Desire

Passages

Every passage tagged with this emotion in the Vela corpus. Search the body text, narrow by source or register, click through to a book’s profile to see how the passage sits with the rest of the work.

Page 11 of 344 · 20 per page

• From Tropic of Cancer (1934)

  Unwittingly, I say, because Claude was the last person in the world who would consciously create such an image in one’s mind. She was too delicate, too sensitive for that. At bottom, Claude was just a good French girl of average breed and intelligence whom life had tricked somehow; something in her there was which was not tough enough to withstand the shock of daily experience. For her were meant those terrible words of Louis-Philippe, “and a night comes when all is over, when so many jaws have closed upon us that we no longer have the strength to stand, and our meat hangs upon our bodies, as though it had been masticated by every mouth.” Germaine, on the other hand, was a whore from the cradle; she was thoroughly satisfied with her role, enjoyed it in fact, except when her stomach pinched or her shoes gave out, little surface things of no account, nothing that ate into her soul, nothing that created torment. Ennui! That was the worst she ever felt. Days there were, no doubt, when she had a bellyful, as we say—but no more than that! Most of the time she enjoyed it—or gave the illusion of enjoying it. It made a difference of course, whom she went with—or came with. But the principal thing was a man. A man! That was what she craved. A man with something between his legs that could tickle her, that could make her writhe in ecstasy, make her grab that bushy twat of hers with both hands and rub it joyfully, boastfully, proudly, with a sense of connection, a sense of life. That was the only place where she experienced any life—down there where she clutched herself with both hands. Germaine was a whore all the way through, even down to her good heart, her whore’s heart which is not really a good heart but a lazy one, an indifferent, flaccid heart that can be touched for a moment, a heart without reference to any fixed point within, a big, flaccid whore’s heart that can detach itself for a moment from its true center. However vile and circumscribed was that world which she had created for herself, nevertheless she functioned in it superbly. And that in itself is a tonic thing. When, after we had become well acquainted, her companions would twit me, saying that I was in love with Germaine (a situation almost inconceivable to them), I would say: “Sure! Sure, I’m in love with her!

• From The Girls (2016)

  2 Cha ching, the slot machine in Connie’s garage went, like a cartoon, Peter’s features soaked in its rosy glow. He was eighteen, Connie’s older brother, and his forearms were the color of toast. His friend Henry hovered at his side. Connie decided she had a crush on Henry, so our Friday night would be devoted to perching on the weight-lifting bench, Henry’s orange motorcycle parked beside us like a prize pony. We’d watch the boys play the slot machine, drinking the off-brand beer Connie’s father kept in the garage fridge. Later they’d shoot the empty bottles with a BB gun, crowing at each glassy burst. I knew I’d see Peter that night, so I’d worn an embroidered shirt, my hair foul with hairspray. I’d dotted a pimple on my jaw with a beige putty of Merle Norman, but it collected along the rim and made it glow. As long as my hair stayed in place, I looked nice, or at least I thought so, and I tucked in my shirt to show the tops of my small breasts, the artificial press of cleavage from my bra. The feeling of exposure gave me an anxious pleasure that made me stand straighter, holding my head on my neck like an egg in a cup. Trying to be more like the black-haired girl in the park, that easy cast of her face. Connie narrowed her eyes when she saw me, a muscle by her mouth twitching, but she didn’t say anything. — Peter had really only spoken to me for the first time two weeks before. I’d been waiting for Connie downstairs. Her bedroom was much smaller than mine, her house meaner, but we spent most of our time there. The house done up in a maritime theme, her father’s misguided attempt to approximate female decoration. I felt bad for Connie’s father: his night job at a dairy plant, the arthritic hands he clenched and unclenched nervously. Connie’s mother lived somewhere in New Mexico, near a hot spring, had twin boys and another life no one ever spoke of. For

• From Tropic of Cancer (1934)

  I want to look at you!” But Fanny is laughing, squirming with laughter. There is something inside her, tickling and tickling. She’ll die laughing if she doesn’t find it. “Fanny, the trunk is full of beautiful things. Fanny, do you hear me?” Fanny is laughing, laughing like a fat worm. Her belly is swollen with laughter. Her legs are getting blue. “O God, Morris, there is something tickling me. … I can’t help it!” Sunday! Left the Villa Borghese a little before noon, just as Boris was getting ready to sit down to lunch. I left out of a sense of delicacy, because it really pains Boris to see me sitting there in the studio with an empty belly. Why he doesn’t invite me to lunch with him I don’t know. He says he can’t afford it, but that’s no excuse. Anyway, I’m delicate about it. If it pains him to eat alone in my presence it would probably pain him more to share his meal with me. It’s not my place to pry into his secret affairs. Dropped in at the Cronstadts’ and they were eating too. A young chicken with wild rice. Pretended that I had eaten already, but I could have torn the chicken from the baby’s hands. This is not just false modesty—it’s a kind of perversion, I’m thinking. Twice they asked me if I wouldn’t join them. No! No! Wouldn’t even accept a cup of coffee after the meal. I’m delicat , I am! On the way out I cast a lingering glance at the bones lying on the baby’s plate—there was still meat on them. Prowling around aimlessly. A beautiful day—so far. The Rue de Buci is alive, crawling. The bars wide open and the curbs lined with bicycles. All the meat and vegetable markets are in full swing. Arms loaded with truck bandaged in newspapers. A fine Catholic Sunday—in the morning, at least. High noon and here I am standing on an empty belly at the confluence of all these crooked lanes that reek with the odor of food. Opposite me is the Hôtel de Louisiane. A grim old hostelry known to the bad boys of the Rue de Buci in the good old days. Hotels and food, and I’m walking about like a leper with crabs gnawing at my entrails. On Sunday mornings there’s a fever in the streets. Nothing like it anywhere, except perhaps on the East Side, or down around Chatham Square. The Rue de l’Echaudé is seething. The streets twist and turn, at every angle a fresh hive of activity. Long queues of people with vegetables under their arms, turning in here and there with crisp, sparkling appetites. Nothing but food, food, food. Makes one delirious. Pass the Square de Furstenberg. Looks different now. at high noon. The other night when I passed by it was deserted, bleak, spectral. In the middle of the square four black trees that have not yet begun to blossom.

