.”
• “All kinds of things are happening to me," I begin. "Some I chose, some I didn't. I don't know how to tell one from the other anymore. What I mean is, it feels like everything's been decided in advance—that I'm following a path somebody else has already mapped out for me. It doesn't matter how much I think things over, how much effort I put into it. In fact, the harder I try, the more I lose my sense of who I am. It's like my identity's an orbit that I've strayed far away from, and that really hurts. But more than that, it scares me. Just thinking about it makes me flinch.”
• “you're forging ahead, as yourself”
• “What you're experiencing now is the motif of many Greek tragedies. Man doesn't choose fate. Fate chooses man. That's the basic worldview of Greek drama. And the sense of tragedy—according to Aristotle—comes, ironically enough, not from the protagonist's weak points but from his good qualities. Do you know what I'm getting at? People are drawn deeper into tragedy not by their defects but by their virtues. Sophocles' Oedipus Rex being a great example.

Oedipus is drawn into tragedy not because of laziness or stupidity, but because of his courage and honesty. So an inevitable irony results." “But it's a hopeless situation." "That depends," Oshima says. "Sometimes it is. But irony deepens a person, helps them mature. It's the entrance to salvation on a higher plane, to a place where you can find a more universal kind of hope. That's why people enjoy reading Greek tragedies even now, why they're considered prototypical classics. I'm repeating myself, but everything in life is metaphor. ”“People don't usually kill their father and sleep with their mother, right? In other words, we accept irony through a device called metaphor. And through that we grow and become deeper human beings.”

• “Like he was chiseling each word into my brain." I take a deep breath and check once more what it is I have to say. Not that I really need to check it—it's always there, banging about in my head, whether I examine it or not. But I have to weigh the words one more time.”
• “Once I've spoken this, put this thought into concrete words, a hollow feeling grabs hold of me. And inside that hollow, my heart pounds out a vacant, metallic rhythm.”
• “He's a wonderful sculptor. His pieces are original, provocative, powerful. Uncompromising, is how I'd put it. ”
• “Oshima lightly presses his fingertips against his temples as he mulls this over.”
• “Distance won't solve anything, the boy named Crow says.”
• “But my father always used to say that without counterevidence to refute a theory, science would never progress. A theory is a battlefield in your head—that was his pet phrase. And right now I can't think of any evidence to counter my hypothesis.”
• “His snores sometimes woke Nakata up, but each time he quickly dropped back into a comfortable sleep. Insomnia was one phenomenon Nakata had never experienced.”
• “He lived in a world circumscribed by a very limited vocabulary.”
• “Only amounts up to fifty dollars or so had any meaning to him. Anything above that—a thousand dollars, ten thousand, a hundred thousand—was all the same to him. A lot of money, that's all it meant. He might have savings, but he'd never seen it. They just told him, "This is how much you have in your account," and told him an amount, which to him was an abstract concept. So when it all vanished he never had the sense that he'd actually lost something real.”
• “Now for the first time, he realized that he'd lost the sea for so long. He hadn't even thought about it all those many years. He nodded several times to himself, confirming this fact. He took off his hat, rubbed his closely-cropped head with his palm, put his hat back on, and gazed out at the sea. This is the extent of his knowledge of the sea: it was very big, it was salty, and fish lived there.” He sat there on the bench, breathing in the scent of the sea, watching seagulls circle overhead, gazing at ships anchored far offshore. He didn't tire of the view. An occasional white seagull would alight on the fresh summer grass in the park. The white against the green was beautiful. ”
• This little corner of Nakano became his new world. Just like dogs and cats, he marked off his territory, a boundary line beyond which, except in unusual circumstances, he never ventured. As long as he stayed there he felt safe and content. No dissatisfactions, no anger at anything. No feelings of loneliness, anxieties about the future, or worries that his life was difficult or inconvenient. Day after day, for more than ten years, this was his life, leisurely enjoying whatever came along.”
• “It's the middle of the night but the room is strangely light, moonlight streaming through the window. I know I closed the curtains before going to bed, but now they're wide open. The girl's silhouette is clearly outlined, bathed by the bone white light of the moon.”
• “She's sitting at the desk, chin resting in her hands, staring at the wall and thinking about something. Nothing too complex, I'd say. It looks more like she's lost in some pleasant, warm memory of not so long ago. Every once in a while a hint of a smile gathers at the corners of her mouth. But the shadows cast by the moonlight keep me from making out any details of her expression. ”
• “ I can see the large flowering dogwood just outside the window, glistening silently in the moonlight. ”
• “There's no wind, and I can't hear a sound. The whole thing feels like I might've died, unknowingly. I'm dead, and this girl and I have sunk to the bottom of a deep crater lake. “In the depths of our crater lake, everything is silent. The volcano's been extinct for ages. Layer upon layer of solitude, like folds of soft mud. The little bit of light that manages to penetrate to the depths lights up the surroundings like the remains of some faint, distant memory. At these depths there's no sign of life. I don't know how long she looks at me—not at me, maybe, but at the spot where I am. Time's rules don't apply here. Time expands, then contracts, all in tune with the stirrings of the heart.”
• “My head's too full of that enigmatic girl. A strange, terrific force unlike anything I've ever experienced is sprouting in my heart, taking root there, growing. Shut up behind my rib cage, my warm heart expands and contracts independent of my will—over and over.”
• “She looks like a symbol of something. A certain time, a certain place. A certain state of mind. She's like a spirit that's sprung up from a happy chance encounter. An eternal, naive innocence, never to be marred, floats around her like spores in spring.”
• “Still, there's something in this photo of the nineteen-year-old that the middle-aged woman I know has lost forever. You might call it an outpouring of energy. Nothing showy, it's colorless, transparent, like fresh water secretly seeping out between rocks—a kind of natural, unspoiled appeal that shoots straight to your heart. That brilliant energy seeps out of her entire being as she sits there at the piano. Just by looking at that happy smile, you can trace the beautiful path that a contented heart must follow. Like a firefly's glow that persists long after it's disappeared into the darkness.”
