Longing

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.

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• From House of Holes: A Book of Raunch (2011)

  They were sleeping. So we looked them all over while they gathered strength, and they had the most beautiful penises and thatchy patches. Then their eyes opened, and mine said, ‘It’s a beautiful day,’ and he stretched. I stroked his chest, and I knelt over him and held the sides of his face and looked at his eyes. He was in the tent of my hair, and I could feel his hips trying to find a way in. He was very ready, so I let him in. He became my boyfriend that summer, and then unfortunately he went away. Now I make sculptures of women. I use very smooth hardwood. The women I carve have wide faces, and I always drill deep into their asses. I think the reason why it is so important to drill deep into their asses in my sculpture is because I pooped out the boycone when I was young.” “Maybe, maybe,” said Wade. “I would like to touch you. ” “Okay.” Wade felt her fingers move lightly over his arms and chest. They converged and found his cock. Koizumi made a little startled happy sound. “Oh, that is lusty,” she said. “I feel like a lusty lady when I hold your cock. I get a very special feeling in my anus.” “I’m glad you like it,” said Wade. “Would you like to know what my wooden women look like when I carve them?” Wade said he would. “They are posed in the kundalini pose, like this.” Koizumi threw off the covers and put her round bottom high, with her knees together and her wrists crossed at her ankles. A wisp of black hair fell across her face and stuck to her lips. “I believe that the anus is the center of life energy and of consciousness,” she said. “I need to be drilled by a cock now. I hope your cock can be hard enough to fill my ass and anus.” “I hope so, too, for both our sakes,” Wade said. She had something in her hand. “I brought you a pinecone,” she said. “Pull off a seed and chew it. It will make your penis very stiff, and then if you come inside my bowel I will make you a special souvenir.” “Oh, wow,” said Wade. He pulled off a pinecone seed and chewed it. Almost immediately he developed a huge, almost painful hard-on. “Jeez, my cock’s straining at the leash.” “Good,” said Koizumi. She handed him a small vial of liquid. “Now put some of this on your finger and circle it around on my anus.” Wade did what she asked. She clenched her bottom cheeks and did a whimpery dance on her knees. “It almost tickles,” she said. “Now drill me with your cock,” she said. “Unh, unh, unh, put it right down into me. Sink it into me, please,” she said. Wade found her anus and pointed the almost sharp head of his dick into it.

• From The City of God

  511 reconstructions—of a mosaic whose full scope is lost, whose final framing perimeter is as shattered as the marble rubble of Hippo Regius, his ancient city. We lack Augustine because our organic connection to him was severed by the chaos and the confusion that followed his death, and ended his world, and erased and altered the audiences to which his works were addressed and with whom he shared a coherent worldview. This is unlike the thought, for example, of Thomas Aquinas, who spawned a continuous and still-living tradition of commentators. But Augustine’s work had no such descendants. He may have had disciples, and he certainly had friends, but the lines burned out quickly in the collapse of Roman North Africa and the tumult that followed in the old territories of the Western Imperium Romanum. One might even argue that his genius was so incommensurate with others in his day that he had few if any, contemporaries either. But be that as may be, Augustine is certainly cut off from all who came after him. And so today, as through history, his thought is continually rediscovered, but the organic assumptions behind his work seems to have largely died with him. We have the flowers, but not the roots. So in a very important way, we lack Augustine. And yet here we are, you and I, not necessarily sharing his worldview, not even necessarily sharing the faith he strove to serve; and we still read, and talk, and think about him—some of us every day—in an age and a world that would be unimaginable to him, and in lands his world never even dreamed of discovering. Why is that? What makes it possible for us to find him available to us, even as he lived so far away? His disconnection from us obviously causes a great deal of trouble. But such a systematic disjunction from others is a kind of blessing, as well. Each age has to reinvent the Augustine it will use, and it does so out of necessity. And perhaps Augustine would have enjoyed this Lecture 24 Transcript—The City of God’s Journey through History 512 Books That Matter: The City of God last irony about himself, that the contingencies of history and the vicissitudes of human society have rendered his work simultaneously foundational and oblique in our world to be treated with admiration and skepticism, honor and suspicion, reverence and scrutiny—and sometimes by the same person, in the same moment. As I said at the beginning, as his life drew to its close, Augustine seems to have foreseen that something like this would happen.

• From The City of God

  456 Books That Matter: The City of God at the end of their lives, but simply the place in the created order where fallen angels and fallen humans fall to? You’ve got to put them somewhere in Creation, unless you want simply to annihilate them. But I don’t think you want to do that, do you? So where, then, are you going to put the damned, if not in Hell? Where would be a better place for them? There is some continuity between sinning on earth and suffering in Hell, as we’ve seen, but a great deal of disruption as well. The key thing here, as with his other eschatological reflections, is that Augustine tries not to let sheer spectatorial speculation have the upper hand; he tries to make it useful to think about these things for our lives in the here and now. That’s why he’s doing this. This is not a kind of apocalyptic voyeurism driving his account, but an existential attempt to make sense, as best he can, of the beliefs he takes to be essential to the Christian faith. Admittedly, Hell is one of most neuralgic things for many people, and for good reasons. I doubt that Augustine can satisfy them to not fear the very idea of Hell, and not to be angry at him, Augustine, for offering so forceful and, I would argue, compelling a view of it. But let me say one last thing to them, extrapolating not from anything Augustine ever said, so far as I know, about Hell, but about some things he said about the doctrine of predestination, about how to preach this doctrine in his works On the Predestination of the Saints and The Gift of Perseverance. Many of the worries People have about predestination seem related to the worry they have about Hell. Let me give you two bits of hypothetical pastoral, theological advice, drawn from Augustine about Hell. First, he would say that believers should not be motivated by fear of Hell but by longing for Heaven, to do so via longing for Heaven in Christ. This is why Augustine repeatedly insists that believers must have Christ as a foundation, not any kind of fear. The key here is loving all else in and through and for Christ. No one has ever been saved by belief in Hell. It has no positive pedagogical

