Love

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 Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)

  My conqueror, who, as he afterwards told me, had been struck with my appearance, and liked me as much as he could think of liking any one in my supposed way of life, asked me briskly at once, if I would be kept by him, and that he would take a lodging for me directly, and relieve me from any engagements he presumed I might be under to the house. Rash, sudden, undigested, even dangerous as this offer might be from a perfect stranger, and that stranger a giddy boy, the prodigious love I was struck with for him, had put a charm into every objection: I not resisting, and blinded me to every objection; I could, at that instant, have died for him: think if I could resist an invitation to live with him! Thus my heart, beating strong to the proposal, dictated my answer, after scarce a minute’s pause, that I would accept of his offer, and make my escape to him in what way he pleased, and that I would be entirely at his disposal, let it be good or bad. I have often since wondered that so great an easiness did not disgust him, or make me too cheap in his eyes, but my fate had so appointed it, that in his fears of the hazzard of the town, he had been some time looking out for a girl to take into keeping, and my person happening to hit his fancy, it was by one of those miracles reserved to love, that we struck the bargain in the instant, which we sealed by an exchange of kisses, that the hopes of a more uninterrupted enjoyment engaged him to content himself with.

• From History of the Christian Church: The Complete Set of Eight Volumes (1858)

  While at Lausanne, Beza was taken sick with the plague. Calvin in writing of this to Farel, under date of June 15, 1551, thus pays his tribute to the character of Beza: "I would not be a man if I did not return his love who loves me more than a brother and reveres me as a father: but I am still more concerned at the loss the church would suffer if in the midst of his career he should be suddenly removed by death, for I saw in him a man whose lovely spirit, noble, pure manners, and open-mindedness endeared him to all the righteous. I hope, however, that he will be given back to us in answer to our prayers." Lausanne was then governed by Bern. It was therefore particularly interested in Bern’s alliance with Geneva, and when this was renewed in 1557, after it had been suffered to lapse a year, Beza considered it very providential. In the spring of that year, 1557, persecution broke out against the neighboring Waldenses, and on nomination of the German clergy and with special permission of Bern, Beza, and Farel began a series of visits through Switzerland and upon the Protestant princes of Germany in the interest of the persecuted. The desire was to stir up the Protestants to unite in an appeal to the king of France. Beza was then thirty-eight years old and had been for eight years a successful teacher and preacher. He was therefore of mature years and established reputation. But what rendered the choice of him still more an ideal one was his aristocratic bearing and his familiarity with court life. He accepted his appointment with alacrity, as a man enters upon a course particularly suited to him. Thus Beza started out upon the first of the many journeys which furnished such unique and invaluable services to the cause of French Protestantism. The two delegates made a favorable impression everywhere. The Lutherans especially were pleased with them, although at first inclined to look askance upon two such avowed admirers and followers of Calvin. But when they had returned full of rejoicing that they had accomplished their design and that the Protestant princes and cantons would unite in petitioning the French king on behalf of the persecuted Waldenses, albeit to small effect, alas! they were called to sharp account because at Göppingen on May 14, 1557, they had defined their doctrine of the Eucharist in terms which emphasized the points of agreement and passed by those of disagreement.1284 This was in the interest of peace. They rightly felt that it would be shameful to shipwreck their Christian attempt upon the shoals of barren controversy. But the odium theologicum compelled their home friends to charge them with disloyalty to the truth! Calvin, however, raised his voice in defence of Beza’s conduct, and the strife of tongues quickly ceased,

• From The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (2007)