• From Tropic of Cancer (1934)

  She insisted on going home, said she had an apartment to herself—and besides she had to look after her mother. On reflection I decided that it would be still cheaper sleeping at her place, so I said yes and let’s go immediately. Before going, however, I decided it was best to let her know just how I stood, so that there wouldn’t be any squawking at the last minute. I thought she was going to faint when I told her how much I had in my pocket. “The likes of it!” she said. Highly insulted she was. I thought there would be a scene. … Undaunted, however, I stood my ground. “Very well, then, I’ll leave you,” I said quietly. “Perhaps I’ve made a mistake.” “I should say you have!” she exclaimed, but clutching me by the sleeve at the same time. “Ecoute, chéri… sois raisonnable!” When I heard that all my confidence was restored. I knew that it would be merely a question of promising her a little extra and everything would be O.K. “All right,” I said wearily, “I’ll be nice to you, you’ll see.” “You were lying to me, then?” she said. “Yes,” I smiled, “I was just lying. …” Before I had even put my hat on she had hailed a cab. I heard her give the Boulevard de Clichy for an address. That was more than the price of room, I thought to myself. Oh well, there was time yet… we’d see. I don’t know how it started any more but soon she was raving to me about Henry Bordeaux. I have yet to meet a whore who doesn’t know of Henry Bordeaux! But this one was genuinely inspired; her language was beautiful now, so tender, so discerning, that I was debating how much to give her. It seemed to me that I had heard her say—“quand il n’y aura plus de temps.” It sounded like that, anyway. In the state I was in, a phrase like that was worth a hundred francs. I wondered if it was her own or if she had pulled it from Henry Bordeaux. Little matter. It was just the right phrase with which to roll up to the foot of Montmartre. “Good evening, mother,” I was saying to myself, “daughter and I will look after you—quand il n’y aura plus de temps !” She was going to show me her diploma, too, I remembered that. She was all aflutter, once the door had closed behind us. Distracted. Wringing her hands and striking Sarah Bernhardt poses, half undressed too, and pausing between times to urge me to hurry, to get undressed, to do this and do that. Finally, when she had stripped down and was poking about with a chemise in her hand, searching for her kimono, I caught hold of her and gave her a good squeeze. She had a look of anguish on her face when I released her. “My God! My God!

• From Tropic of Cancer (1934)

  Perhaps it wasn’t so pleasant to smell that boozy breath of hers, that breath compounded of weak coffee, cognac, apéritifs , Pernods and all the other stuff she guzzled between times, what to warm herself and what to summon up strength and courage, but the fire of it penetrated her, it glowed down there between her legs where women ought to glow, and there was established that circuit which makes one feel the earth under his legs again. When she lay there with her legs apart and moaning, even if she did moan that way for any and everybody, it was good, it was a proper show of feeling. She didn’t stare up at the ceiling with a vacant look or count the bedbugs on the wallpaper; she kept her mind on her business, she talked about the things a man wants to hear when he’s climbing over a woman. Whereas Claude—well, with Claude there was always a certain delicacy, even when she got under the sheets with you. And her delicacy offended. Who wants a delicate whore! Claude would even ask you to turn your face away when she squatted over the bidet . All wrong! A man, when he’s burning up with passion, wants to see things; he wants to see everything , even how they make water. And while it’s all very nice to know that a woman has a mind, literature coming from the cold corpse of a whore is the last thing to be served in bed. Germaine had the right idea: she was ignorant and lusty, she put her heart and soul into her work. She was a whore all the way through—and that was her virtue! Easter came in like a frozen hare—but it was fairly warm in bed. Today it is lovely again and along the Champs-Elysées at twilight it is like an outdoor seraglio choked with dark-eyed houris. The trees are in full foliage and of a verdure so pure, so rich, that it seems as though they were still wet and glistening with dew. From the Palais du Louvre to the Etoile it is like a piece of music for the pianoforte. For five days I have not touched the typewriter nor looked at a book; nor have I had a single idea in my head except to go to the American Express. At nine this morning I was there, just as the doors were being opened, and again at one o’clock. No news. At four-thirty I dash out of the hotel, resolved to make a last-minute stab at it. Just as I turn the corner I brush against Walter Pach. Since he doesn’t recognize me, and since I have nothing to say to him, I make no attempt to arrest him. Later, when I am stretching my legs in the Tuileries his figure reverts to mind. He was a little stooped, pensive, with a sort of serene yet reserved smile on his face.