• From The City of God

  492 Books That Matter: The City of God education—part of a larger education about the true nature of the longings that our politics imperfectly, indeed perversely, expresses. And so politics opens into deeper longings, longings that the human does not always want honestly to express. And this gets us to our second great theme of The City, namely, the anthropology—the picture of the human that it propounds and that it assumes. And this anthropology is ineliminably a theological anthropology. As he says in the Confessions, “You, God, you have made us for yourself, and our heart is restless till it rests in thee.” The human is a creature who longs for God. And as such, the human is a creature of excess, of gratuity. We are eccentric—that is, having our centers outside of ourselves. We find our true end not in enclosed self-satisfaction, but in ecstatic going outside of ourselves in praise and union with God. Wherever we are, we over-spill our bounds, overrun our ends. And once we are untethered from God after the Fall, our affections keep flowing from us, snaking crazily across the surface of this world like a fire hose out of control, shooting water this way and that. This is clearly manifest in our political lives, but it’s also manifest elsewhere in our worldly lives in how we love one another; in how we adore sports teams, musicians, artists, yes, even books; how we are patriots, lovers, fans. We are, essentially, a doxological creature—a creature who loves to praise; to give glory; to, in one way or another, worship. Augustine chooses to capture this fact about us by making love the key term of his anthropology. It’s hard to over-estimate the decisiveness of this decision for future thought—not just politically, as before, but theologically and morally as well in the West. Theologically and psychologically, it means that who we most definitely are is discoverable by finding out in what we invest our affections. We cannot help but adore things; the question is what we will choose to adore. Morally, it also means that the core matter for us to address in thinking about ethical matters is not the quality of the act itself,

• From House of Holes: A Book of Raunch (2011)

  Luna Goes to a Concer t L una met a man named Chuck at the soup kitchen. He was manning the sink and she was unloading the dishwasher, which wasn’t an easy job because the steam was hot. They developed a nice wordless rhythm together of unloading and drying and stacking. Then, wiping the edge of the sink with a clean dish towel, Chuck directed his restless blue eyes directly at her and asked her if she would like to go with him to the Masturboats. Just like that, all of a sudden: “Would you like to go with me to the Masturboats?” “I’m not sure I’m ready for that,” Luna replied with a laugh, not knowing exactly what the Masturboats were. But inside she was saying, Why not? Because she knew that his kind of easy glancing manner was not all that common. Men turned thirty-eight, thirty-nine, and it was like someone dimmed the lights. When they’re young, they’re hilarious and bubbly and boyish. And bad. So bad. When they’re old, they’re flat and stupid and dull. She watched them in airports with their wives: brain-dead, mostly. And yet this man, Chuck, was probably forty-five at least. He still had some humor left in him. He was funny about how hot the plates were. Not funny in a poking kind of way, but in a cheerful way. He had a shock of Jimmy Stewart hair that he flung around. In some ways a beautiful man, with a rough grace to him. Why had she refused his polite offer? Of course she should have said yes to the Masturboats, whatever they were. But she just didn’t want to. Chuck was unfazed. “Then would you like to go with me to an intimate concert of Russian piano music and sit in the Velvet Room, and I’ll toy with your hair?” She took a breath, thinking. “I like Russian music,” she said finally. “That sounds nice. Sure.” First, though, she needed to go to Tan Wizards. She didn’t want to have white shoulders when she wore her black dress with the spaghetti straps. She didn’t want to be some blinking creature coming out of her nocturnal burrow for a grand musical adventure. She wanted to be working from a position of strength, with cinnamon-colored shoulders that shrugged and moved alluringly. So she went to Tan Wizards and signed up. The girl there asked her which room she wanted, Room 1, Room 2, or Room 3. “Which do you recommend for very fast results?” Luna asked. “The bulbs are best in Room 3,” the girl said, and she winked. “And I recommend this bronzer.

• From The Unexpected Legacy of Divorce: A 25-Year Landmark Study (2000)

  The Biological DadTHE FOURTH MEMBER of the quartet is the biological father, who together with his ex-wife can make or break the child’s relationship to the stepfather. Some absent fathers, though they don’t directly block the child’s attachment to another man, can prevent it from happening by keeping alive the child’s hope for a better relationship. Such children are the ones most likely to have a poor relationship with their stepfathers—a fact most adults find hard to understand. After all, a child who is unhappy in one relationship should logically welcome another person to fill that gap. But that would be true only if the child gives up hope for the father’s renewed love and interest or rejects the father, as we saw in Larry’s story. Billy, no matter how many disappointments he sustained, never gave up expecting that his father would someday love him and value him. To many children, the father’s disinterest fuels a passionate attachment in the son toward the father. A close relationship with a stepfather would be a betrayal of the father. Whether he is nearby or far away, the biological father’s attitude toward the stepfather is of utmost importance. He stands symbolically at the entrance to their relationship. If the biological father resents the stepfather or competes with him for the child’s affection, it is almost impossible for the child to love the new man. But if the father encourages the new relationship, he helps clear the path for stepfather and child to proceed. In contrast, children and adolescents who have rejected their biological father, seeing him as a failure or morally flawed or lacking in interest, often turn eagerly to their stepfather as a person they can admire and emulate. Many talked of their stepfather with great affection and praise. “I really love him. He’s a good, loyal man.” Others said, “My stepfather saved my life.” One young man explained to me, “I have no respect for my father. He’s irresponsible and self-centered. But my stepfather is just the kind of person that I want to be. I’m lucky to have him.” One young woman, who was rescued from a delinquent life with a motorcycle gang by her stepfather’s confidence in her, told me proudly, “He told me that I was smart and that I was too good to waste my time with those losers. He said that I should go to college, and best of all he put his money where his mouth was. He is the father I always wanted.” I have seen many such transformations when an adolescent turns his back on the morally bankrupt biological parent and looks to the stepfather for guidance and help in the real world. One young man said, “My step is more of a father than my real father. He’s the one who took care of my mom, my sisters, and me. He’s earned his place with me.”