  For example, I imagined that Arnold sketched his friend Gordy as he studied in the library, concentrating on the weird way Gordy rested his face on his hand with his intent facial expression and the curve of his shoulders. Arnold was using his sketchbook to love Gordy, in a way. Other pencil sketches, like the portrait of Eugene on a motorcycle, suggest that he drew them from a photograph. He wanted to spend time with those people, but for some reason—logistically, or emotionally—couldn’t do it in person. One other detailed style was for the Penelope bird. When Arnold drew that, he was thinking about how he loved Penelope and how they both wanted to fly away. I thought he might sit with that feeling for a while and I imagined he was in the school library copying a bird out of a textbook. Arnold would sit and draw very meditatively in ink—all the feathers, using shading, crosshatching, and even little dots. Can you explain how the portrait of Rowdy evolved from being a straight-on elegant sketch to one that was defaced? I actually did a similar thing in one of my own sketchbooks several years ago. I was in a terrible mood, and was drawing a self-portrait to get it out of my system. I was about half-done and I hated it, so I scribbled a big “X” over my whole face. When I looked at it later, I realized that it reflected my mood much better than if I’d actually finished the drawing. The drawing of Rowdy is meant to be a vignette, describing the particular intimacy in Arnold and Rowdy’s friendship. Rowdy was much more defensive than Arnold about how close they were, and was constantly pulling Arnold to him and pushing him away, often at the same time. I pictured the scene like this: Rowdy was lying on the floor in an unself-conscious way. Arnold was sneakily drawing a portrait of him, but when Arnold was only half-done, Rowdy looked up and snapped, “What’re you drawing?!” The scene changed from intimacy to defensiveness with Arnold stopping and scribbling the cartoon face over Rowdy’s face, with the word balloon of Rowdy’s verbal slap. I hadn’t planned all that out when I started doing the sketch, but when I was half-done, I realized that Arnold wouldn’t have been able to pin Rowdy down for very long. I took a piece of tracing paper and scribbled an angry cartoon face over Rowdy’s face, and that looked just right to me. What do you feel is the biggest contribution your artwork brings to the book? Arnold depends on his cartoons to express himself, be understood, to escape, and to survive. He says they are his “tiny little lifeboats.” The reader needs to see what he’s talking about and what he means by that.

• From The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (2007)

  The thing is, whether we were talking about basketball or girls or school or anything else, Randy was the first person who always, always, always made me feel loved. Made me feel appreciated. Made me feel understood. And yeah, in the meantime he was fighting and arguing with almost everybody else. With kids and adults. But he was always good to me. And so I started to believe that I was good. I started to believe I was great. More than that, I started to believe that a little Indian boy like me could compete against white people. Do you remember how it felt to be so Indian and so poor and so powerless? And it felt like you would lose to white people? That you’d always lose to white people? Well, Randy didn’t believe that. And he wouldn’t let me believe it, either. He wouldn’t let me believe I was inferior to white people. Or to other Indians. Randy had so much faith in me. It was amazing. And it feels weird to say this. It sounds hurtful, maybe. But I think Randy’s faith in me gave me the faith to leave the reservation school and transfer to Reardan. I think about my older son. He was really sick when he was born, and he needed a lot of speech therapy and physical therapy as he grew older. For a few years, he did hippotherapy. I know that sounds like he rode hippos. Ha! But actually he rode horses as a way to build up his muscles and his confidence. And one day as he was riding, the horse trainer said that my son was “borrowing the strength of the horse until he could find his own.” So I’m not calling Randy a horse here, but I think that I borrowed his strength. I think I absolutely needed to borrow his strength in Wellpinit, on the reservation, until I found my own strength off the reservation. And you guys mostly know what happened in high school. I became a basketball star in Reardan. Eventually, Randy left Wellpinit a couple years after I did. He went back to school in Springdale and became a basketball star, too. We never played each other in high school, though, because his teams were terrible and my teams were good. Ha! I had to talk trash one more time. You see, at Reardan, I played with white boys who were good at basketball. At Springdale, Randy played with white boys who weren’t good. Ha! Randy and I became friendly again over the years, mostly because of basketball. In all-star high school tournaments. And then in all-Indian tournaments after high school. I remember when I hit two clutch free throws to beat his team in an all-Indian tournament in Springdale.

• From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)

  I had quite lost my senses.' "He stopped for a moment to look at me, and then,—'How I love you, my Camille!' he went on, showering kisses on me; 'I have loved you to distraction from the very moment I saw you.' "Then I began to tell him how I had suffered in trying to overcome my love for him; how I was haunted by his presence day and night; how happy I was at last. "'And now you must take my place. You must make me feel what you felt. You will now be active and I passive; but we must try another position, for it is really tiresome to stand after all the fatigue we have undergone.' "'And what am I to do, for you know I am quite a novice?' "'Sit down there,' he replied, pointing to a stool constructed for the purpose, 'I'll ride on you whilst you impale me as if I were a woman. It is a mode of locomotion of which the ladies are so fond that they put it into practice whenever they get the slightest chance. My mother actually rode a gentleman under my very eyes. I was in the parlour when a friend happened to call, and had I been sent out suspicions might have been aroused, so I was made to believe that I was a very naughty little boy, and I was put in a corner with my face to the wall. Moreover, she told me that if I cried or turned round she'd put me to bed; but if I were good she'd give me a cake. I obeyed for one or two minutes, but after that, hearing an unusual rustle, and a loud breathing and panting, I saw what I could not understand at the time, but what was clear to me many years afterwards.' "He sighed, shrugged his shoulders, then smiled and added,—'Well, sit down there.' "I did as I was bidden. He first knelt down to say his prayers to Priapus—which was, after all, a more dainty bit to kiss than the old Pope's gouty toe—and having bathed and tickled the little god with his tongue, he got a-straddle over me. As he had already lost his maidenhood long ago, my rod entered far more easily in him than his had done in me, nor did I give him the pain that I had felt, although my tool is of no mean size. "He stretched his hole open, the tip entered, he moved a little, half the phallus was plunged in; he pressed down, lifted himself up, then came down again; after one or two strokes the whole turgid column was lodged within his body. When he was well impaled he put his arms round my neck, and hugged and kissed me. "'Do you regret having given yourself to me?' he asked, pressing me convulsively as if afraid to lose me.