• “I sit on my bed for a long time, record jacket in hand, not thinking about anything, just letting time pass by. I open my eyes, go to the window, and take a deep breath of fresh air, catching a whiff of the sea on the breeze that's come up through a pine forest.”
• I'm drawn to that ghost, attracted to her. Not to the Miss Saeki who's here right now, but to the fifteen-year-old who isn't. Very attracted, a feeling so strong I can't explain it. And no matter what anybody says, this is real. Maybe she doesn't really exist, but just thinking about her makes my heart—my flesh and blood, my real heart—thump like mad. These feelings are as real as the blood all over my chest that awful night.

As it gets near closing time Miss Saeki comes downstairs, her heels clicking as she walks. When I see her, I tense up and can hear my heart pounding. I see the fifteen-year-old girl inside her. Like some small animal in hibernation, she's curled up in a hollow inside Miss Saeki, asleep. Miss Saeki's asking me something but I can't reply. I don't even know what she said. I can hear her, of course—her words vibrate my eardrums and transmit a message to my brain that's converted into language—but there's a disconnect between words and meaning. Flustered, I blush and stammer out something stupid. Oshima intervenes and answers her question.

• “The world of the grotesque is the darkness within us. Well before Freud and Jung shined a light on the workings of the subconscious, this correlation between darkness and our subconscious, these two forms of darkness, was obvious to people. It wasn't a metaphor, even. If you trace it back further, it wasn't even a correlation. Until Edison invented the electric “light, most of the world was totally covered in darkness. The physical darkness outside and the inner darkness of the soul were mixed together, with no boundary separating the two. They were directly linked. Like this." Oshima brings his two hands together tightly.”
• “The darkness in the outside world has vanished, but the darkness in our hearts remains, virtually unchanged. Just like an iceberg, what we label the ego or consciousness is, for the most part, sunk in darkness. And that estrangement sometimes creates a deep contradiction or confusion within us.”
• “I listen to the record three times. First of all, I'm wondering how a record with lyrics like this could sell over a million copies. I'm not saying they're totally obscure, just kind of abstract and surreal. Not exactly catchy lyrics. But if you listen to them a few times they begin to sound familiar. One by one the words find a home in my heart. It's a weird feeling. Images beyond any meaning arise like cutout figures and stand alone, just like when I'm in the middle of a deep dream.”
• “Miss Saeki's voice melts into it naturally. Her voice needs more power—she isn't what you'd call a professional singer—but it gently cleanses your mind, like a spring rain washing over stepping stones in a garden.”
• “Two unusual chords appear in the refrain. The other chords in the song are nothing special, but these two are different, not the kind you can figure out by listening just a couple of times. At first I felt confused. To exaggerate a little, I felt betrayed, even. The total unexpectedness of the sounds shook me, unsettled me, like when a cold wind suddenly blows in through a crack. But once the refrain is over, that beautiful melody returns, taking you back to that original world of harmony and intimacy. No more chilly wind here. The piano plays its final note while the strings quietly hold the last chord, the lingering sound of the oboe bringing the song to a close. “Listening to it over and over, I start to get some idea why "Kafka on the Shore" moved so many people. The song's direct and gentle at the same time, the product of a capable yet unselfish heart. There's a kind of miraculous feel to it, this overlap of opposites. A shy nineteen-year-old girl from a provincial town writes lyrics about her boyfriend far away, sits down at the piano and sets it to music, then unhesitantly sings her creation. She didn't write the song for others to hear, but for herself, to warm her own heart, if even a little. And her self-absorption strikes a subtle but powerful chord in her listeners' hearts.”
• I walk to the window and look out at the garden. Darkness is just settling in on the world. ”
• “a solitary soul straying by an absurd shore.”
• felt uncharacteristically helpless
• “The pain Hoshino felt at that instant was awful, unreasonably so. A huge flash of light went off in his brain and everything went white. He stopped breathing. It felt like he'd been thrown from the top of a tall tower into the depths of hell. He couldn't even manage a scream, so hideous was the pain. All thoughts had burned up and shot away. It was like his body had been shattered into pieces. Even death couldn't be this awful, he felt. He tried to open his eyes but couldn't. He just lay there, helpless, facedown on the tatami, drooling, tears streaming down his face.”
• “Out of the blue my heart starts beating hard, a dry sound like somebody's knocking at the door. The sound echoes through the silent, dead-of-night room, and startles me so much that I nearly leap right out of bed.”
• “A short time later I fall into a restless sleep. My body needs rest, but my mind won't allow it. I swing like a pendulum, back and forth between the two. ”
• “A single white seagull flits aimlessly across the windless sky. Small waves break against the shore at regular intervals, leaving behind a gentle curve and tiny bubbles on the sand.”
• “Yup, you're in a strange position, all right. You're in love with a girl who is no more, jealous of a boy who's gone forever. Even so, this emotion you're feeling is more real, and more intensely painful, than anything you've ever felt before. And there's no way out. No possibility of finding an exit. You've wandered into a labyrinth of time, and the biggest problem of all is that you have no desire at all to get out. Am I right?”
• “The lyrics, though, are pretty symbolic," I venture.”
• ostensible reason
• precocious
• “That's how stories happen—with a turning point, an unexpected twist. There's only one kind of happiness, but misfortune comes in all shapes and sizes. It's like Tolstoy said. Happiness is an allegory, unhappiness a story. ”
• “she makes a quick, smooth segue to another topic. ”
• cipher
• nodding warmly as she listens
• “Kafka, in everybody's life there's a point of no return. And in a very few cases, a point where you can't go forward anymore. And when we reach that point, all we can do is quietly accept the fact. That's how we survive”
• “his voice tinged with an entire day's worth of exhaustion”
• “It's Monday and the library's closed. The library is quiet enough most of the time, but on a day like this when it's closed it's like the land that time forgot. Or more like a place that's holding its breath, hoping time won't stumble upon it”
• “It's getting close to evening, and the sinking sun glints past the cedar branches.”
• “I try imagining myself in forty years, but it's like trying to picture what lies beyond the universe.”
• “Her tone of voice is hard and unyielding, like a loaf of bread someone forgot on the back of a shelf.”