• From House of Holes: A Book of Raunch (2011)

  He paused and stood with his hips canted forward, his peeny wanger close to her hand. “Go ahead.” She rose on one elbow and held the cock like the handle of a trowel and pulled slowly on it. She felt it thicken and was filled with longings in various directions. “What’s your name?” the nice-looking young man asked, gasping slightly. Marcela decided to make a name up. “My name is Lucky Eyes,” she said. She pointed his cock up and then kissed its tip and filled her mouth once with it. “Oh, please don’t do that cause I’ll shoot for sure in two seconds. I’m real full of come cause your tits make me hot.” Marcela lay down and breathed. “Where are we going?” “Into the massage room.” “Oh. Who will be massaging me?” “Lanasha, the head masseuse, while Bono and I watch in the other room.” He pointed to a one-way mirror. “Then we’re supposed to take you to the groanrooms.” “Oh.” In the massage room there were Japanese screens and a pile of folded cloths, and bowls of water and liquids. “Is it okay to leave my bra on?” said Marcela. “Lanasha will take care of everything,” said the boy. Then he shyly squeezed her and said, “Thank you for holding me. It felt really good. I’m Ross.” Some trance music came on, and Marcela lay on her stomach feeling very peaceful, still in her bra, with a towel covering her butt and throbbing cuntspot. Soon she heard the sound of a sliding paper door. Lanasha, a large Filipina woman in a red dress, came in and sat in a chair next to her table. “I am here to give you a teaching massage,” Lanasha said. “What would you most like to learn?” “Everything, I think,” said Marcela. “I’ve not been to a sex resort before. Last week I let a man hold my breasts, but besides that I’ve been pretty darned nonsexual lately. It’s been almost a year. I’ve started to worry about it, actually.” Lanasha unhooked Marcela’s bra and tickled her back with the loose ends of it. Then she began making odd paddling motions over her shoulder blades and down the small of her back. Once, she lifted the towel. “You have a very lovely bottom—all men will like it,” the masseuse said. “Thank you.” Lanasha squirted oil on Marcela’s bottom. “Do you know what the Gumuz boys sing in the Sudan?” she said. “No, what?” “They sing, ‘My girl’s got big boobies and a big soft ass; she is the shapeliest woman in the world.’ ” “Catchy song,” said Marcela. “Can I ask you something?” “Sure.” “Do you enjoy having a man behind you? Because I miss seeing his face make those nice twisty expressions that I see men make in dirty movies. ” Lanasha smiled. “What you do is you send your whole self back to your bottom.

• From House of Holes: A Book of Raunch (2011)

  Then she took hold of Ruzty’s cock, which was as hard as a summer squash. She splayed her fingers and moved them over his balls and then over his stomach. She could see his thigh muscles tighten. His cock was straining, and she had to stroke it. She took it in her hand and felt its thickness and its sense of certainty. It was like the Arch of St. Louis. It had one thing to say to the world: “I am a stiff swervie.” She slid her hand up to the tip—it was like sliding over a steering wheel—and slid it down again, enjoying the sheen of the soapy water on his cockknob. “This is a big, beautiful dick you’ve got, Ruzty,” she whispered. “Thank you,” he said. “You’re nice to say it.” She began moving her hand slowly, then faster. “Ooh boy, I want this dick inside me,” she said, “I want to be fucked by this dick, I can’t help it, it’s so perfect. It’s literally THE perfect dick for me.” She gave it a number of good quick pulls and then she noticed that Ruzty was quivering and trembling. Suddenly he said “Ohhhhhhrrrrr” in his beautiful accent, and several white glops spouted from the end. Immediately there was a buzzer and a ringing. “Uh-oh,” said Shandee. She blew Ruzty a kiss . “Bye-bye,” said Ruzty. An assistant named Krock appeared and led Shandee away. “Why in heaven’s name did you wank him off?” Krock asked. “I didn’t mean to. He begged me, and I obliged him.” “Did you take off your sponge gloves?” Shandee nodded. “We had a rapport. I’m sorry.” Krock reassured her. “I think it’ll be okay. Lila will give you your reassignment tomorrow.” “Is there any chance that I’ll be able to see him again?” “You never know,” said Krock. He gave her a sly look. “I’ll put in a good word for you.” “Thanks.” Shandee shook her head wistfully. “I really wanted that cock of his so bad. God, I still do. I can’t stop thinking about it. I had to hold it. I’d give that cock everything.” “I wish people said that about my cock,” said Krock, as they reached the lobby of Shandee’s hotel. “I’m sure it’s nice,” said Shandee. “Do you want to see it?” “Um—” Shandee checked the wall clock. “No, thanks. Dave’s arm is going to be needing his meal.” Jessica Has Some Tattoos Remove d J essica went for a walk one day wearing not enough clothes. Why? Nobody knows. She didn’t know. It was summer, that was all, and she looked good and wanted the world to see. She was wearing a T-shirt and a pair of shorts with wide cuffs and some striped sandals. Only the sandals were the right size.