• From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)

  "Soon they were in his apartment. "She looked timidly around, and seeing herself in that young man's room alone with him, she blushed and seemed thoroughly ashamed of herself. "'Oh! Réné,' said she, 'what must you think of me?' "'That you love me dearly,' quoth he; 'do you not?' "'Yes, indeed; not wisely, but too well.' "Thereupon, taking off her wrappers, she rushed up and clasped her lover in her arms, showering her warm kisses on his head, his eyes, his cheeks and then upon his mouth. That mouth I so longed to kiss! "With lips pressed together, she remained for some time inhaling his breath, and—almost frightened at her boldness—she touched his lips with the tip of her tongue. Then, taking courage, soon afterwards she slipped it in his mouth, and then after a while, she thrust it in and out, as if she were enticing him to try the act of nature by it; she was so convulsed with lust by this kiss that she had to clasp herself to him not to fall, for the blood was rushing to her head, and her knees were almost giving way beneath her. At last, taking his right hand, after squeezingly it hesitatingly for a moment, she placed it within her breasts, giving him her nipple to pinch, and as he did so, the pleasure she felt was so great that she was swooning away for joy. "'Oh, Teleny!' said she; 'I can't! I can't any more.' "And she rubbed herself as strongly as she could against him, protruding her middle parts against his." "And Teleny?" "Well, jealous as I was, I could not help feeling how different his manner was now from the rapturous way with which he had clung to me that evening, when he had taken the bunch of heliotrope from his button-hole and had put it in mine. "He accepted rather than returned her caresses. Anyhow, she seemed pleased, for she thought him shy. "She was now hanging on him. One of her arms was clasped around his waist, the other one around his neck. Her dainty, tapering bejewelled fingers were playing with his curly hair, and paddling his neck. "He was squeezing her breasts, and, as I said before, slightly fingering her nipples. "She gazed deep into his eyes, and then sighed. "'You do not love me,' at last she said. 'I can see it in your eyes. You are not thinking of me, but of somebody else.' "And it was true. At that moment he was thinking of me—fondly, longingly; and then, as he did so, he got more excited, and he caught her in his arms, and hugged and kissed her with far more eagerness than he had hitherto done—nay, he began to suck her tongue as if it had been mine, and then began to thrust his own into her mouth.

• From The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (2007)

  I couldn’t believe how many trophies he’d won. The first time I went to his house, I had to pick up and study every trophy. He was great at everything. Football, baseball, track, wrestling, boxing. I didn’t even play any of those sports. And he was better at basketball. At first. And I hate to say this at Randy’s funeral, with him right there in his coffin, unable to talk trash back to me, but I eventually ended up being a better basketball player than he was. I think he knew it, too. But he never admitted it. Randy would never admit to something like that. We played against each other only twice. In eighth grade. When I was at Reardan and he was still at Wellpinit. Randy won that first game in Wellpinit, when Billy Shawn and Marty Andrews were the refs. They weren’t even real refs. They were high school kids. And they fouled me out in the third quarter. But back in Reardan, when we had real refs, we swamped Wellpinit. We won the game by thirty points. And I guarded Randy and held him to two points. It would have been zero points, but my own teammate tripped me on the last play of the game, and Randy broke free and got a layup. They’d lost the game by thirty points, but Randy still talked trash at me because he’d scored that last hoop. He talked trash about that for years. “Remember that time when I faked you out and you fell down and I drove for that layup?” he’d say. “I got tripped,” I’d say. “And that was your only basket of the game.” “I don’t remember that,” he’d say. “And we beat you by thirty.” “Don’t remember that, either.” Randy and I never stopped being competitive. But basketball wasn’t the best thing that we shared. You see, Randy was the first person who really listened to me. I’d stay the night at his house. He’d sleep on the bottom bunk, and I’d be on the top bunk. And I would do most of the talking. Wherever I’ve gone in my life, I’ve usually done most of the talking. Talk, talk, talk, that’s me. So Randy and I would stay awake all night, and I would talk about the girls I loved. Some of you girls are in this room. You’re women now, and I’m still a little bit in love with some of you. Ha! No, I’m not going to say who. But, hey, none of you loved me back. Not as a boyfriend. So my heart was always broken. I would talk about you, the girls I loved who did not love me back, and I would cry. I would cry hard . Randy never made fun of me for crying. He would listen and listen and listen, and he would tell me that you girls didn’t deserve my love.