• “This might seem an outrageous choice, but consider this: most choices we make in life are equally outrageous”
• “you don't need to suffer any pangs of conscience. You're doing exactly what I'm hoping for.”
• “The knack to killing someone, Mr. Nakata, is not to hesitate. Focus your prejudice and execute it swiftly—that's the ticket when it comes to killing. I have an excellent example right here. It's not a person, but it might help you get the picture.”
• lovingly
• “Now that you've said hello, I'm afraid we move right into farewells. Hello, good-bye. Like flowers scattered in a storm, man's life is one long farewell, as they say”
• “Closing your eyes isn't going to change anything. Nothing's going to disappear just because you can't see what's going on. In fact, things will be even worse the next time you open your eyes. That's the kind of world we live in, Mr. Nakata. Keep your eyes wide open. Only a coward closes his eyes. Closing your eyes and plugging up your ears won't make time stand still.”
• “Everything in the room had come to a standstill.”
• “With each passing day I've gotten more used to the silence and how incredibly dark it is. The night doesn't scare me anymore—or at least not as much. When I get tired, I just space out and stare at the flames. I never grow tired of looking at them. They come in all shapes and colors, and move around like living things—they are born, connect up, part company, and die. When it's not cloudy I go outside and gaze up at the sky. The stars don't seem as intimidating as before, and I'm starting to feel closer to them. Each one gives out its own special light. I identify certain stars and watch how they twinkle in the night. Every once in a while they blaze more brightly for a moment. The moon hangs there, pale and bright, and if I look closely it's like I can make out individual crags on the surface. I don't form any coherent thoughts, just gaze, enthralled, at the sky.”
• “Having no music doesn't bother me as much as I thought it would. There're lots of other sounds that take its place—the chirping of birds, the cries of all sorts of insects, the gurgle of the brook, the rustling of leaves. Rain falls, something scrambles across the cabin roof, and sometimes I hear indescribable sounds I can't explain. I never knew the world was full of so many beautiful, natural sounds. I've ignored them my entire life, but not now. I sit on the porch for hours with my eyes closed, trying to be inconspicuous, picking up each and every sound around me. The woods don't scare me as much as they used to, either, and I've started to feel a kind of closeness and respect. That said, I don't venture too far from the cabin, and stay on the path. As long as I follow these rules, it shouldn't get too precarious. That's the important thing—follow the rules and the woods will wordlessly accept me, sharing some of their peace and beauty. Cross the line, though, and beasts of silence lay in wait to maul me with razor-sharp claws. I often lie down in the round little clearing and let the sunlight wash over me. Eyes closed tight, I give myself up to it, ears tuned to the wind whipping through the treetops. Wrapped in the deep fragrance of the forest, I listen to the flapping of birds' wings, to the stirring of the ferns. I'm freed from gravity and float up—just a little—from the ground and drift in the air. Of course I can't stay there forever. It's just a momentary sensation—open my eyes and it's gone. Still, it's an overwhelming experience. Being able to float in the air.”
• “All sorts of knowledge seeps, bit by bit, into my brain.”
• “As Oshima locks up the cabin, I turn to look one last time. Up till a minute ago it felt so real, but now it seems imaginary. Just a few steps is all it takes for everything associated with it to lose all sense of reality. And me—the person who was there until a moment ago—now I seem imaginary too.”
• “Oshima's humming some melody. I let my mind wander.”
• “From my own experience, when someone is trying very hard to get something, they don't. And when they're running away from something as hard as they can, it usually catches up with them. I'm generalizing, of course.”
• “A moment passes before he goes on. "If I had to say anything it'd be this: Whatever it is you're seeking won't come in the form you're expecting." "Kind of an ominous prophecy.”
• “If I sound like I'm always predicting ominous things, it's because I'm a pragmatist. I use deductive reasoning to generalize, and I suppose this sometimes winds up sounding like unlucky prophecies. You know why? Because reality's just the accumulation of ominous prophecies come to life. All you have to do is open a newspaper on any given day and weigh the good news versus the bad news, and you'll see what I mean.”
• “I file that away for future reference.”
• “giving a halting report to his present client”
• “That, he figured, would only complicate matters.”
• “Once he'd spilled out all these ideas Nakata couldn't follow, Kawamura left beaming”
• “The cats here were particularly adept at giving someone the cold shoulder. They must have had some pretty awful experiences with humans, Nakata decided. He was in no position to demand anything of them, and didn't blame them for their coldness. He knew very well that in the world of cats he would always be an outsider.”
• said brusquely
• “Frown lines appeared between his eyebrows and he blinked in consternation several times. ”
• “But the world was full of many things Nakata couldn't hope to fathom, so he gave up thinking about it. With a brain like his, the only result he got from thinking too much was a headache.”
• “But he didn't carry this thought one step further and see himself in imminent peril.”
• “The concept of death was beyond his powers of imagination. And pain was something he wasn't aware of until he actually felt it. As an abstract concept pain didn't mean a thing. The upshot of this was he wasn't afraid, even with this monstrous dog staring him down. He was merely perplexed.”
• “clambering to his feet”
• “Silence descended on the room”
• “That's a colossal waste of time”
• “Like it was lying in wait for me, silence wraps itself around me tightly once I'm alone. ”
• “My mind's a little spacey from lack of sleep and my muscles ache from bouncing around in the car so long. I turn down the light on the lamp. The room dims as the shadows that fill the corners grow more intense.”
• “I close my eyes but can't fall asleep, my body dying for rest while my mind's wide awake.”
• “A bird occasionally breaks the silence of the night.”
• “And I feel like somebody's watching me. My skin smarts with the sense of eyes boring in on me. My heart beats out a hollow thump. Several times from inside the sleeping bag I open my eyes a slit and peer around the dimly lit room just to be sure no one else is there. The front door's bolted with that heavy bolt, and the thick curtains at the windows are shut tight”
• “But still I can't shake the feeling that I'm being watched. My throat's parched and I'm having trouble breathing. I need to drink some water, but if I do I'll need to take a leak and that means going outside. I have to hold on till morning. Curled up in my sleeping bag, I give a small shake of my head.”