• From A Greek-English Lexicon (Liddell-Scott) (1957)

  πόθος, 6, a longing, yearning, fond desire or regret (for something absent or lost), Lat. desiderium (cf. Plat. Crat. 420 A), Hom. (who pre- fers the form 7067), Hdt., Pind., Att.; a. ἱκνεῖταί τινα Soph. Ph. 601 ; σὺν πόθῳ γὰρ ἡ χάρις the gift is attended by desire to give, Id. Ο. Ο. 1100. 2. c. gen. objecti, π. ἡνιόχοιο 1]. 17. 4393 ἀλλά pe Οδυσ- ojos πόθος αἴνυται Od. 14. 1443 γλυκὺν π. ᾿Αργοῦς Pind. P. 4. 327; ἀνδρῶν πόθῳ Aesch, Pers. 133, cf. Ag. 414; τοῦ βίου δ᾽ οὐδεὶς 7. Soph. El. 822; ἔλαβε [αὐτοὺς] 7600s. . τῆς πόλιος Hdt. 1. 165 ; ἀποθανόντος αὐτοῦ πόθον ἔχειν πάντας Id. 3.67, cf. Soph. Ph. 646, Ar. Ran. 66; so with a possess. Pron., σὸς 7. yearning after thee, Od. 11. 202, cf. Ar. Pax 585; τοὐμῷ π. Soph. O. T. 969, cf. O.C. 419:—pl., πότερα πόθοισι:; was it by reason of regrets? Ib. 332; τὰς ἐν τοῖς θρήνοις καὶ πόθοις ἡδονάς Plat. Phileb. 48 A. II. the longing desire of love, love, desire, Hes. Sc. 41 (who never uses the form 7067), Aesch. Pr. 654, Soph. Tr. 107, 368, Theocr. 2. 143, etc.; πόθου κέντρα Plat. Phaedr. 253 E; τὸν π. τὸν ἐξ ἐμοῦ Soph, Tr. 631 :—generally, desire, πόθῳ θανεῖν (i.e. Tov θανεῖν) Eur. Andr. 824; π. γυναικός Ar. Ran. 55. 2. personified, Aesch. Supp. 1040, where ΠΠόθος and Πειθώ are children of Kumpis ; "Ἔρως καὶ Ἵμερος καὶ Π. Paus. 1. 43, 6; Kump Πόθων μῆτερ, Hor. mater saeva Cupidinum, Anth. P. το. 21. 111. a kind of flower, which was planted on graves, Theophr. H. P. 6. 8, 3. mot; interrog. Adv. (cf. ποῦ) whither? Lat. quo, first in Theogn. 586, then often in Trag. and Att. Prose; ποῖ με χρὴ μολεῖν ; Soph. El. 812; t , ποθέρπω -- ποιέεω. | ποῖ τις φυγῇ ; Ar. Pl. 439; ποῖ τις ἂν τράποιτο; ποῖ τις τρέψεται ; Ib. 374, Thesm. 603; ellipt., ποῖ Κλυταιμνήστρα ; whither has she gone? Aesch. Cho. 882, cf. 405. 2. c. gen., ποῖ χθονός ; ποῖ γῆς; to what spot of earth? Aesch. Supp. 777, Soph. Tr. 984, etc.; ποῖ φροντί- dos; ποῖ φρενῶν ; ποῖ γνώμης; Soph. O. C. 170, 310, Tr. 705; v. κῆχος.---ΤἸὶ differs from πῆ ; in that ποῖ; means whither? Lat. quo? πῆ; which way? where? Lat. qua? ν. Ellendt Lex. Soph. s.v. It never can be used for ποῦ ; Lat. ubi? e.g. in Soph. El. 958, ποῖ μενεῖς ῥᾷθυμος εἰς τίν᾽ ἐλπίδων βλέψασα, it belongs not to μενεῖς, but to βλέψασα; v. sub ποῦ. ΤΙ. to what end? Lat. guorsum? πῶς τε καὶ ποῖ τελευτᾷ; Aesch. Pers. 735, cf. Id. Cho. 732, Herm. Soph. O. C. 227. ἘΠῚ how long? Lat. quousque? ποῖ χρὴ ἀναμεῖναι ; Ar. Lys. 526. B που, enclit. Adv. somewhither, Soph. O. C. 26, Ar. Pl. 447, Plat. Rep. 420 A, etc.; cf. Herm. Soph. Tr. 303.—The relat. form is οἷ, ὅποι.

• From House of Holes: A Book of Raunch (2011)

  It reached her thigh. Shandee handed it a pen and folded back the yellow pad to give it a fresh page. “Where did my roommate go off to?” she asked. “The House of Holes,” the arm wrote. “Would you like to come, too?” “Maybe,” said Shandee. “How?” “If you let me touch you,” he wrote. “Touch where?” said Shandee. “Where it aches.” “It aches in my head,” she said. “Never enough sleep.” “Let me help,” the arm scrawled. She held it, and the hand surged through her hair, and when she steered it around to the back of her neck it massaged the stiffness away. His fingers were mobile and trembly now. She gave him back the pen. “Isn’t there another place that aches?” he wrote. “Yes,” she said, “there is.” He wrote: “TWAT?” “Mhm,” Shandee said. “But I really don’t think I can let you do that until I know you better. You need to be more than an arm to me.” “Take me to class tomorrow,” he wrote. The next morning she fed him some fish paste and drained his waste and wrapped the cloth around his life-support addendum and put him in her bag. In the middle of her nineteenth-century novel class she felt his fingers very gently brushing her calf. She reached down and held his hand and loved how it felt. When she got home that afternoon, she washed the hand carefully in the sink and then took him back to her room and dimmed the lights and put on Appleseed’s “When Are We Going (to Do It).” She said, “I’m ready for you to hold me now, any way you want.” His hand brushed over her lips—she was wearing Terranova again—and she opened her mouth and tasted his fingers, and he circled her tongue and tweaked it, and then as she steadied him he crawled down. She put her feet together and let her knees fall open. His hand found her stash and she looked down and saw his fingers half buried in her folds, and then she felt a warm filling feeling as first one, then two of Dave’s fingers slid inside. She held his arm and helped him angle his fingers in and then pull them out. Then she pulled him up to her clitty and he circled it. “Oh, that’s nice,” she said. Just before she came, he stopped and held his hand up to her mouth. “What is it, baby?” she asked. His fingers made the O and then he pushed the O shape to her mouth. She put her tongue through it, and her mind and neck and body stretched until they were very long and flowed through his fingers, and then his fingers flowed with her. She was pulled in a whoosh of wispiness, and she landed and condensed. Before her was a sign in the grass: “Welcome to the House of Holes.” She looked down at her hands. They were still holding Dave’s arm.