• From The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (2007)

  “You just have to send me postcards,” he said. “You have to be a postcard Indian. You have to send me postcards from everywhere in the world.” Well, I don’t think I ever sent one postcard to Randy J. Peone. But I wrote a novel about him. And I’ve discovered that millions of people love the fictional version of Randy. Randy, I don’t know if you knew how important Rowdy has become to people. And I never told you how important you have always been to me. We didn’t talk about things like that. We didn’t talk about us. But I do know some good things. I am a storyteller because you listened to me. I am alive because you lived. And, like I said earlier, I don’t believe in magic. I don’t believe in God, either. But I thank God anyway for you. I thank God you stepped into that sixth-grade classroom and asked me my name. Dear Randy J. Peone, dear Rowdy, I love you so much. And I will miss you forever. Personal Photos from Sherman [image "A photograph of Sherman and his siblings Arnold, Kim and Arlene surrounding their father." file=image_rsrc4TH.jpg] Arnold, my big brother; my younger sisters, twins Kim and Arlene; and me piling on my father, Sherman Alexie Sr. It was taken by my mother in 1971 in our nineteenth-century house on the Spokane Indian Reservation. At this point, we lived in our one-bedroom house with our big sister, Mary; my father’s grandmother Lizzie and his great-uncle Stubby; and five adult cousins, Johnny, Tinker, Bill, Eugene, and Sam. [image "Sherman, Arnold and their father pose with raised fists, all shirtless." file=image_rsrc4TJ.jpg] Me, my big brother, and my father pretending to be Bruce Lee. It was taken by my mother in 1975 in our house constructed by the Department of Housing and Urban Development. My father had just returned from a ten-day drinking binge, and we were happy to have him home. [image "Arnold jumps to shoot a basketball while another player defends. Other players and spectators are visible in the background." file=image_rsrc4TK.jpg] Reardan High School Annual, 1985 This is me, six feet two inches and 145 pounds, hitting a jumper against Harrington High School during my senior year. We were an undersized and underdog team that year but won our district playoffs by defeating Ritzville and Davenport, who finished second and third in the Class B state tournament. We lost our two games in the state tourney, and I still have nightmares about those losses. [image "The late Randy J. Peone sitting at a desk holding a phone with papers and a wall with drawings behind them" file=image_rsrc4TM.jpg] Springdale High School Annual, 1985 The late Randy J. Peone, my childhood best friend and the inspiration for Rowdy. I will miss him forever.

• From History of the Christian Church: The Complete Set of Eight Volumes (1858)

  But by the grace of God I am what I am; and his grace which was bestowed upon me was not in vain; but I labored more abundantly than they all: yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me."376 This confession contains, in epitome, the whole meaning of his life and work. The idea of justification by the free grace of God in Christ through a living faith which makes Christ and his merits our own and leads to consecration and holiness, is the central idea of Paul’s Epistles. His whole theology, doctrinal, ethical, and practical, lies, like a germ, in his conversion; but it was actually developed by a sharp conflict with Judaizing teachers who continued to trust in the law for righteousness and salvation, and thus virtually frustrated the grace of God and made Christ’s death unnecessary and fruitless. Although Paul broke radically with Judaism and opposed the Pharisaical notion of legal righteousness at every step and with all his might, he was far from opposing the Old Testament or the Jewish people. Herein he shows his great wisdom and moderation, and his infinite superiority over Marcion and other ultra- and pseudo-Pauline reformers. He now expounded the Scriptures as a direct preparation for the gospel, the law as a schoolmaster leading to Christ, Abraham as the father of the faithful. And as to his countrymen after the flesh, he loved them more than ever before. Filled with the amazing love of Christ who had pardoned him, "the chief of sinners," he was ready for the greatest possible sacrifice if thereby he might save them. His startling language in the ninth chapter of the Romans is not rhetorical exaggeration, but the genuine expression of that heroic self-denial and devotion which animated Moses, and which culminated in the sacrifice of the eternal Son of God on the cross of Calvary.377 Paul’s conversion was at the same time his call to the apostleship, not indeed to a place among the Twelve (for the vacancy of Judas was filled), but to the independent apostleship of the Gentiles.378 Then followed an uninterrupted activity of more than a quarter of a century, which for interest and for permanent and ever-growing usefulness has no parallel in the annals of history, and affords an unanswerable proof of the sincerity of his conversion and the truth of Christianity.379 Analogous Conversions. God deals with men according to their peculiar character and condition. As in Elijah’s vision on Mount Horeb, God appears now in the mighty rushing wind that uproots the trees, now in the earthquake that rends the rocks, now in the consuming fire, now in the still small voice. Some are suddenly converted, and can remember the place and hour; others are gradually and imperceptibly changed in spirit and conduct; still others grow up unconsciously in the Christian faith from the mother’s knee and the baptismal font.