• “I'm being tested, I tell myself. ”
• “That's what he meant by solitude comes in different varieties. Oshima knows exactly how I feel being here alone at night, because he's gone through the same thing, and felt the same emotions. This thought helps me relax a little. I feel like I can trace the shadows of the past that linger here and imagine myself as a part of it. I take a deep breath, and I fall asleep before I know it.”
• “When I pull back the curtains, every bit of last night's darkness has disappeared from around the cabin. Everything sparkles in a newborn golden glow.”
• “The morning light pours down through the tall trees onto the open space in front of the cabin, sunbeams everywhere and mist floating like freshly minted souls. The pure clean air pierces my lungs with each breath. I sit down on a porch step and watch the birds scudding from tree to tree, listening to their calls.”
• “I follow the sound of the water and find the stream right away, close by. Rocks form a kind of pool where the water flows in, swirling around in a maze of eddies before rushing back out to rejoin the stream. The water is clear and beautiful. I scoop some up to drink—it's cold and delicious—and then hold my hands in the current.”
• “Our responsibility begins with the power to imagine. It's just like Yeats said: In dreams begin responsibilities. Flip this around and you could say that where there's no power to imagine, no responsibility can arise.”
• “I try to picture Oshima sitting in this chair, his usual nicely sharpened pencil in hand, looking back over this book and writing down his impressions. In dreams begin responsibilities. The words hit home.”
• “But they counter with this: "It doesn't matter whose dream it started out as, you have the same dream. So you're responsible for whatever happens in the dream. That dream crept inside you, right down the dark corridor of your soul.”
• “Just like Adolf Eichmann, caught up—whether he liked it or not—in the twisted dreams of a man named Hitler.”
• “I search my memory.”
• “Like someone excitedly relating a story only to find the words petering out, the path gets narrower the farther I go, the undergrowth taking over. Beyond a certain point it's hard to tell if it's really a path or something that just vaguely resembles one.”
• “Just like Crow said, the world's filled with things I don't know about. All the plants and trees there, for instance. I'd never imagined that trees could be so weird and unearthly. I mean, the only plants I've ever really seen or touched till now are the city kind—neatly trimmed and cared-for bushes and trees. But the ones here—the ones living here—are totally different. They have a physical power, their breath grazing any humans who might chance by, their gaze zeroing in on the intruder like they've spotted their prey. Like they have some dark, prehistoric, magical powers. Like deep-sea creatures rule the ocean depths, in the forest trees reign supreme. If it wanted to, the forest could reject me—or swallow me up whole. A healthy amount of fear and respect might be a good idea.”
• “After a simple dinner I go out on the porch and gaze up at the stars twinkling above, the random scattering of millions of stars. Even in a planetarium you wouldn't find this many. Some of them look really big and distinct, like if you reached your hand out intently you could touch them. The whole thing is breathtaking. Not just beautiful, though—the stars are like the trees in the forest, alive and breathing. And they're watching me. What I've done up till now, what I'm going to do—they know it all. Nothing gets past their watchful eyes. As I sit there under the shining night sky, again a violent fear takes hold of me. My heart's pounding a mile a minute, and I can barely breathe. All these millions of stars looking down on me, and I've never given them more than a passing thought before. Not just stars—how many other things haven't I noticed in the world, things I know nothing about? I suddenly feel helpless, completely powerless. And I know I'll never outrun that awful feeling.”
• “He grew incensed at these uncertain elements that threw his elegant solution into disarray. ”
• “The fire bathes the room in an orange glow, and the pleasant warmth calms my tension and fear.”
• “I've got to get some sleep. A log topples over in the stove, an owl hoots outside. And I topple down into an indistinct dream.”
• “Sunlight shoots down through the branches like a spotlight illuminating the ground at my feet. The place feels special, somehow. I sit down in the sunlight and let the faint warmth wash over me, taking out a chocolate bar from my pocket and enjoying the sweet taste. Realizing all over again how important sunlight is to human beings, I appreciate each second of that precious light.”
• “The intense loneliness and helplessness I felt under those millions of stars has vanished.”
• “In the afternoon dark clouds suddenly color the sky a mysterious shade and it starts raining hard, pounding the roof and windows of the cabin. I strip naked and run outside, washing my face with soap and scrubbing myself all over. It feels wonderful. In my joy I shut my eyes and shout out meaningless words as the large raindrops strike me on the cheeks, the eyelids, chest, side, penis, legs, and butt—the stinging pain like a religious initiation or something. Along with the pain there's a feeling of closeness, like for once in my life the world's treating me fairly. I feel elated, as if all of a sudden I've been set free. I face the sky, hands held wide apart, open my mouth wide, and gulp down the falling rain.”
• “I want to hold on to that sensation a while longer.”
• “Once my routine's done, my mind's clear. The rain's stopped, the sun's starting to shine through breaks in the clouds, and the birds have started chirping again. But that calm won't last long, you know. It's like beasts that never tire, tracking you everywhere you go. They come out at you deep in the forest. They're tough, relentless, merciless, untiring, and they never give up. You might control yourself now, and not masturbate, but they'll get you in the end, as a wet dream. You might dream about raping your sister, your mother. It's not something you can control. It's a power beyond you—and all you can do is accept it. You're afraid of imagination. And even more afraid of dreams. Afraid of the responsibility that begins in dreams. But you have to sleep, and dreams are a part of sleep. When you're awake you can suppress imagination. But you can't suppress dreams.”
• “I yank off my headphones and listen. Silence, I discover, is something you can actually hear.”
• inert feel
• dilettante
• “make a flute so large it'll rival the universe”
• “All of this exceeded his limited powers of comprehension.”
• “pulling my thoughts together”
• “Once I get there, something will work out. I don't know why, but I just have a feeling it will. Fate seems to be taking me in some even stranger directions.”
• “I sit down beside him and stroke his large body for a while. The feel of his fur brings back memories. The cat narrows his eyes and starts to purr. We sit there on the stairs for a long time, each enjoying his own version of this intimate feeling.