• From The City of God

  And consequently he goes on, "Thou hast holden me by my right hand, and by Thy counsel Thou hast guided me, and with glory hast taken me up;" as if all earthly advantages were left-hand blessings, though, when he saw them enjoyed by the wicked, his feet had almost gone. "For what," he says, "have I in heaven, and what have I desired from Thee upon earth? "He blames himself, and is justly displeased with himself; because, though he had in heaven so vast a possession (as he afterwards understood), he yet sought from his God on earth a transitory and fleeting happiness;--a happiness of mire, we may say. "My heart and my flesh," he says, "fail, O God of my heart. " Happy failure, from things below to things above! And hence in another psalm He says, "My soul longeth, yea, even faileth, for the courts of the Lord. " [424]Yet, though he had said of both his heart and his flesh that they were failing, he did not say, O God of my heart and my flesh, but, O God of my heart; for by the heart the flesh is made clean. Therefore, says the Lord, "Cleanse that which is within, and the outside shall be clean also. " [425]He then says that God Himself,--not anything received from Him, but Himself,--is his portion. "The God of my heart, and my portion for ever. "Among the various objects of human choice, God alone satisfied him. "For, lo," he says, "they that are far from Thee shall perish:Thou destroyest all them that go a-whoring from Thee,"--that is, who prostitute themselves to many gods. And then follows the verse for which all the rest of the psalm seems to prepare:"It is good for me to cleave to God,"--not to go far off; not to go a-whoring with a multitude of gods. And then shall this union with God be perfected, when all that is to be redeemed in us has been redeemed. But for the present we must, as he goes on to say, "place our hope in God. ""For that which is seen," says the apostle, "is not hope. For what a man sees, why does he yet hope for? But if we hope for that we see not, then do we with patience wait for it. " [426]Being, then, for the present established in this hope, let us do what the Psalmist further indicates, and become in our measure angels or messengers of God, declaring His will, and praising His glory and His grace. For when he had said, "To place my hope in God," he goes on, "that I may declare all Thy praises in the gates of the daughter of Zion.

• From House of Holes: A Book of Raunch (2011)

  I’m Canadian Japanese. I believe in supporting Canadian singers.” “Makes sense,” said Wade. “I believe in Canadian art. Also I believe in men who have quite big penises.” “Do they have to be Canadian men?” “No, they can be non-Canadian. They can be from any country. When I said to the computer that I was ready for sex now I specified only men with quite large penises. So I hope you have one. ” “Well, you’ll have to see, won’t you? Your nipples are hard, like dried peas.” “My husband was not honest with me,” said Koizumi. “He had a large penis, and he was very nice, but he was a gay man and he pretended to love me but he couldn’t. He wanted me to have my hair cut very short like a boy. He liked to do me in the anus.” “Did you enjoy that?” asked Wade. “Yes, because of a time I ate a pinecone seed.” “Really? It was eating a pinecone seed that made you like anal sex?” “Yes, it was,” said Koizumi. “When I was thirteen, I wanted a boyfriend. We lived in a small town in northern Saskatchewan. The only friends I had were two sisters, Natasha and Brigid. I told Natasha that I wanted to see a boy without any clothes on, and she said she did, too. So we went to her sister, Brigid, who was older, and we said, ‘Brigid, we would like to see a boy without any clothes on.’ She said, ‘You mean a picture of a boy?’ And we said, ‘No, not a picture, a real boy.’ And she said, ‘Then follow me.’ So we followed her out to the hill behind their house, where there was a tree that had lots of large pinecones on it. Brigid said, ‘Choose a nice pinecone and pull a seed off it and put it in your mouth and chew on it a little and swallow it.’ We asked her what would happen and she said, ‘A special pinecone will grow inside of you. You’ll feel like you’re constipated. In a few hours, you will need to take the biggest poop of your life, and it will hurt a lot when it comes out, but not unbearably.’ And we said, ‘Okay, but how will this help us see a boy naked?’ ” “That would have been my question, too,” said Wade. “Brigid said, ‘The pinecone is called a boycone, and the best place to allow it out is in the creek.’ She said, ‘When it comes out, wash the cone in the creek and it’ll crack open and a miniature boy will hop out, and if you rub him he will grow rapidly until he is a full-sized boy, and you can talk to him and look at him naked.’

• From House of Holes: A Book of Raunch (2011)

  A woman got in line behind him. He turned and recognized her from his seminar. “I enjoyed the class,” said the woman, who had a kindly face and dark hair that didn’t quite touch her shoulders. “I liked how few euphemisms you used. You never once said ‘issue.’ ” “Thanks,” Dennis said. “It was a lot of money for just two days, though.” He asked her what kind of nonprofit work she did, and she told him that she was working on a documentary about women in a remote region of Estonia who sing while they masturbate. “We’ve got some great material,” she said. “It’s just a question of editing it down. We’re looking for investors.” “Ah,” said Dennis. “What’s your name? ” “Mindy.” Just then two different people at the counter said, “I can help you over here.” Dennis the traveling instructor and Mindy the filmmaker went up and paid their bills and signed, and then they were done. They walked toward the door and stopped for a minute feeling a warm breeze. “Your seminar has given me the confidence to ask for what I want,” said Mindy. She’s smart in a certain way that I really like, thought Dennis. And he thought: I really don’t want to walk out of this lobby without talking to her more. “I hate this feeling,” he said finally. “What feeling?” she asked. “The feeling of having just talked to you for a moment and now you’re leaving.” “Would you enjoy a stick of gum?” Mindy asked. “Sometimes gum can alleviate the pain.” “Yes, I would,” said Dennis. She reached in her purse and pulled out a packet of gum. He unwrapped a stick and began chewing it vigorously. Immediately, yellow and pink stars came twirling in from the edge of his vision. “This is good gum!” he said. “It’s special gum,” she said. “Every time you chew, a woman in Estonia is having a singing orgasm.” “Mmm!” He chewed, his jaw working noisily. “Utterly delicious. I could chew this all day long.” He looked down. “What else have you got in that dark, strange purse of yours?” “In here?” she asked, holding the flap open wider so he could peer into its depths. “Why don’t you take a look?” Dennis leaned, bringing his head close to the compartmented opening. He could smell the leathery smell, and he thought he could also smell more sticks of gum, and her checkbook, and her lipstick. But he didn’t smell any money. “Do you have a tiny address book in there?” he asked. “Yes, I do.” “May I reach in and give a squeeze to your tiny little address book?” “You may.”