• From History of the Christian Church: The Complete Set of Eight Volumes (1858)

  Though unseen, he is loved beyond all human beings. I see Thee not, I hear Thee not, Yet art Thou oft with me; And earth hath ne’er so dear a spot, As when I meet with Thee." Jesus no doubt accommodated himself in dress and general appearance to the customs of his age and people, and avoided all ostentation. He probably passed unnoticed through busy crowds. But to the closer observer he must have revealed a spiritual beauty and an overawing majesty in his countenance and personal bearing. This helps to explain the readiness with which the disciples, forsaking all things, followed him in boundless reverence and devotion. He had not the physiognomy of a sinner. He had more than the physiognomy of a saint. He reflected from his eyes and countenance the serene peace and celestial purity of a sinless soul in blessed harmony with God. His presence commanded reverence, confidence and affection. In the absence of authentic representation, Christian art in its irrepressible desire to exhibit in visible form the fairest among the children of men, was left to its own imperfect conception of ideal beauty. The church under persecution in the first three centuries, was averse to pictorial representations of Christ, and associated with him in his state of humiliation (but not in his state of exaltation) the idea of uncomeliness, taking too literally the prophetic description of the suffering Messiah in the twenty-second Psalm and the fifty-third chapter of Isaiah. The victorious church after Constantine, starting from the Messianic picture in the forty-fifth Psalm and the Song of Solomon, saw the same Lord in heavenly glory, "fairer than the children of men" and "altogether lovely." Yet the difference was not so great as it is sometimes represented. For even the ante-Nicene fathers (especially Clement of Alexandria), besides expressly distinguishing between the first appearance of Christ in lowliness and humility, and his second appearance in glory and, majesty, did not mean to deny to the Saviour even in the days of his flesh a higher order of spiritual beauty, "the glory of the only-begotten of the Father full of grace and truth," which shone through the veil of his humanity, and which at times, as on the mount of transfiguration, anticipated his future glory. "Certainly," says Jerome, "a flame of fire and starry brightness flashed from his eye, and the majesty of the God head shone in his face." The earliest pictures of Christ, in the Catacombs, are purely symbolic, and represent him under the figures of the Lamb, the good Shepherd, the Fish. The last has reference to the Greek word Ichthys, which contains the initials of the words jIhsou'" Cristov" Qeou' JUio;" Swth;r. "Jesus Christ, Son of God, Saviour." Real pictures of Christ in the early church would have been an offence to the Jewish, and a temptation and snare to the heathen converts.

• From History of the Christian Church: The Complete Set of Eight Volumes (1858)

  Without the least disposition to detract from the merits of my numerous predecessors, to several of whom I feel deeply indebted, I have reason to hope that this new attempt at a historical reproduction of ancient Christianity will meet a want in our theological literature and commend itself, both by its spirit and method, and by presenting with the author’s own labors the results of the latest German and English research, to therespectful attention of the American student. Having no sectarian ends to serve, I have confined myself to the duty of a witness—to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth; always remembering, however, that history has a soul as well as a body, and that the ruling ideas and general principles must be represented no less than the outward facts and dates. A church history without the life of Christ glowing through its pages could give us at best only the picture of a temple stately and imposing from without, but vacant and dreary within, a mummy in praying posture perhaps and covered with trophies, but withered and unclean: such a history is not worth the trouble of writing or reading. Let the dead bury their dead; we prefer to live among the living, and to record the immortal thoughts and deeds of Christ in and through his people, rather than dwell upon the outer hulls, the trifling accidents and temporary scaffolding of history, or give too much prominence to Satan and his infernal tribe, whose works Christ came to destroy. The account of the apostolic period, which forms the divine-human basis of the whole structure of history, or the ever-living fountain of the unbroken stream of the church, is here necessarily short and not intended to supersede my larger work, although it presents more than a mere summary of it, and views the subject in part under new aspects. For the history of the second period, which constitutes the body of this volume, large use has been made of the new sources of information recently brought to light, such as the Syriac and Armenian Ignatius, and especially the Philosophoumena of Hippolytus. The bold and searching criticism of modern German historians as applied to the apostolic and post-apostolic literature, though often arbitrary and untenable in its results, has nevertheless done good service by removing old prejudices, placing many things in a new light, and conducing to a comprehensive and organic view of the living process and gradual growth of ancient Christianity in its distinctive character, both in its unity with, and difference from, the preceding age of the apostles and the succeeding systems of Catholicism and Protestantism. And now I commit this work to the great Head of the church with the prayer that, under his blessing, it may aid in promoting a correct knowledge of his