• “I've always been impressed by your insights, and I find the worldview that runs through all of your publications very convincing—namely that as individuals each of us is extremely isolated, while at the same time we are all linked by a prototypical memory. There have been times in my own life that I felt exactly this way. From afar, then, I pray for your continued success.
• “It's a trite observation, perhaps, but it is true what they say—that time does fly—and I've found the passage of time to be incredibly swift.”
• “Twenty-eight years have passed, but to me it's as fresh in my mind as if it took place yesterday. Those memories are always with me, shadowing my every waking moment. I've spent countless sleepless nights pondering it all, and it's even haunted my dreams.”
• “It's as if the aftershocks of that incident affect every aspect of my life.”
• “Something as traumatic as that you'd think would have to have some lingering physical or psychological impact on all of us. I can't believe otherwise. But when it comes to pinpointing what sort of effects these were, and how great an impact it all had, I'm at a loss.”
• “Most things are forgotten over time. Even the war itself, the life-and-death struggle people went through, is now like something from the distant past. We're so caught up in our everyday lives that events of the past, like ancient stars that have burned out, are no longer in orbit around our minds. There are just too many things we have to think about every day, too many new things we have to learn. New styles, new information, new technology, new terminology... But still, no matter how much time passes, no matter what takes place in the interim, there are some things we can never assign to oblivion, memories we can never rub away. They remain with us forever, like a touchstone. And for me, what happened in the woods that day is one of these”
• “I could be candid about any private matter”
• “The dream was extremely realistic and sexually charged—one of those dreams that's so vivid it's hard to distinguish between dream and reality.”
• “My head was a complete blank, and I couldn't focus at all. ”
• “I was usually the type who suppressed those kinds of thoughts.”
• “A deep silence descended on the woods”
• “I was angry, afraid, embarrassed—all of these rolled into one.”
• “lose the sort of openness and sense of accomplishment they innately have”
• “dealt a fatal blow to whatever feelings had been budding inside him. I was hoping for an opportunity to repair the harm I'd caused, but circumstances dictated otherwise. ”
• “I can still see the look on his face as I was beating him. The tremendous fear and resignation he felt at that instant.”
• “To tell the truth, when my husband died in the Philippines just before the end of the war, it wasn't that much of a shock. I didn't feel any despair or anger—just a deep sense of helplessness. I didn't cry at all. ”
• “I'd accepted my husband's death as inevitable, as something fated to be. So news of his death merely confirmed what I already knew. The whole experience on the hill was beyond anything I've ever experienced. I feel like I left a part of my soul in those woods.”
• “This innocent rich boy finds himself crawling around in the dregs of society”
• “ut nothing in the novel shows he learned anything from these experiences, that his life changed, that he thought deeply now about the meaning of life or started questioning society or anything. You don't get any sense, either, that he's matured. You have a strange feeling after you finish the book. It's like you wonder what Soseki was trying to say. It's like not really knowing what he's getting at is the part that stays with you. I can't explain it very well.”
• “Sanshiro grows up in the story. Runs into obstacles, ponders things, overcomes difficulties, right? But the hero of The Miner's different. All he does is watch things happen and accept it all. I mean, occasionally he gives his own opinions, but nothing very deep. Instead, he just broods over his love affair. He comes out of the mine about the same as when he went in. He has no sense that it was something he decided to do himself, or that he had a choice. He's like totally passive. But I think in real life people are like that. It's not so easy to make choices on your own.”
• “But people need to cling to something," Oshima says. "They have to. You're doing the same, even though you don't realize it. It's like Goethe said: Everything's a metaphor." I mull this over for a while. Oshima takes a sip of coffee. "At any rate, that's an interesting take on The Miner.”
• “how should I put it?" Oshima begins, then uncharacteristically comes to a halt, searching for the right word. "A little different.”
• “She has a different take on things than other people”
• “She just isn't bound by conventional ways of doing things”
• “decide to hold off on any more questions. For the time being.
• “I go back to the reading room and pick up where I left off in Poppies. I'm not a fast reader. I like to linger over each sentence, enjoying the style. If I don't enjoy the writing, I stop. ”
• “drive through the twilit city streets”
• “Besides, when I die I want to die quietly, all by myself.”
• “Because playing Schubert's piano sonatas well is one of the hardest things in the world. Especially this, the Sonata in D Major. It's a tough piece to master. Some pianists can play one or maybe two of the movements perfectly, but if you listen to all four movements as a unified whole, no one has ever nailed it. A lot of famous pianists have tried to rise to the challenge, but it's like there's always something missing. “There's never one where you can say, Yes! He's got it! Do you know why?" "No," I reply. "Because the sonata itself is imperfect. Robert Schumann understood Schubert's sonatas well, and he labeled this one 'Heavenly Tedious.'" "If the composition's imperfect, why would so many pianists try to master it?" "Good question," Oshima says, and pauses as music fills in the silence. "I have no great explanation for it, but one thing I can say. Works that have a certain imperfection to them have an appeal for that very reason—or at least they appeal to certain types of people. Just like you're attracted to Soseki's The Miner. There's something in it that draws you in, more than more fully realized novels like Kokoro or Sanshiro. You discover something about that work that tugs at your heart—or maybe we should say the work discovers you. Schubert's Sonata in D Major is sort of the same thing.”
• “too long and too pastoral, and technically too simplistic. Play it through the way it is and it's flat and tasteless, some dusty antique. “Which is why every pianist who attempts it adds something of his own, something extra. Like this—hear how he articulates it there? Adding rubato. Adjusting the pace, modulation, whatever. Otherwise they can't hold it all together. They have to be careful, though, or else all those extra devices destroy the dignity of the piece. Then it's not Schubert's music anymore. Every single pianist who's played this sonata struggles with the same paradox.”
• “Like I said, it's because all the performances are imperfect. A dense, artistic kind of imperfection stimulates your consciousness, keeps you alert. If I listen to some utterly perfect performance of an utterly perfect piece while I'm driving, I might want to close my eyes and die right then and there. But listening to the D major, I can feel the limits of what humans are capable of—that a certain type of perfection can only be realized through a limitless accumulation of the imperfect. And personally, I find that encouraging. Do you know what I'm getting at?”