• From Tropic of Cancer (1934)

  What are you going to do this evening? Tell me the truth, my little one. … I am sorry that I have such an ugly temper.” He kisses her timidly, just like a little bunny with long pink ears; gives her a little peck on the lips as if he were nibbling a cabbage leaf. And at the same time his bright round eyes fall caressingly on her purse which is lying open beside her on the bench. He is only waiting for the moment when he can graciously give her the slip; he is itching to get away, to sit down in some quiet café on the Rue du Faubourg Montmartre. I know him, the innocent little devil, with his round, frightened eyes of a rabbit. And I know what a devil’s street is the Faubourg Montmartre with its brass plates and rubber goods, the lights twinkling all night and sex running through the street like a sewer. To walk from the Rue Lafayette to the boulevard is like running the gauntlet; they attach themselves to you like barnacles, they eat into you like ants, they coax, wheedle, cajole, implore, beseech, they try it out in German, English, Spanish, they show you their torn hearts and their busted shoes, and long after you’ve chopped the tentacles away, long after the fizz and sizzle has died out, the fragrance of the lavabo clings to your nostrils—it is the odor of the Parfum de Danse whose effectiveness is guaranteed only for a distance of twenty centimeters. One could piss away a whole lifetime in that little stretch between the boulevard and the Rue Lafayette. Every bar is alive, throbbing, the dice loaded; the cashiers are perched like vultures on their high stools and the money they handle has a human stink to it. There is no equivalent in the Banque de France for the blood money that passes currency here, the money that glistens with human sweat, that passes like a forest fire from hand to hand and leaves behind it a smoke and stench. A man who can walk through the Faubourg Montmartre at night without panting or sweating, without a prayer or a curse on his lips, a man like that has no balls, and if he has, then he ought to be castrated. Supposing the timid little rabbit does spend fifty francs of an evening while waiting for his Lucienne? Supposing he does get hungry and buy a sandwich and a glass of beer, or stop and chat with somebody else’s trollop? You think he ought to be weary of that round night after night? You think it ought to weigh on him, oppress him, bore him to death? You don’t think that a pimp is inhuman, I hope? A pimp has his private grief and misery too, don’t you forget. Perhaps he would like nothing better than to stand on the corner every night with a pair of white dogs and watch them piddle.

• From Tropic of Cancer (1934)

  Mallarmé sounds like a sirloin steak, Victor Hugo like foie de veau . Elsa is ordering a delicate little lunch for Boris—“a nice juicy little pork chop,” she says. I see a whole flock of pink hams lying cold on the marble, wonderful hams cushioned in white fat. I have a terrific hunger though we’ve only had breakfast a few minutes ago—it’s the lunch that I’ll have to skip. It’s only Wednesdays that I eat lunch, thanks to Borowski. Elsa is still telephoning—she forgot to order a piece of bacon. “Yes, a nice little piece of bacon, not too fatty,” she says… Zut alors! Throw in some sweetbreads, throw in some mountain oysters and some psst clams! Throw in some fried liverwurst while you’re at it; I could gobble up the fifteen hundred plays of Lope de Vega in one sitting. It is a beautiful woman who has come to look at the apartment. An American, of course. I stand at the window with my back to her watching a sparrow pecking at a fresh turd. Amazing how easily the sparrow is provided for. It is raining a bit and the drops are very big. I used to think a bird couldn’t fly if its wings got wet. Amazing how these rich dames come to Paris and find all the swell studios. A little talent and a big purse. If it rains they have a chance to display their brand new slickers. Food is nothing: sometimes they’re so busy gadding about that they haven’t time for lunch. Just a little sandwich, a wafer, at the Café de la Paix or the Ritz Bar. “For the daughters of gentlefolk only”—that’s what it says at the old studio of Puvis de Chavannes. Happened to pass there the other day. Rich American cunts with paint boxes slung over their shoulders. A little talent and a fat purse. The sparrow is hopping frantically from one cobblestone to another. Truly herculean efforts, if you stop to examine closely. Everywhere there is food lying about—in the gutter, I mean. The beautiful American woman is inquiring about the toilet. The toilet! Let me show you, you velvet-snooted gazelle! The toilet, you say? Par ici, Madame. N’oubliez pas que les places numérotées sont réservées aux mutilés de la guerre . Boris is rubbing his hands—he is putting the finishing touches to the deal. The dogs are barking in the courtyard; they bark like wolves. Upstairs Mrs. Melverness is moving the furniture around. She had nothing to do all day, she’s bored; if she finds a crumb of dirt anywhere she cleans the whole house. There’s a bunch of green grapes on the table and a bottle of wine—vin de choix , ten degrees. “Yes,” says Boris. “I could make a washstand for you, just come here, please. Yes, this is the toilet. There is one upstairs too, of course. Yes, a thousand francs a month. You don’t care much for Utrillo, you say? No, this is it.

• From Tropic of Cancer (1934)

  I’ll do it for little Murray—because he’s a genius, that kid.” I should like to be there when Fanny opens the trunk. “See, Fanny, this is what I bought in Budapest from an old Jew. … This is what they wear in Bulgaria—it’s pure wool. … This belonged to the Duke of something or other—no, you don’t wind it, you put it in the sun. … This I want you to wear, Fanny, when we go to the Opera… wear it with that comb I showed you. … And this, Fanny, is something Tania picked up for me… she’s a little bit on your type. …” And Fanny is sitting there on the settee, just as she was in the oleograph, with Moe on one side of her and little Murray, Murray the genius, on the other. Her fat legs are a little too short to reach the floor. Her eyes have a dull permanganate glow. Breasts like ripe red cabbage; they bobble a little when she leans forward. But the sad thing about her is that the juice has been cut off. She sits there like a dead storage battery; her face is out of plumb—it needs a little animation, a sudden spurt of juice to bring it back into focus. Moldorf is jumping around in front of her like a fat toad. His flesh quivers. He slips and it is difficult for him to roll over again on his belly. She prods him with her thick toes. His eyes protrude a little further. “Kick me again, Fanny, that was good.” She gives him a good prod this time—it leaves a permanent dent in his paunch. His face is close to the carpet; the wattles are joggling in the nap of the rug. He livens up a bit, flips around, springs from furniture to furniture. “Fanny, you are marvelous!” He is sitting now on her shoulder. He bites a little piece from her ear, just a little tip from the lobe where it doesn’t hurt. But she’s still dead—all storage battery and no juice. He falls on her lap and lies there quivering like a toothache. He is all warm now and helpless. His belly glistens like a patent-leather shoe. In the sockets of his eyes a pair of fancy vest buttons. “Unbutton my eyes, Fanny, I want to see you better!” Fanny carries him to bed and drops a little hot wax over his eyes. She puts rings around his navel and a thermometer up his ass. She places him and he quivers again. Suddenly he’s dwindled, shrunk completely out of sight. She searches all over for him, in her intestines, everywhere. Something is tickling her—she doesn’t know where exactly. The bed is full of toads and fancy vest buttons. “Fanny, where are you?” Something is tickling her—she can’t say where. The buttons are dropping off the bed. The toads are climbing the walls. A tickling and a tickling. “Fanny, take the wax out of my eyes!