• From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)

  In our cessations from active pleasure, Charles framed himself one, in instructing me, as far as his own lights reached, in a great many points of life, that I was, in consequence of my no-education, perfectly ignorant of: nor did I suffer one word to fall in vain from the mouth of my lovely teacher: I hung on every syllable he uttered, and received, as oracles, all he said; whilst kisses were all the interruption I could not refuse myself the pleasure of admitting, from lips that breathed more than Arabian sweetness, I was in a little time enabled, by the progress I had made, to prove the deep regard I had paid to all that he had said to me: repeating it to him almost word for word; and to shew that I was not entirely the parrot, but that I reflected upon, that I entered into it, I joined my own comments, and asked him questions of explanation. My country accent, and the rusticity of my gait, manners, and deportment, began now sensibly to wear off: so quick was my observation, and so efficacious my desire of growing every day worthier of his heart. As to money, though, he brought me constantly all he received, it was with difficulty he even got me to give it room in my bureau; and what clothes I had, he could prevail on me to accept of on no other foot, than that of pleasing him by the greater neatness in my dress, beyond which I had no ambition. I could have made a pleasure of the greatest toil, and worked my fingers to the bone, with joy, to have supported him: guess, then, if I could harbour any idea of being burthensome to him, and this disinterested turn in me was so unaffected, so much the dictate of my heart, that Charles could not but feel it: and if he did not love me as much as I did him (which was the constant and only matter of sweet contention between us), he managed so, at least, as to give me the satisfaction of believing it impossible for man to be more tender, more true, more faithful than he was.

• From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)

  "'Now that I think it over, I believe that he would like to have us both together, so that we might form a kind of trinity of love and bliss.' "'And you think he tried to bring it about in that way.' "'In love and in war, every stratagem is good; and perhaps with him, as with the Jesuits, "the end justifies the means." Anyhow, forget this note completely, let it be like a mid-winter night's dream.' "Then, taking the obnoxious bit of paper, he placed it on the glowing embers; first it writhed and crackled, then a sudden flame burst forth and consumed it. An instant afterwards, it was nothing but a little, black, crumpled thing, on which tiny, fiery snakes were hastily chasing and then swallowing each other as they met. "Then came a puff from the crackling logs, and it mounted and disappeared up the chimney like a little black devil. "Naked as we were on the low couch in front of the fireplace, we clasped and hugged each other fondly. "'It seemed to threaten us before it disappeared, did it not? I hope Briancourt will never come between us.' "'We'll defy him,' said my friend, smiling; and taking hold of my phallus and of his own, he brandled them both. 'This,' said he, 'is the most efficient exorcism in Italy against the evil eye. Moreover he has doubtless forgotten both you and me by this time—nay, even the very idea of having written this note.' "'Why?' "'Because he has found out a new lover.' "'Who, the Spahi officer?' "'No, a young Arab. Anyhow we'll know who it is by the subject of the picture he is going to paint. Some time ago he was only dreaming of a pendant to the three Graces, which to him represented the mystic trinity of tribadism.' "A few days afterwards we met Briancourt in the green room of the Opera. When he saw us, he looked away and tried to shun us. I would have done the same. "'No,' said Teleny, 'let us go and speak to him and have matters out. In such things never shew the slightest fear. If you face the enemy boldly, you have already half vanquished him.' Then, going up to him and dragging me with him,—'Well,' said he, stretching out his hand, 'what has become of you? It is some days since we have seen each other.' "'Of course,' replied he, 'new friends make us forget old ones.' "'Like new pictures old ones. By the bye, what sketch have you begun?' "'Oh, something glorious!—a picture that will make a mark, if any does.' "'But what is it?' "'Jesus Christ.' "'Jesus Christ?' "'Yes, since I knew Achmet, I have been able to understand the Saviour. You would love Him, too,' added he, 'if you could see those dark, mesmeric eyes, with their long and jetty fringe.'

