“When they fall in love with a city it is for forever. As though there
never was a time when they didn't love it. The minute they arrive at the
train station or get off the ferry and glimpse the wide streets and the
wasteful lamps lighting them, they know they are born for it. There, in
a city, they are not so much new as themselves, their stronger, riskier
selves. And in the beginning when they first arrive, and twenty years
later when they and the city have grown up, they love that part of
themselvers so much they forget what loving other people was like - if
they ever knew, that is.”
“Pain. I seem to have an affection, a kind of sweettooth for it. Bolts
of lightning, little rivulets of thunder. And I the eye of the storm.
Mourning the split trees, hens starving on rooftops. Figuring out what
can be done to save them since they cannot save themselves without me
because- well, its my storm, isn’t it? I break lives to prove I can mend
them back again. And although the pain is theirs, I share it, don’t I?
Of course. Of course. I wouldn't have it any other way. But it is
another way. I am uneasy now. Feeling a bit false. What, I wonder, what
would I be without a few brilliant spots of blood to ponder? Without
aching words that set, then miss, the mark?”
“Whatever happens, whether you get rich or stay poor, ruin your health or live to old age, you always end up back where you started: hungry for the one thing everybody loses - young loving.”
“I told you again that you were the reason Adam ate the apple and its
core. That when he left Eden, he left a rich man. Not only did he have
Eve, but he had the taste of the first apple in the world in his mouth
for the rest of his life.”
“I laughed but before I could agree with the hairdressers that she was
crazy, she said, 'What's the world for if you can't make it up the way
you want it?'
" 'The way I want it?'
" 'Yeah. The way you want it. Don't you want it to be something more than what it is?'
" 'What'st eh point? I can't change it.'
" 'That's the point. If you don't, it will change you and it'll be your fault cause you let it. I let it. And messed up my life.'
" 'Mess it up how?'
" 'Forgot it.'
" 'Forgot?'
" 'Forgot it was mine. My life. I just ran up and down the streets wishing I was somebody else.”
" 'The way I want it?'
" 'Yeah. The way you want it. Don't you want it to be something more than what it is?'
" 'What'st eh point? I can't change it.'
" 'That's the point. If you don't, it will change you and it'll be your fault cause you let it. I let it. And messed up my life.'
" 'Mess it up how?'
" 'Forgot it.'
" 'Forgot?'
" 'Forgot it was mine. My life. I just ran up and down the streets wishing I was somebody else.”
Word Chimes