• From Tropic of Cancer (1934)

  High noon and here I am standing on an empty belly at the confluence of all these crooked lanes that reek with the odor of food. Opposite me is the Hôtel de Louisiane. A grim old hostelry known to the bad boys of the Rue de Buci in the good old days. Hotels and food, and I’m walking about like a leper with crabs gnawing at my entrails. On Sunday mornings there’s a fever in the streets. Nothing like it anywhere, except perhaps on the East Side, or down around Chatham Square. The Rue de l’Echaudé is seething. The streets twist and turn, at every angle a fresh hive of activity. Long queues of people with vegetables under their arms, turning in here and there with crisp, sparkling appetites. Nothing but food, food, food. Makes one delirious. Pass the Square de Furstenberg. Looks different now. at high noon. The other night when I passed by it was deserted, bleak, spectral. In the middle of the square four black trees that have not yet begun to blossom. Intellectual trees, nourished by the paving stones. Like T. S. Eliot’s verse. Here, by God, if Marie Laurencin ever brought her Lesbians out into the open, would be the place for them to commune. Très lesbienne ici. Sterile, hybrid, dry as Boris’ heart. In the little garden adjoining the Eglise St. Germain are a few dismounted gargoyles. Monsters that jut forward with a terrifying plunge. On the benches other monsters—old people, idiots, cripples, epileptics. Snoozing there quietly, waiting for the dinner bell to ring. At the Galerie Zak across the way some imbecile has made a picture of the cosmos—on the flat. A painter’s cosmos! Full of odds and ends, bric-a-bric. In the lower left-hand corner, however, there’s an anchor—and a dinner bell. Salute! Salute! O Cosmos! Still prowling around. Mid afternoon. Guts rattling. Beginning to rain now. Notre-Dame rises tomblike from the water. The gargoyles lean far out over the lace façade. They hang there like an idée fixe in the mind of a monomaniac. An old man with yellow whiskers approaches me. Has some Jaworski nonsense in his hand. Comes up to me with his head thrown back and the rain splashing in his face turns the golden sands to mud. Bookstore with some of Raoul Dufy’s drawings in the window. Drawings of charwomen with rosebushes between their legs. A treatise on the philosophy of Joan Miró. The philosophy, mind you! In the same window: A Man Cut In Slices! Chapter one: the man in the eyes of his family. Chapter two: the same in the eyes of his mistress. Chapter three:— No chapter three. Have to come back tomorrow for chapters three and four. Every day the window trimmer turns a fresh page. A man cut in slices. ... You can’t imagine how furious I am not to have thought of a title like that!

• From Tropic of Cancer (1934)

  In fact, I think you’d like her. With you it’s different. You don’t have to fuck her. You can afford to like her. Maybe you wouldn’t like all those dresses and the bottles and what not, but you could be tolerant. She wouldn’t bore you, that I can tell you. She’s even interesting, I might say. But she’s withered. Her breasts are all right yet—but her arms! I told her I’d bring you around some day. I talked a lot about you. … I didn’t know what to say to her. Maybe you’d like her, especially when she’s dressed. I don’t know. …” “Listen, she’s rich, you say? I’ll like her! I don’t care how old she is, so long as she’s not a hag. …” “She’s not a hag! What are you talking about? She’s charming, I tell you. She talks well. She looks well too… only her arms. …” “All right, if that’s how it is, I’ll fuck her—if you don’t want to. Tell her that. Be subtle about it, though. With a woman like that you’ve got to do things slowly. You bring me around and let things work out for themselves. Praise the shit out of me. Act jealous like. … Shit, maybe we’ll fuck her together… and we’ll go places and we’ll eat together… and we’ll drive and hunt and wear nice things. If she wants to go to Borneo let her take us along. I don’t know how to shoot either, but that doesn’t matter. She doesn’t care about that either. She just wants to be fucked that’s all. You’re talking about her arms all the time. You don’t have to look at her arms all the time, do you? Look at this bedspread! Look at the mirror! Do you call this living? Do you want to go on being delicate and live like a louse all your life? You can’t even pay your hotel bill… and you’ve got a job too. This is no way to live. I don’t care if she’s seventy years old—it’s better than this. …” “Listen, Joe, you fuck her for me… then everything’ll be fine. Maybe I’ll fuck her once in a while too… on my night off. It’s four days now since I’ve had a good shit. There’s something sticking to me, like grapes. …” “You’ve got the piles, that’s what.” “My hair’s falling out too… and I ought to see the dentist. I feel as though I were falling apart. I told her what a good guy you are. … You’ll do things for me, eh? You’re not too delicate, eh? If we go to Borneo I won’t have hemorrhoids any more. Maybe I’ll develop something else… something worse… fever perhaps… or cholera. Shit, it’s better to die of a good disease like that than to piss your life away on a newspaper with grapes up your ass and buttons falling off your pants.