• “I'd have to say Brendel and Ashkenazy give the best performances, though they don't do anything for me emotionally. Schubert's music challenges and shatters the ways of the world. That's the essence of Romanticism, and Schubert's music is the epitome of the Romantic”
• “You can appreciate Schubert if you train yourself. I was the same way when I first listened to him—it bored me silly. It's only natural for someone your age. In time you'll appreciate it. People soon get tired of things that aren't boring, but not of what is boring. Go figure. For me, I might have the leisure to be bored, but not to grow tired of something. Most people can't distinguish between the two”
• “We fall silent, each of us filling in the silence with our own random thoughts. I gaze vacantly at the passing signs.”
• “But solitude comes in different varieties. What's waiting for you might be a little unexpected.”
• “His expression is fixed as he focuses on driving, lips tight, eyes riveted on a point up ahead in the darkness, right hand clutching the top of the wheel, left hand poised for action on the gearshift knob.”
• “I breathe a sigh of relief when the road finally cuts away from the bluffs and turns into a forest. Trees magically soar above us. Our headlights lick at the trunks, illuminating one after another. We've left the paved road behind, the tires squirting out pebbles that ricochet against the bottom of the car. The suspension dances up and down over the rough road. There's no moon out, no stars. A fine rain occasionally splashes against the windshield.”
• “with the engine off a heavy stillness falls over us. I hear a small stream nearby, the faint sound of water. High above us the wind rustles symbolically. I open the door and step outside. Patches of chill hang in the air.”
• “languidly rose to its feet”
• said bashfully
• “raised its head a fraction”
• “cats are creatures of habit. Usually they live very ordered lives, and unless something extraordinary happens they generally try to keep to their routine
• “seconds on toast don't seem likely to materialize”
• “traipsing off to the gym in the middle of the day”
• “I'm safe inside this container called me. With a little click, the outlines of this being—me—fit right inside and are locked neatly away. Just the way I like it. I'm where I belong.”
• The station's packed with people streaming in and out, all of them dressed in their favorite clothes, bags or briefcases in hand, each one dashing off to take care of some pressing business. I stare at this ceaseless, rushing crowd and imagine a time a hundred years from now. In a hundred years everybody here—me included—will have disappeared from the face of the earth and turned into ashes or dust. A weird thought, but everything in front of me starts to seem unreal, like a gust of wind could blow it all away.
• “I spread my hands out in front of me and take a good hard look at them. What am I always so tense about? Why this desperate struggle just to survive? I shake my head, turn from the window, clear my mind of thoughts of a hundred years away. I'll just think about now.
• “at a loss for words”
• “ Compared to those faceless hordes of people rushing through the train station, these crazy, preposterous stories of a thousand years ago are, at least to me, much more real. How that's possible, I don't know. It's pretty weird.”
• “The sky's covered with clouds, not a speck of blue in sight”
• “It takes me a while to gather my thoughts.”
• “that's his own device for explaining the kind of lives we lead”
• “I go back to the reading room, where I sink down in the sofa and into the world of The Arabian Nights. Slowly, like a movie fadeout, the real world evaporates. I'm alone, inside the world of the story. My favorite feeling in the world.”
• “this simple, centripetal life is blown to bits
• “he avoids vague statements, drawing a sharp distinction between facts and conjecture.”
• “surmised that something extraordinary had occurred”
• “In most cases their goals were strictly utilitarian, with no interest in pursuing truth in an academic sense, only arriving at conclusions that accorded with their preconceptions.”
• “He never tried to use the fact that we were civilians to lord it over us or conceal anything from us, as some might do”
• “gave us a detailed explanation about what had transpired”
• “accepted the premise that a poison gas had been dropped”
• “I broached the idea of it being a case of mass hypnosis ”
• “making it clear this was merely a conjecture. All I could do was speculate. My two colleagues generally concurred.
• “walked back to school under their own steam.”
• “She sidles up beside me ”
• “All the while, she's bathing me in a deep frown”
• “the chance didn't present itself often”
• “Totally blithe to it all”
• puzzling things out logically, after all, wasn't exactly his forte
• “The two of them were silent for a time, eel musings filling the passing moments”
• “meet a miserable end”
• “Nakata stored this information away in his head, carefully folding it all away in a front drawer so he wouldn't forget it. ”
• “The world was full of things Nakata couldn't comprehend”
• “Just a quiet early afternoon. Everything was at rest, placid, harmonious.”
• “Nakata was used to aimless waiting and spending time alone, doing nothing. He wasn't bothered in the least.”
• “Nakata let his body relax, switched off his mind, allowing things to flow through him. This was natural for him, something he'd done ever since he was a child, without a second thought. Before long the borders of his consciousness fluttered around, just like the butterflies. Beyond these borders lay a dark abyss. Occasionally his consciousness would fly over the border and hover over that dizzying, black crevass. But Nakata wasn't afraid of the darkness or how deep it was. And why should he be? That bottomless world of darkness, that weighty silence and chaos, was an old friend, a part of him already. Nakata understood this well. In that world there was no writing, no days of the week, no scary Governor, no opera, no BMWs. No scissors, no tall hats. On the other hand, there was also no delicious eel, no tasty bean-jam buns. Everything is there, but there are no parts. Since there are no parts, there's no need to replace one thing with another. No need to remove anything, or add anything. You don't have to think about difficult things, just let yourself soak it all in. For Nakata, nothing could be better.
• “This languid sensation spreads over my lower half, like a liquid floating to the surface.”
• “I go back to my sleeping bag and close my eyes. This time I can get to sleep. A deep, deep sleep, maybe the deepest since I ran away from home. It's like I'm in some huge elevator that slowly, silently carries me deeper and deeper underground. Finally all light has disappeared, all sound faded away.”