• From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)

  "'And if I were unfaithful?' "'Teleny,' said I, feeling faint, 'you have another lover.' And I saw him in the arms of someone else, tasting that bliss which was mine and mine alone. "'No,' said he, 'I have not; but if I had?' "'You would love him—or her, and then my life would be blasted for ever.' "'No, not for ever; only for a time, perhaps. But could you not forgive me?' "'Yes, if you still loved me.' "The idea of losing him sent a sharp pang through my heart, which seemed to act like a sound flagellation, my eyes were filled with tears, and my blood was on fire. I therefore clasped him in my arms and hugged him, straining all my muscles in my embrace; my lips eagerly sought his, my tongue was in his mouth. The more I kissed him the sadder I grew, and the more eager was my desire. I stopped a moment to look at him. How handsome he was that day! His beauty was almost ethereal. "I can see him now with that aureole of hair so soft and silky, the colour of a golden ray of sunshine playing through a crystal goblet of topaz-coloured wine, with his moist half-opened mouth, Oriental in its voluptuousness, with his blood-red lips which no illness had withered like those of the painted, musk-scented courtezans who sell a few moments of carrion bliss for gold, nor discoloured like those of pale, wasp-waisted, anæmic virgins, whose monthly menses have left in their veins nothing but a colourless fluid instead of ruby blood. "And those luminous eyes, in which an innate, sullen fire seemed to temper the lust of the carnal mouth, just as his cheeks, almost child-like in their innocent, peachy roundness, contrasted with the massive throat so full of manly vigour,— ⁠'and a form indeed. Where every god did seem to set his seal To give the world assurance of a man.' Let the listless, orris-scented æsthete in love with a shadow, scourge me after this for the burning, maddening passion which his virile beauty excited in my breast. Well—yes, I am like the men of fervent blood born on the volcanic soil of Naples, or under the glowing sun of the East; and, after all, I would rather be like Brunette Latun—a man who loved his fellow-men,—than like Dante, who sent them all to hell, whilst he himself went to that effete place called heaven, with a languid vision of his own creation. "Teleny returned me my kisses with the passionate eagerness of despair.

• From Mud Vein (2014)

  We walked up to my house together. When I closed the door behind us, he took my mail from my hands. I watched as he set it on the table next to the door. A single, white envelope slipped off the edge and slid to the floor. It skidded to a stop behind Isaac’s right heel. He turned to me and took my face in his hands. I wanted to keep looking at the safe white of that envelope, but he was right there, making me look at him. His gaze was slicing. Sluicing. There was too much emotion. He kissed me with color, with drumbeat, and a surgeon’s precision. He kissed me with who he was, the sum of his life—and it was all encompassing. I wondered what I kissed him with since I was only broken parts. When he stopped kissing me I felt the loss. His lips, for a brief moment, touched my darkness, and there was a glimpse of light. His hands were still in my hair, touching my scalp, and we were only a nose apart as we looked at each other. “I’m not ready for this,” I said softly. “I know.” He shifted positions until he had me wrapped up in his arms. A hug. This was far more intimate than anything I’d done with a man in years. My face was underneath his chin, pressed to his collarbone. “Goodnight, Senna.” “Goodnight, Isaac.” He let me go, took a step back, and left. His impressions were so short and so acute. I listened to the hum of his car as it left my driveway. There was a small kick of gravel as he pulled onto the street. When he was gone everything was still and quiet as it always was. Everything but me. Part Three Anger and Bargaining [image file=image26.jpg] Out of the walls, music begins to play. We stand frozen, looking at each other, the whites of our eyes expanding with each beat. There is an invisible chord between us; there has been since Isaac saw my pain and accepted it as his own. I can feel it tugging as the music accelerates and Isaac and I stand immobilized by shock. I want to step into the circle of his arms and hide my face in his neck. I am frightened. I can feel the fear in the hollows of my mind. It’s pounding like a doomsday drum. Dum Da-Dum Dum Da-Dum Florence Welch is singing Landscape through our prison walls. “Get warm clothes,” he says, without taking his eyes from mine. “Layer everything you have. We are getting out of here.” I run.