• From Tropic of Cancer (1934)

  I told her I’d bring you around some day. I talked a lot about you. ... I didn’t know what to say to her. Maybe you’d like her, especially when she’s dressed. I don’t know. ...” “Listen, she’s rich, you say? I’ll like her! I don’t care how old she is, so long as she’s not a hag. ...” “She’s not a hag! What are you talking about? She’s charming, I tell you. She talks well. She looks well too... only her arms. ...” “All right, if that’s how it is, I’ll fuck her—if you don’t want to. Tell her that. Be subtle about it, though. With a woman like that you’ve got to do things slowly. You bring me around and let things work out for themselves. Praise the shit out of me. Act jealous like. ... Shit, maybe we’ll fuck her together... and we’ll go places and we’ll eat together... and we’ll drive and hunt and wear nice things. If she wants to go to Borneo let her take us along. I don’t know how to shoot either, but that doesn’t matter. She doesn’t care about that either. She just wants to be fucked that’s all. You’re talking about her arms all the time. You don’t have to look at her arms all the time, do you? Look at this bedspread! Look at the mirror! Do you call this living? Do you want to go on being delicate and live like a louse all your life? You can’t even pay your hotel bill... and you’ve got a job too. This is no way to live. I don’t care if she’s seventy years old—it’s better than this. ...” “Listen, Joe, you fuck her for me... then everything’ll be fine. Maybe I’ll fuck her once in a while too... on my night off. It’s four days now since I’ve had a good shit. There’s something sticking to me, like grapes. ...” “You’ve got the piles, that’s what.” “My hair’s falling out too... and I ought to see the dentist. I feel as though I were falling apart. I told her what a good guy you are. ... You’ll do things for me, eh? You’re not too delicate, eh? If we go to Borneo I won’t have hemorrhoids any more. Maybe I’ll develop something else... something worse... fever perhaps... or cholera. Shit, it’s better to die of a good disease like that than to piss your life away on a newspaper with grapes up your ass and buttons falling off your pants. I’d like to be rich, even if it were only for a week, and then go to a hospital with a good disease, a fatal one, and have flowers in the room and nurses dancing around and telegrams coming. They take good care of you if you’re rich. They wash you with cotton batting and they comb your hair for you.

• From Tropic of Cancer (1934)

  For a moment I was almost on the point of leaving. How the hell can you climb over a woman when her mother’s dying downstairs, perhaps right beneath you? I put my arms around her, half in sympathy and half determined to get what I had come for. As we stood thus she murmured, as if in real distress, her need for the money I had promised her. It was for “maman.” Shit, I didn’t have the heart to haggle about a few francs at the moment. I walked over to the chair where my clothes were lying and I wiggled a hundred franc note out of my fob pocket, carefully keeping my back turned to her just the same. And, as a further precaution, I placed my pants on the side of the bed where I knew I was going to flop. The hundred francs wasn’t altogether satisfactory to her, but I could see from the feeble way that she protested that it was quite enough. Then, with an energy that astonished me, she flung off her kimono and jumped into bed. As soon as I had put my arms around her and pulled her to me she reached for the switch and out went the lights. She embraced me passionately, and she groaned as all French cunts do when they get you in bed. She was getting me frightfully roused with her carrying on; that business of turning out the lights was a new one to me... it seemed like the real thing. But I was suspicious too, and as soon as I could manage conveniently I put my hands out to feel if my trousers were still there on the chair. I thought we were settled for the night. The bed felt very comfortable, softer than the average hotel bed—and the sheets were clean, I had noticed that. If only she wouldn’t squirm so! You would think she hadn’t slept with a man for a month. I wanted to stretch it out. I wanted full value for my hundred francs. But she was mumbling all sorts of things in that crazy bed language which goes to your blood even more rapidly when it’s in the dark. I was putting up a stiff fight, but it was impossible with her groaning and gasping going on, and her muttering: “Vite chéri! Vite chéri! Oh, c’est bon! Oh, oh! Vite, vite, chéri!” I tried to count but it was like a fire alarm going off. “Vite, chéri!” and this time she gave such a gasping shudder that bango! I heard the stars chiming and there was my hundred francs gone and the fifty that I had forgotten all about and the lights were on again and with the same alacrity that she had bounced into bed she was bouncing out again and grunting and squealing like an old sow.

• From Little Sister: A Memoir (2019)