• devouring books
• you'd better absorb whatever you can while you've got the chance. Become like a sheet of blotting paper and soak it all in. Later on you can figure out what to keep and what to unload
• My brain like a sponge, I focused on every word said in class and let it all sink in, figured out what it meant, and committed everything to memory. ”
• “Sometimes the wall I've erected around me comes crumbling down. It doesn't happen very often, but sometimes, before I even realize what's going on, there I am—naked and defenseless and totally confused. At times like that I always feel an omen calling out to me, like a dark, omnipresent pool of water. A dark, omnipresent pool of water. It was probably always there, hidden away somewhere. But when the time comes it silently rushes out, chilling every cell in your body. You drown in that cruel flood, gasping for breath. You cling to a vent near the ceiling, struggling, but the air you manage to breathe is dry and burns your throat. Water and thirst, cold and heat—these supposedly opposite elements combine to assault you. The world is a huge space, but the space that will take you in—and it doesn't have to be very big—is nowhere to be found. You seek a voice, but what do you get? Silence. You look for silence, but guess what? All you hear over and over and over is the voice of this omen. And sometimes this prophetic voice pushes a secret switch hidden deep inside your brain. “Your heart is like a great river after a long spell of rain, spilling over its banks. All signposts that once stood on the ground are gone, inundated and carried away by that rush of water. And still the rain beats down on the surface of the river. Every time you see a flood like that on the news you tell yourself: That's it. That's my heart.”
• “No sooner do I settle down than my consciousness, like a battery that's lost its charge, starts to fade away, and I fall asleep.
• “Sometime in the middle of the night a hard rain begins to fall. I wake up every once in a while, part the chintzy curtain at the window, and gaze out at the highway rushing by. Raindrops beat against the glass, blurring streetlights alongside the road that stretch off into the distance at identical intervals like they were set down to measure the earth. A new light rushes up close and in an instant fades off behind us.”
• “The war seemed like something in a faraway land that had nothing to do with us”
• “It's nearly dawn when I wake up. I draw the curtain back and take a look. It must have just stopped raining, since everything is still wet and drippy. Clouds to the east are sharply etched against the sky, each one framed by light. The sky looks ominous one minute, inviting the next. It all depends on the angle.
• “The bus plows down the highway at a set speed, the tires humming along, never getting any louder or softer. Same with the engine, its monotonous sound like a mortar smoothly grinding down time and the consciousness of the people on board. The other passengers are all sunk back in their seats, asleep, their curtains drawn tight.”
• “I must have busted a hole in my brain trying to remember. ”
• “picking up her ham sandwich and taking an uninspired bite, washing it down with a sip of coffee.”
• “In traveling, a companion, in life, compassion - “chance encounters are what keep us going”
• “I stare at her chest. As she breathes, the rounded peaks move up and down like the swell of waves, somehow reminding me of rain falling softly on a broad stretch of sea. I'm the lonely voyager standing on deck, and she's the sea. The sky is a blanket of gray, merging with the gray sea off on the horizon. It's hard to tell the difference between sea and sky. Between voyager and sea. Between reality and the workings of the heart.”
• “He has a calm manner but is very brisk and concise and says exactly what's on his mind. Behind his glasses his eyes have a very sharp, alert look, and his memory seems reliable.
• “It was a bracing scent, the fragrance of trees. ”
• “That we couldn't explain. But mistakes are part of life, and some things we aren't meant to understand, I suppose.
• “The whole thing was an odd, unpleasant affair. Even to this day it's like a weight pressing down on me.
• “ Becoming a different person might be hard, but taking on a different name is a cinch.”
• 'Even chance meetings'...how does the rest of that go?" "'Are the result of karma.' “That things in life are fated by our previous lives. That even in the smallest events there's no such thing as coincidence.
• “confronted with noodles like nothing I've ever seen
• “I'm happily stuffed. Afterward I plop myself down on a bench in the plaza next to the station and gaze up at the sunny sky. I'm free, I remind myself. Like the clouds floating across the sky, I'm all by myself, totally free.
• “forged on to the very last page”
• “For some reason that photo really stayed with me, and I wanted to see this in person if someday the chance came along.”
• “I press my face against the window, drinking in the unfamiliar sights.”
• “All of a sudden the air feels thin and something heavy is bearing down on my chest. Am I really doing the right thing? The thought makes me feel helpless, isolated.
• “A river winding through a flat stretch of land looks cool and inviting”
• “Watching this scenery makes me feel warm and calm all over again. You're going to be okay, I tell myself, taking a deep breath. All you can do is forge on ahead.
• “I go into the high-ceilinged stacks and wander among the shelves, searching for a book that looks interesting. Magnificent thick beams run across the ceiling of the room, and gentle early-summer sunlight is shining through the open window, the chatter of birds in the garden filtering in.
• “When I open them, most of the books have the smell of an earlier time leaking out between the pages—a special odor of the knowledge and emotions that for ages have been calmly resting between the covers. Breathing it in, I glance through a few pages before returning each book to its shelf.”
• “I've been meaning to read this book.
• “As I relax on the sofa and gaze around the room a thought hits me: This is exactly the place I've been looking for forever. A little hideaway in some sinkhole somewhere. I'd always thought of it as a secret, imaginary place, and can barely believe that it actually exists. I close my eyes and take a breath, and like a gentle cloud the wonder of it all settles over me.
• “According to Aristophanes in Plato's Symposium, in the ancient world of myth there were three types of people," Oshima says. "Have you heard about this?" "No." "In ancient times people weren't just male or female, but one of three types: male/male, male/female, or female/female. In other words, each person was made out of the components of two people. Everyone was happy with this arrangement and never really gave it much thought. But then God took a knife and cut everybody in half, right down the middle. So after that the world was divided just into male and female, the upshot being that people spend their time running around trying to locate their missing other half.” ... “Anyway, my point is that it's really hard for people to live their lives alone.”
• “my mind wanders away from the book. Male/male, male/female, and female/female?”
• “Her long hair is loosely tied back, her face very refined and intelligent looking, with beautiful eyes and a shadowy smile playing over her lips, a smile whose sense of completeness is indescribable. It reminds me of a small, sunny spot, the special patch of sunlight you find only in some remote, secluded place. My house back in Tokyo has one just like that in the garden, and ever since I was little I loved that bright little spot. She makes a strong impression on me, making me feel wistful and nostalgic.”