• From House of Holes: A Book of Raunch (2011)

  [image "decoration" file=image_rsrc2SX.jpg] Dennis, a traveling teacher, went to a city to give his two-day fund-raising seminar for nonprofits, “How to Get Other People to Give You All the Money They Have.” After he was done he waited in line at the hotel to check out. A woman got in line behind him. He turned and recognized her from his seminar. “I enjoyed the class,” said the woman, who had a kindly face and dark hair that didn’t quite touch her shoulders. “I liked how few euphemisms you used. You never once said ‘issue.’ ” “Thanks,” Dennis said. “It was a lot of money for just two days, though.” He asked her what kind of nonprofit work she did, and she told him that she was working on a documentary about women in a remote region of Estonia who sing while they masturbate. “We’ve got some great material,” she said. “It’s just a question of editing it down. We’re looking for investors.” “Ah,” said Dennis. “What’s your name?” “Mindy.” Just then two different people at the counter said, “I can help you over here.” Dennis the traveling instructor and Mindy the filmmaker went up and paid their bills and signed, and then they were done. They walked toward the door and stopped for a minute feeling a warm breeze. “Your seminar has given me the confidence to ask for what I want,” said Mindy. She’s smart in a certain way that I really like, thought Dennis. And he thought: I really don’t want to walk out of this lobby without talking to her more. “I hate this feeling,” he said finally. “What feeling?” she asked. “The feeling of having just talked to you for a moment and now you’re leaving.” “Would you enjoy a stick of gum?” Mindy asked. “Sometimes gum can alleviate the pain.” “Yes, I would,” said Dennis. She reached in her purse and pulled out a packet of gum. He unwrapped a stick and began chewing it vigorously. Immediately, yellow and pink stars came twirling in from the edge of his vision. “This is good gum!” he said. “It’s special gum,” she said. “Every time you chew, a woman in Estonia is having a singing orgasm.” “Mmm!” He chewed, his jaw working noisily. “Utterly delicious. I could chew this all day long.” He looked down. “What else have you got in that dark, strange purse of yours?” “In here?” she asked, holding the flap open wider so he could peer into its depths. “Why don’t you take a look?” Dennis leaned, bringing his head close to the compartmented opening. He could smell the leathery smell, and he thought he could also smell more sticks of gum, and her checkbook, and her lipstick. But he didn’t smell any money. “Do you have a tiny address book in there?” he asked. “Yes, I do.” “May I reach in and give a squeeze to your tiny little address book?”

• From The City of God

  Chapter 12. --To Whose Person the Entreaty for the Promises is to Be Understood to Belong, When He Says in the Psalm, "Where are Thine Ancient Compassions, Lord? " Etc. But the rest of this psalm runs thus:"Where are Thine ancient compassions, Lord, which Thou swarest unto David in Thy truth? Remember, Lord, the reproach of Thy servants, which I have borne in my bosom of many nations; wherewith Thine enemies have reproached, O Lord, wherewith they have reproached the change of Thy Christ. " [1067]Now it may with very good reason be asked whether this is spoken in the person of those Israelites who desired that the promise made to David might be fulfilled to them; or rather of the Christians, who are Israelites not after the flesh but after the Spirit. [1068]This certainly was spoken or written in the time of Ethan, from whose name this psalm gets its title, and that was the same as the time of David's reign; and therefore it would not have been said, "Where are Thine ancient compassions, Lord, which Thou hast sworn unto David in Thy truth? " unless the prophet had assumed the person of those who should come long afterwards, to whom that time when these things were promised to David was ancient. But it may be understood thus, that many nations, when they persecuted the Christians, reproached them with the passion of Christ, which Scripture calls His change, because by dying He is made immortal. The change of Christ, according to this passage, may also be understood to be reproached by the Israelites, because, when they hoped He would be theirs, He was made the Saviour of the nations; and many nations who have believed in Him by the New Testament now reproach them who remain in the old with this:so that it is said, "Remember, Lord, the reproach of Thy servants;" because through the Lord's not forgetting, but rather pitying them, even they after this reproach are to believe. But what I have put first seems to me the most suitable meaning. For to the enemies of Christ who are reproached with this, that Christ hath left them, turning to the Gentiles, [1069] this speech is incongruously assigned, "Remember, Lord, the reproach of Thy servants," for such Jews are not to be styled the servants of God; but these words fit those who, if they suffered great humiliations through persecution for the name of Christ, could call to mind that an exalted kingdom had been promised to the seed of David, and in desire of it, could say not despairingly, but as asking, seeking, knocking, [1070] "Where are Thine ancient compassions, Lord, which Thou swarest unto David in Thy truth? Remember, Lord, the reproach of Thy servants, that I have borne in my bosom of many nations;" that is, have patiently endured in my inward parts.