  As we swatted away the endless reign of terror from deerflies, horseflies, and mosquitoes, one of the Angels would stand at the end of one of the long rows reading aloud to us stories from the lives of the saints. A midday swimming break in the spring-fed watering hole that Sister Catherine had constructed the year after we moved to Still River was a blessed relief. Each summer also brought with it a challenge—a project hatched by Sister Catherine. One year it might be clearing the brush from acres of land to increase the pastures for our growing herds. Another time we built hermitages, in the image of the early saints who chose to leave society and retire into the desert. This summer we undertook to build a fieldstone chicken coop under the supervision of the Big Sisters. At twenty by forty feet and ten feet high, its construction required an enormous effort. Gathering the building stones entailed dismantling the generations-old stone walls that ran through our property. Despite the backbreaking nature of the work, lugging boulders and rocks to the site, I reveled in the experience, envisioning myself as a frontier woman, a pioneer of sorts, as I learned how to mix cement and use a plumb bob to ensure that the walls would be straight. Recreation that summer included our first horseback riding lessons. As Little Sisters, we were required to ride sidesaddle, while the Little Brothers had both English and western saddles. I didn’t take naturally to horses, but my interest in riding was augmented by our riding instructor, Brother Dominic Maria. Before joining the Center, he had been Temple Morgan (related to the wealthy Astors and Morgans). He’d gone to Groton School and then Harvard College, where he was a member of the prestigious Porcellian Club. Raised on a stately horse farm in Maryland, he was an excellent rider. Until that summer, I’d barely noticed Brother Dominic Maria. But when he took my hands to show me how to hold the reins, I suddenly became aware of him in a different way. At six foot two, rugged and wiry, with jet-black hair and deep brown eyes, he was nothing like Brother Sebastian, my first crush of a year earlier, who was short and delicate looking, played the cello, and did indoor kinds of things like arranging flowers and writing poems. I didn’t understand my own feelings, but my heart skipped a beat each time I put my left foot into Brother Dominic Maria’s cupped hands and hoisted myself up into the sidesaddle. As I sat poised and ready to ride off with my horse, he spoke in a low tone. “Remember, you’re the boss, girl. Don’t let the horse get control of you. He can tell if you’re nervous.” “Girl”—I loved how he said that. No one said that at the Center. I could scarcely concentrate on the horse, as my insides got all fluttery. And “boss”—another word I never heard spoken.

• From Little Sister: A Memoir (2019)

  own feelings, but my heart skipped a beat each time I put my left foot into Brother Dominic Maria’s cupped hands and hoisted myself up into the sidesaddle. As I sat poised and ready to ride off with my horse, he spoke in a low tone. “Remember, you’re the boss, girl. Don’t let the horse get control of you. He can tell if you’re nervous.” “Girl”—I loved how he said that. No one said that at the Center. I could scarcely concentrate on the horse, as my insides got all fluttery. And “boss”— another word I never heard spoken. But I knew its meaning and took pride in it. One day, to impress him, I rode our palomino Regis all the way down to the Nashua River and then cantered back up to the barn through the lower fields and along the rutted road. As the horse panted and dripped with sweat, I sat proudly, waiting to hear what compliment Brother Dominic Maria might have for me. “Girl, you rode like St. Joan of Arc,” he said. My knees began to shake, my heart beat madly, and my mouth became so dry I could barely manage a smile. As he helped me to dismount, I let my body brush up against his. A few evenings later, Sister Catherine made an announcement in our refectory. “Little Sisters and Brothers,” she said, “there are certain words we do not use because they’re not very nice. ‘Boss’ is one of them.” My stomach lurched. She’s talking about Brother Dominic Maria and me, I thought in a panic. I tried to recollect which Angel had been in charge the day he told me I was the boss of the horse. I waited for days, fearing Sister Catherine might call me into her office and tell me that I could no longer take riding lessons. But to my relief, my lessons continued throughout the summer—as did my crush. However, once we were proficient in riding sidesaddle, the lessons tapered off. By the end of August, the ten-week chicken-coop project was nearing completion. Using ropes, we hoisted long roof beams to the top of the ten-foot- tall structure, nailed plywood to the beams, put on a layer of tar paper, and sealed the roof with shingles. The final touches on the henhouse came with whitewashing the interior walls and installing dozens of nesting boxes. By Labor Day, a week before tutoring was to begin, we opened the gates to the enclosure and let in over two hundred pullets, the young hens Sister Teresa had

• From Tropic of Cancer (1934)

  Here, at the neck of the bottle, so to speak, there was always a cluster of vultures who croaked and flapped their dirty wings, who reached out with sharp talons and plucked you into a doorway. Jolly, rapacious devils who didn’t even give you time to button your pants when it was over. Led you into a little room off the street, a room without a window usually, and, sitting on the edge of the bed with skirts tucked up gave you a quick inspection, spat on your cock, and placed it for you. While you washed yourself another one stood at the door and, holding her victim by the hand, watched nonchalantly as you gave the finishing touches to your toilet. Germaine was different. There was nothing to tell me so from her appearance. Nothing to distinguish her from the other trollops who met each afternoon and evening at the Café de l’Eléphant. As I say, it was a spring day and the few francs my wife had scraped up to cable me were jingling in my pocket. I had a sort of vague premonition that I would not reach the Bastille without being taken in tow by one of these buzzards. Sauntering along the boulevard I had noticed her verging toward me with that curious trot-about air of a whore and the run- down heels and cheap jewelry and the pasty look of their kind which the rouge only accentuates. It was not difficult to come to terms with her. We sat in the back of the little tabac called L’Eléphant and talked it over quickly. In a few minutes we were in a five franc room on the Rue Amelot, the curtains drawn and the covers thrown back. She didn’t rush things, Germaine. She sat on the bidet soaping herself and talked to me pleasantly about this and that; she liked the knickerbockers I was wearing. Très chic! she thought. They were once, but I had worn the seat out of them; fortunately the jacket covered my ass. As she stood up to dry herself, still talking to me pleasantly, suddenly she dropped the towel and, advancing toward me leisurely, she commenced rubbing her pussy affectionately, stroking it with her two hands, caressing it, patting it, patting it. There was something about her eloquence at that moment and the way she thrust that rosebush under my nose which remains unforgettable; she spoke of it as if it were some extraneous object which she had acquired at great cost, an object whose value had increased with time and which now she prized above everything in the world. Her words imbued it with a peculiar fragrance; it was no longer just her private organ, but a treasure, a magic, potent treasure, a God- given thing—and none the less so because she traded it day in and day out for a few pieces of silver.