• “The wife keeps up a one-sided conversation, her husband just grunting out a monosyllable every once in a while to let her know he's still alive. Other than that, he gives the occasional nod to show he's properly impressed or else mutters some fragmentary comment I can't catch.”
• “But at the time, he was an unknown, so perhaps it couldn't be helped. There are many things we only see clearly in retrospect.”
• “When he built this library, the head of the family decided not to follow the simple and elegant style favored by artists in Kyoto, instead choosing a design more like a rustic dwelling. Still, as you can see, in contrast to the bold structure of the building, the furnishings and picture frames are quite elaborate and luxurious. The carving of these wooden panels, for instance, is very elegant. All the finest master craftsmen in Shikoku were assembled to work on the construction."
• “the horizon's faintly visible between the trees.
• “I watch how she carries herself, every motion natural and elegant. I can't express it well, but there's definitely something special about it ”
• “Everything goes smooth as silk, business as usual.”
• “The room is minuscule, outfitted with an uninviting bed, a rock-hard pillow, a miniature excuse for a desk, a tiny TV, sun-bleached curtains.”
• acclimatize myself to the surroundings.
• I'm free, I think. I shut my eyes and think hard and deep about how free I am, but I can't really understand what it means. All I know is I'm totally alone. All alone in an unfamiliar place, like some solitary explorer who's lost his compass and his map. Is this what it means to be free? I don't know, and I give up thinking about it.
• charming, offbeat library
• I shove the phone back in the pocket of my backpack, turn off the light, and close my eyes. I don't dream. Come to think of it, I haven't had any dreams in a long time.
• ruse
• Oshima lightly taps the eraser end of a pencil against his temple a couple of times. The phone rings, but he ignores it. / "Every one of us is losing something precious to us," he says after the phone stops ringing. "Lost opportunities, lost possibilities, feelings we can never get back again. That's part of what it means to be alive. But inside our heads -- at least that's where I imagine it -- there's a little room where we store those memories. A room like the stacks in this library. And to understand the workings of our own heart we have to keep on making new reference cards. We have to dust things off every once in a while, let in fresh air, change the water in the flower vases. In other words, you'll live forever in your own private library." / I stare at the pencil in his hand. It pains me to look at it, but I have to be the world's toughest fifteen-year-old, at least for a while longer. Or pretend to be. I take a deep breath, fill my lungs with air, and manage to inhale that lump of emotion.
• "That would be great," Hoshino said (to Toro, a black cat). "Take a paws in your schedule, huh?"
• "There's another world that parallels our own, and to a certain degree you're able to step into that other world and come back safely. As long as you're careful. But go past a certain point and you'll lose the path out. It's a labyrinth. Do you know where the idea of a labyrinth first came from?" I shake my head. "It was the ancient Mesopotamians. They pulled out animal intestines -- sometimes human intestines, I expect -- and used the shape to predict the future. They admired the complex shape of intestines. So the prototype for labyrinths is, in a word, guts. Which means that the principle for the labyrinth is inside you. And that correlates to the labyrinth outside." "Another metaphor," I comment. "That's right, a reciprocal metaphor. Things outside you are projections of what's inside you, and what's inside you is a projection of what's outside. So when you step into the labyrinth outside you, at the same time you're stepping into the labyrinth inside. Most definitely a risky business." "Sort of like Hansel and Gretel." "Right -- just like them."
• He sits down on a corner of the counter, puts the tiniest lump of sugar into his coffee cup, then carefully stirs it with a spoon. "So you like the song?" / "Yeah, a lot." / "I'm fond of it myself. It's a lovely tune, quite unique. Simple yet deep. It tells you a lot about the person who composed it." / "The lyrics, though, are pretty symbolic," I venture. / "From time immemorial, symbolism and poetry have been inseparable. Like a pirate and his rum." / "Do you think Miss Saeki knew what all the lyrics mean?" / Oshima looks up, listening to the thunder as if calculating how far away it is. He turns to me and shakes his head. "Not necessarily. Symbolism and meaning are two separate things. I think she found the right words by bypassing procedures like meaning and logic. She captured words in a dream, like delicately catching hold of a butterfly's wings as it flutters around. Artists are those who can evade the verbose." / "So you're saying Miss Saeki maybe found those words in some other space -- like in dreams?" / "Most great poetry is like that. If the words can't create a prophetic tunnel connecting them to the reader, then the whole thing no longer functions as a poem."
• “I'll think about that when the time comes," I say. "When the time comes," Crow repeats, as if weighing these words in his hand.”
• “Sometimes fate is like a small sandstorm that keeps changing directions," Crow says./ Sometimes fate is like a small sandstorm that keeps changing directions. You change direction but the sandstorm chases you. You turn again, but the storm adjusts. / Over and over you play this out, like some ominous dance with death just before dawn. / Why? Because this storm isn't something that blew in from far away, something that has nothing to do with you. This storm is you. Something inside ”“of you. So all you can do is give in to it, step right inside the storm, closing your eyes and plugging up your ears so the sand doesn't get in, and walk through it, step by step. There's no sun there, no moon, no direction, no sense of time. Just fine white sand swirling up into the sky like pulverized bones. That's the kind of sandstorm you need to imagine. / And that's exactly what I do. I imagine a white funnel stretching up vertically like a thick rope. My eyes are closed tight, hands cupped over my ears, so those fine grains of sand can't blow inside me. The sandstorm draws steadily closer. I can feel the air pressing on my skin. It really is going to swallow me up.
• I just want to sink off into sleep like this
• And you really will have to make it through that violent, metaphysical, symbolic storm. No matter how metaphysical or symbolic it might be, make no mistake about it: it will cut through flesh like a thousand razor blades. People will bleed there, and you will bleed too. Hot, red blood. You'll catch that blood in your hands, your own blood and the blood of others. / And once the storm is over you won't remember how you made it through, how you managed to survive. You won't even be sure, in fact, whether the storm is really over. But one thing is certain. When you come out of the storm you won't be the same person who walked in. That's what this storm's all about.