• From A Greek-English Lexicon (Liddell-Scott) (1957)

  ἵμερος [1], 6: (v. sub fin.): a longing or yearning after, Lat. deside- rium, c. gen. rei, σίτου .. περὶ φρένας ἵμερος αἱρεῖ Il. 11. 80, etc. ; γόου ἵμερον ὦρσεν raised [in them] a yearning after tears, i.e. a desire of the soul to disburden itself in grief (cf.Gen. 43.30), Il.23.14; ὑφ᾽ ἵμερος ὦρτο γόοιο Od. τό. 215, etc.; and with a second gen. (objecti), πατρὸς ὑφ᾽ ἵμερον ὦρσε “γόοιο for his father, 4. 113; cf. ivepdes:—in Hdt., ἵμερον ἔχειν -- ἱμείρεσθαι, c. inf., 5. 106., 7. 433 also, ἵμερος ἔχει pe.. ἰδεῖν Soph. O.C. 1725; tu. ἐπῆλθέ μοι, ἐπείρεσθαι Hat. 1. 30, cf. 9. 3: rare in Att. Prose, as Plat. Phaedr. 251 C, Symp. 197 D:—in pl., πολλοὲ γὰρ εἰς ἐν ἐυμπίτνουσιν ἵμεροι various impulses or emotions, Aesch. Cho. 299. 2. absol. desire, love, Lat. cupido, ὥς ceo νῦν ἔραμαι καί pe γλυκὺς ἵμερος αἱρεῖ 1]. 3. 446; δὸς viv por φιλότητα καὶ ἵμερον 14. 108; so later, γλυκὺς iu. Pind. Ο. 3.58; δαμεὶς φρένας ἱμέρῳ Ib. 1.65 ; ἱμέρῳ πεπληγμένος Aesch. Ag. 544, cf. Pr. 640, etc., Soph. Ant. 795, Tr. 476, Ar. Ran. 59 (v. sub ἐνστάζω) :—much like ἔρως, though it commonly represents the mere animal passion, cf. Luc. Deor. Jud. 15, where he distinguishes ἔρως, ἵμερος, πόθος. 3. as prop. n., Cupid, Nonn. D.1, cf. Hes. Th. 64. 11. as Adj., but only in neut. as Ady., ἵμερον αὐλεῖν Anth. P. 9. 266; ἵμερα μελίζεσθαι, δακρύειν Ib. 7. 30, 364. (Properly iopepos, from ὩΣ, cf. Skt. ish, ekk-hdmi for aiss-kami (desidero), ish-tas (ποθητός), ish-mas (god of love); Sabine ais-os (prayer) ; Slav. is-kati (to seek); O. H. G. eis-cén :—hence ἱμείρω, etc., and id77s.) ἱμερό-φωνος, ov, of lovely voice or song, ἀηδών Sappho 42, Aleman 13 (ubi vulg. ἱεροφ--), Theocr. 28. 7: cf. ἡμερόφωνος. ipéppw [τ], Aeol. for ἱμείρω, q. v. ἱμερτός [1], 7, dv, (ἱμείρων longed for, desired, lovely, epith. of a river, Il. 2.751; of places, Solont. 1; κίθαρις h. Hom. Merc. 510; στέφανοι Hes. Th. 577; λέχος Pind. P. 3.177; ἀοιδαί, δόξα Id. O. 6. το, P. 9. 132; iu. ἡλικίη dear life, Simon. 86; of persons, Anth. P. 5. 298., 9. 524, 525.—Poét. word: Plut. uses ἱμερτόν, ἱμερτά, 2. 394 B, g20F. ἱμερώδης, es, (εἶδος) -- ἱμερόεις, Callistr. Imag. go4. ἵἱμητός [1], 7, dv, (ἱμάω) drawn out as from a well, Hesych. ippevar, poét. for ἔμεναι, ἰέναι, inf. of εἶμι (ébo). ἱμονιά [1], ἡ, (Eas) the rope of a draw-well: generally, a rope, Alex. Tlavy. 3; ἱμονιάν (absol.), a rope’s length, i. e. as long as a bucket takes to go down and come up a well, Ar. Eccl. 351. ἱμονιο-στρόφος, ὁ, a water-drawer, v. sub ἱβαῖος. ἵν, dat. and acc. of the old pers. Pron. ἵ, q. v. iv, Cretic for ἐν, cf, Lat. in, intus, Hesych. ἵν, etv, or ὗν, τό, indecl. a Hebr. liquid measure, Lxx, Eust. 1282. 51.

• From The City of God

  [758] The position of Calama is described by Augustin as between Constantine and Hippo, but nearer Hippo. --Contra I. it. Petil. ii. 228. A full description of it is given in Poujoulat's Histoire de S. Augustin, i. 340, who says it was one of the most important towns of Numidia, eighteen leagues south of Hippo, and represented by the modern Ghelma. It is to its bishop, Possidius, we owe the contemporary Life of Augustin. Chapter 25. --Of True Blessedness, Which This Present Life Cannot Enjoy. However, if we look at this a little more closely, we see that no one lives as he wishes but the blessed, and that no one is blessed but the righteous. But even the righteous himself does not live as he wishes, until he has arrived where he cannot die, be deceived, or injured, and until he is assured that this shall be his eternal condition. For this nature demands; and nature is not fully and perfectly blessed till it attains what it seeks. But what man is at present able to live as he wishes, when it is not in his power so much as to live? He wishes to live, he is compelled to die. How, then, does he live as he wishes who does not live as long as he wishes? or if he wishes to die, how can he live as he wishes, since he does not wish even to live? Or if he wishes to die, not because he dislikes life, but that after death he may live better, still he is not yet living as he wishes, but only has the prospect of so living when, through death, he reaches that which he wishes. But admit that he lives as he wishes, because he has done violence to himself, and forced himself not to wish what he cannot obtain, and to wish only what he can (as Terence has it, "Since you cannot do what you will, will what you can" [759] ), is he therefore blessed because he is patiently wretched? For a blessed life is possessed only by the man who loves it. If it is loved and possessed, it must necessarily be more ardently loved than all besides; for whatever else is loved must be loved for the sake of the blessed life. And if it is loved as it deserves to be,--and the man is not blessed who does not love the blessed life as it deserves,--then he who so loves it cannot but wish it to be eternal. Therefore it shall then only be blessed when it is eternal. [759] Andr. ii. 1, 5.