• From Tropic of Cancer (1934)

  Moldorf, on the other hand, who suffers too in his peculiar way, is not mad. Moldorf is word drunk. He has no veins or blood vessels, no heart or kidneys. He is a portable trunk filled with innumerable drawers and in the drawers are labels written out in white ink, brown ink, red ink, blue ink, vermilion, saffron, mauve, sienna, apricot, turquoise, onyx, Anjou, herring, Corona, verdigris, gorgonzola. ... I have moved the typewriter into the next room where I can see myself in the mirror as I write. Tania is like Irène. She expects fat letters. But there is another Tania, a Tania like a big seed, who scatters pollen everywhere—or, let us say, a little bit of Tolstoy, a stable scene in which the fetus is dug up. Tania is a fever, too—les voies urinaires, Café de la Liberté, Place des Vosges, bright neckties on the Boulevard Montparnasse, dark bathrooms, Porto Sec, Abdullah cigarettes, the adagio sonata Pathétique, aural amplificators, anecdotal seances, burnt sienna breasts, heavy garters, what time is it, golden pheasants stuffed with chestnuts, taffeta fingers, vaporish twilights turning to ilex, acromegaly, cancer and delirium, warm veils, poker chips, carpets of blood and soft thighs. Tania says so that every one may hear: “I love him!” And while Boris scalds himself with whisky she says: “Sit down here! O Boris... Russia... what’ll I do? I’m bursting with it!” At night when I look at Boris’ goatee lying on the pillow I get hysterical. O Tania, where now is that warm cunt of yours, those fat, heavy garters, those soft, bulging thighs? There is a bone in my prick six inches long. I will ream out every wrinkle in your cunt, Tania, big with seed. I will send you home to your Sylvester with an ache in your belly and your womb turned inside out. Your Sylvester! Yes, he knows how to build a fire, but I know how to inflame a cunt. I shoot hot bolts into you, Tania, I make your ovaries incandescent. Your Sylvester is a little jealous now? He feels something, does he? He feels the remnants of my big prick. I have set the shores a little wider, I have ironed out the wrinkles. After me you can take on stallions, bulls, rams, drakes, St. Bernards. You can stuff toads, bats, lizards up your rectum. You can shit arpeggios if you like, or string a zither across your navel. I am fucking you, Tania, so that you’ll stay fucked. And if you are afraid of being fucked publicly I will fuck you privately. I will tear off a few hairs from your cunt and paste them on Boris’ chin. I will bite into your clitoris and spit out two franc pieces. ... Indigo sky swept clear of fleecy clouds, gaunt trees in-finitely extended, their black boughs gesticulating like a sleepwalker. Somber, spectral trees, their trunks pale as cigar ash.

• From The Girls (2016)

  from the floor; the bulk of the dresser, the slivered doorway. I couldn’t imagine Connie in the rooms beyond. Connie mumbling in her sleep, as she often did, sometimes announcing a number like an addled bingo player. “You can get under the blankets if you’re cold,” he said, caping open the covers so I saw his bare chest, his nakedness. I got in beside him with ritual silence. It was as easy as this—I’d entered a possibility that had always been there. He didn’t speak, after that, and neither did I. He hitched me close so my back was pressed against his chest and I could feel his dick rear against my thighs. I didn’t want to breathe, feeling that it would be an imposition on him, even the fact of my ribs rising and falling too much of a bother. I was taking tiny breaths through my nose, a light-headedness overtaking me. The strident rank of him in the dark, his blankets, his sheets—it was what Pamela got all the time, this easy occupation of his presence. His arm was around me, a weight I kept identifying as the weight of a boy’s arm. Peter acted like he was going to sleep, the casual sigh and shuffle, but that kept the whole thing together. You had to act as if nothing strange were happening. When he brushed my nipple with his finger, I kept very still. I could feel his steady breath on my neck. His hand taking an impersonal measurement. Twisting the nipple so I inhaled audibly, and he hesitated for a moment but kept going. His dick smearing at my bare thighs. I would be shunted along whatever would happen, I understood. However he piloted the night. And there wasn’t fear, just a feeling adjacent to excitement, a viewing from the wings. What would happen to Evie? When the floorboards creaked from the hall, the spell cracked. Peter withdrew his hand, rolling abruptly onto his back. Staring at the ceiling so I could see his eyes. “I’ve gotta get some sleep,” he said in a voice carefully drained. A voice like an eraser, its insistent dullness meant to make me wonder if anything had happened. And I was slow to get to my feet, a little stunned, but also in a happy swoon, like even that little bit had fed me. — The boys played the slot machine for what seemed like hours. Connie and

• From Comrade Loves of the Samurai (1972)

  A young man Stood watching these two graceful silhouettes. He could not see their faces, and was curious to know what beautiful boys they might be. He had great longing to see their delightful faces. Then an old servant woman came out of the tent, and called to them: 'Dear maidens, dear Ofuji and Oyoshi.'The young man was disappointed to find that the two graceful persons were women and not young men. He went swiftly to the town of Sendai, the capital of that Province. At the end of one of the Streets of this town, called Bashyoja Fsuojji, there was a druggist's shop, the owner of which was a certain Hiusuke Ronishi. As our young man passed the shop, a delicious scent of incense escaped from the black curtains at the back of it, separating the commercial part from the living-rooms. The perfume was sweeter than that famous White Chrysanthemum incense which only the Lord of the Province possessed. The young man had a keen taste in incense, and was attracted by the perfume. So he entered the shop and, after buying some common perfumes, said to the proprietor: 'I should like to buy that incense which you are now burning behind the shop. Its perfume is exquisite. Will you give me a little? 'But the proprietor answered: 'That incense is my son's favourite, and we cannot sell it.' The young man was cast down, and lingered for a moment in the shop; for he could not tear himself from the delicious odour; and it was with regret that he withdrew. His name was Itjikuro Ban, and he was a Guard of the Province of Tsugaru, and immensely rich. He was passionately addicted to pederasty and did not waste a thought on women. He was at that particular time going to Yedo to see a celebrated young actor named Dekijima, whose beauty was attracting many men's admiration. His servant had received a letter from a friend at Yedo, praising Dekijima's beauty, and Itjikuro had at once set out to see him. He was a person of great refinement and dignity, of a rank which is seldom met with in so distant a country.