• From Augustine: A New Biography (2005)

  But the Christian story doesn’t end with death and rebirth: it holds that one must die and be reborn twice, once spiritually and once physically. The time between the two is of indeterminate length and little interest, according to Augustine, both in the Confessions and in City of God, which applies the same narrative principles on a world-historical scale. Falling and rising facilitate narrative: the earthly afterlife, that time between, what he calls in one place “this time between times,”124 is without plot and order. So, without plot, storytelling stops and a new model of existence replaces it, filling books 10 through 13 of the Confessions. Augustine the believer—the object of the narrative, seen at a distance—now has faith but not vision, believes but doesn’t really know and see, and so lives in a perpetual state of longing and a new restless alienation, loving in a new way but still imperfectly. Anxiety is joined by its sibling, hope. Wisdom—so the Augustine of the Confessions will say and believe and enact, though other Augustines we encounter may say and think other things—consists of pining for the divine, hankering after it, and struggling to get momentary glimpses and tastes of it. The language of hankering carries over from sexual love to divine love: I was late in loving you, beauty so old and so new, I was late in loving you. You were inside me and I was outside myself, and I was looking for you out there and went rushing headlong among all the beautiful things you had made, me in my self-made ugliness. You were there for me and I was not with you. All sorts of things distracted me from you, things that wouldn’t have had any meaning without you giving it to them. So you called out to me and shouted and broke through my deafness! You flashed, you gleamed, you chased away my blindness! Your odor flooded me and I took a deep breath and sucked you in! I took a taste, and I hungered and thirsted the more! And then you touched me, and I was all on fire for your peace!125 That’s how the first attempt in the Confessions to show the new life in action ends—enraptured, orgasmic. The next page shows a collapse back into alienation. The rest of the tenth book is the mind-numbing analysis of temptation and its lingering effects, where the bishop shows us himself as far from god as he gets in these postconversion books, very nearly alone, faced with the temptations he might yet submit to. There’s no Calvinist doctrine of assurance here.

• From The City of God

  Chapter 18. --Against Those Who Deny that the Books of the Church are to Be Believed About the Miracles Whereby the People of God Were Educated. Will some one say that these miracles are false, that they never happened, and that the records of them are lies? Whoever says so, and asserts that in such matters no records whatever can be credited, may also say that there are no gods who care for human affairs. For they have induced men to worship them only by means of miraculous works, which the heathen histories testify, and by which the gods have made a display of their own power rather than done any real service. This is the reason why we have not undertaken in this work, of which we are now writing the tenth book, to refute those who either deny that there is any divine power, or contend that it does not interfere with human affairs, but those who prefer their own god to our God, the Founder of the holy and most glorious city, not knowing that He is also the invisible and unchangeable Founder of this visible and changing world, and the truest bestower of the blessed life which resides not in things created, but in Himself. For thus speaks His most trustworthy prophet:"It is good for me to be united to God. " [413]Among philosophers it is a question, what is that end and good to the attainment of which all our duties are to have a relation? The Psalmist did not say, It is good for me to have great wealth, or to wear imperial insignia, purple, sceptre, and diadem; or, as some even of the philosophers have not blushed to say, It is good for me to enjoy sensual pleasure; or, as the better men among them seemed to say, My good is my spiritual strength; but, "It is good for me to be united to God. "This he had learned from Him whom the holy angels, with the accompanying witness of miracles, presented as the sole object of worship. And hence he himself became the sacrifice of God, whose spiritual love inflamed him, and into whose ineffable and incorporeal embrace he yearned to cast himself. Moreover, if the worshippers of many gods (whatever kind of gods they fancy their own to be) believe that the miracles recorded in their civil histories, or in the books of magic, or of the more respectable theurgy, were wrought by these gods, what reason have they for refusing to believe the miracles recorded in those writings, to which we owe a credence as much greater as He is greater to whom alone these writings teach us to sacrifice? [413] Ps. lxxiii. 28.

• From Augustine: A New Biography (2005)

  So he knew his scripture by physical subsets: a volume of Paul, a Psalter, a book of Gospels, and so forth. (At one point he encourages his listeners in a sermon delivered in one of Africa’s larger cities to go out and buy a copy of the Gospels for themselves—they are readily available for sale—and spend time reading it rather than their usual trifles.232) If we look at his history as a reader, the Psalms come first in his affections, Genesis second, Paul’s letters third, and the Gospel of John fourth. Nothing else quite competes. The synoptic gospels he knows well, but they don’t move or impress him with their theological depth the way John does. While he was at Cassiciacum, he wrote to Bishop Ambrose to report his newfound devotion and ask advice on scripture reading. Ambrose replied by suggesting Isaiah, but Augustine made no headway with it. He found it too difficult and put it aside for later. But at no point in his career did the prophets seize his attention. Jerome wrote endless commentaries on the prophets, but Augustine never felt their magic (or dared to compete with the older master). And so we hear less than we might from Augustine about apocalypses and the millennium. He was more literal-minded earlier in his career, more agnostic later, but preaching the last judgment and second coming and reporting the details of that future history are less a concern for him than for many of his contemporaries. The Donatists, on the other hand, were great readers of the prophets and great students of the end times to come. The Psalter was a book he loved and returned to all his life. He carried it with him in Italy, and from the time he became priest at Hippo he immediately started writing short exegetical treatises on individual psalms. Even before he was allowed to preach in his bishop’s church, he wrote sketchy outlines of interpretation of the first thirty-two. Over the next two decades, from his pulpit he would preach and take care to have recorded sermons on all 150 psalms. In the 410s he realized he had come close to a full set and so made sure to dictate a discussion of the 118th Psalm (119 in the modern numbering), for the sake of completeness—that psalm was far too long to make the object of a single sermon. We don’t know how many times Augustine may have performed a given psalm before getting it right, before instructing the scribes to retain a copy (and a few psalms are treated twice in the collection of written sermons). We have just under two dozen other sermons of Augustine on psalm themes, but these are ones where he concentrates on a very few verses of a given psalm. Devoting a whole sermon to part of a psalm was a distinct choice he made, particularly with the longer psalms, arranging to have the scribes at hand to take down what he said.