• From Comrade Loves of the Samurai (1972)

  Falling One by one. 58. Deep Light.I have no wish for A frivolous or coquettish existence, I want the deep life of love. have set up the double screen Against a wind balmed with the plum trees. Come to me and I will love you In the tender light of a veiled moon, I will love you, far from the plum trees. Yet afterwards in bed I know I shall sulk and weep; Frogs in the garden pool All night, all night. 59. Snow Night.There are two in the small room On this cold snow night. Pretty half-meanings As they tease each other, Hair she has just washed And cannot manage. 'You get on my nerves,' she says, 'Always chewing your toothpick.' 60. Spring Night.This dream of a Spring night Grows complicated. The smell of his body lies on the air. The cloudy sky and my ringed eyes Are veiled. Are we not a couple Made of flower and butterfly? Well, well, I mean to say. 61. Love Night.The cuckoo has sung all night And at first they did not sleep at all. There is sweet slumber after love With a rounded arm for pillow. The lamp was fetched away Without their noticing. 62. Moon and Plum Tree. The moon and the plum tree part not On a very clear night, But rather lie smiling to the snow. Not a word is said, But the scent the plum tree cannot hold Goes up toward the moon. And look at the innocent whiteness Of the plum tree. 63. Bamboos and Sparrows. This sparrow lighting Harmoniously On the bamboo. In love things do not go quite so Harmoniously. It is I alone who love and suffer. I hate his beastly face. 64. Sky before Dawn.Sky just at dawn between the trees The cuckoo flies and hides. I comb the wet hair on my temples I am wetted and am happy. I am so wet. It rains this morning. 65. Myosotis.If I clasp my hands, my sleeve: Dew and perfume and colour. His picture remains in absence Myosotis, memory. If he flowered on a branch I would plant him, And love him every Lonely hour. 66. Flower of the Cherry.It is because they fall That they are admirable. What is the good of clinging Without hope? Clinging violently to the branches, Withered on all the branches, Soiled by the birds. 67. Pillow.How many nights We have not come together. The plovers of Awaji island Mingle their crying. I am alone and wretched In this plank custom's hut, Alone and loft. That moonbeam entering to my pillow, Would it were, Just for once. 68. The Pine Tree.The wind in the roof Is playing on three Strings, Moon, snow and flower. Right from the very small Pushing of the Spring The green of the green pine Changes not. What do the infant cranes cry Fluttering from the nest In the green pine top? 'Long live the King! 'they cry. The green pine lives for ever.

• From The Well of Loneliness (1928)

  You were awfully scared that first day at The Grange; why were you so scared?’ Stephen answered slowly: ‘I’m frightened now—I’m frightened of you.’ ‘Yet you’re stronger than I am—’ ‘Yes, that’s why I’m so frightened, you make me feel strong—do you want to do that?’ ‘Well—perhaps—you’re so very unusual, Stephen.’ ‘Am I?’ ‘Of course, don’t you know that you are? Why, you’re altogether different from other people.’ Stephen trembled a little: ‘Do you mind?’ she faltered. ‘I know that you’re you,’ teased Angela, smiling again, but she reached out and took Stephen’s hand. Something in the queer, vital strength of that hand stirred her deeply, so that she tightened her fingers: ‘What in the Lord’s name are you?’ she murmured. ‘I don’t know. Go on holding like that to my hand—hold it tighter—I like the feel of your fingers.’ ‘Stephen, don’t be absurd!’ ‘Go on holding my hand, I like the feel of your fingers.’ ‘Stephen, you’re hurting, you’re crushing my rings!’ And now they were under the trees by the lakes, their feet falling softly on the luminous carpet. Hand in hand they entered that place of deep stillness, and only their breathing disturbed the stillness for a moment, then it folded back over their breathing. ‘Look,’ said Stephen, and she pointed to the swan called Peter, who had come drifting past on his own white reflection. ‘Look,’ she said, ‘this is Morton, all beauty and peace—it drifts like that swan does, on calm, deep water. And all this beauty and peace is for you, because now you’re a part of Morton.’ Angela said: ‘I’ve never known peace, it’s not in me—I don’t think I’d find it here, Stephen.’ And as she spoke she released her hand, moving a little away from the girl. But Stephen continued to talk on gently; her voice sounded almost like that of a dreamer: ‘Lovely, oh, lovely it is, our Morton. On evenings in winter these lakes are quite frozen, and the ice looks like slabs of gold in the sunset, when you and I come and stand here in the winter. And as we walk back we can smell the log fires long before we can see them, and we love that good smell because it means home, and our home is Morton—and we’re happy, happy—we’re utterly contented and at peace, we’re filled with the peace of this place—’ ‘Stephen—don’t!’ ‘We’re both filled with the old peace of Morton, because we love each other so deeply—and because we’re perfect, a perfect thing, you and I —not two separate people but one. And our love has lit a great, comforting beacon, so that we need never be afraid of the dark any more— we can warm ourselves at our love, we can lie down together, and my arms will be round you—’ She broke off abruptly, and they stared at each other. ‘Do you know what you’re saying?’ Angela whispered.