• From Mud Vein (2014)

  “I know,” he smiles. “The entire session was me trying not to tell her things that could get me kidnapped.” We get serious. “How are you?” he asks cautiously. I appreciate the way he’s tiptoeing around my feelings, but we are a little too crushed for such gentle sentiments. For the first time, I answer him. “Shitty.” The corner of his mouth turns up. Just one corner. It’s his trademark. “That’s better than being closed off, I guess,” he says. I feel emotion rush me—the intimacy, the awkwardness. I want to revolt against it, but I don’t. It takes an awful toll on a person to fight down everything they’re feeling. Elgin tried to tell me that once. The bitch. “I heard about your prognosis…” “I’m okay with it,” I say quickly. “It just … is.” He looks like he has a million things to say, and he can’t. “I wanted to come see you, Senna. I just didn’t know how.” “You didn’t know how to come see me?” I ask, partially amused. He looks at my eyes, in them. So sadly. “It’s okay,” I say, slowly. “I get it.” “What do we do now?” he asks. I don’t know if he’s asking how we are supposed to live, or how we are supposed to finish this conversation. I don’t ever know what to do. “We live then we leave,” I say. “Do the best we can.” He runs his tongue along the inside of his bottom lip. It puffs out and settles back down. It reminds me of when you’re baking a cake and you open the oven too early. I toy with the jagged edges of my hair, glancing up at him every so often. “Are things good? With you and Daphne?” I have no right to ask him, none at all. Especially considering that everything Elgin did was because of me. “No,” he says. “How can they be?” He shakes his head. “She has been supportive. I can’t complain there, but it was like they gave me a month and then they wanted the old me back. They being my family,” he tells me. “But I don’t know how to be him. I’m different.” Isaac was always so honest with his emotions. I wish I could be like that. I feel as if I need to say something. “I don’t have anyone to disappoint,” I confess. “I don’t know if that makes it easier or harder.” He looks startled. His black scrubs wrinkle as he leans toward me. “You’re loved,” he says. Love is a possession; it’s something that you own from the layers of people in your life. But if my life were a cake it would be un-layered, unbaked, missing ingredients. I isolated myself too soundly to own anyone’s love. “I love you,” says Isaac. “From the moment you ran out of the woods, I’ve loved you.”

• From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)

  I could not see this amiable criminal, so suddenly the first object of my love, and as suddenly of my just hate, on his knees, bedewing my hands with his tears, without relenting. He was still stark-naked, but my modesty had been already too much wounded, in essentials, to be so much shocked as I should have otherwise been with appearances only; in short, my anger ebbed so fast, and the tide of love returned so strong upon me, that I felt it a point of my own happiness to forgive him. The reproaches I made him were murmured in so soft a tone, my eyes met his with such glances, expressing more languor than resentment, that he could not but presume his forgiveness was at no desperate distance; but still he would not quit his posture of submission, till I had pronounced his pardon in form; which after the most fervent entreaties, protestations, and promises, I had not the power to withhold. On which, with the utmost marks of a fear of again offending, he ventured to kiss my lips, which I neither declined nor resented: but on my mild expostulation with him upon the barbarity of his treatment, he explained the mystery of my ruin, if not entirely to the clearance, at least much to the alleviation of his guilt, in the eyes of a judge so partial in his favour as I was grown. “It seems that the circumstance of his going down, or sinking, which in my extreme ignorance I had mistaken for something very fatal, was no other than a trick of diving, which I had not ever heard, or at least attended o, the mention of: and he was so long-breathed at it, that in the few moments in which I ran out to save him, he had not yet emerged, before I fell into the swoon, in which, as he rose, seeing me extended on the bank, his first idea was, that some young woman was upon some design of frolic or diversion with him, for he knew I could not have fallen asleep there without his having seen me before: agreebly to which notion he had ventured to approach, and finding me without sign of life, and still perplexed as he was what to think of the adventure, he took me in his arms at all hazards, and carried me into the summer-house, of which he observed the door open: there he laid me down on the couch, and tried, as he protested in good faith, by several means to bring me to myself again, till fired, as he said, beyond all bearing by the sight and touch of several parts of me, which were unguardedly exposed to him, he could no longer govern his passion; and the less, as he was not quite sure that his first idea of this swoon being a feint, was not the very truth of the case; seduced then by this flattering notion, and overcome by the present, as he styled them, super-human temptations, combined with the solitude and seeming security of the attempt, he was not enough his own master not to make it.

• From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)

  "I looked at him, and shuddered. So young, so beautiful, and I was thus to murder him! The vision of Antinöus as I had seen it the first time he played appeared before me. "He had tied the scarf tightly round his waist, and he was about to pass it around me. "'Come.' "The die was cast. I had not the right to accept such a sacrifice from him. "'No,' quoth I, 'let us live.' "'Live,' added he, 'and then?' "He did not speak for some moments, as if waiting for a reply to that question which had not been framed in words. In answer to his mute appeal I stretched out my hands towards him. He—as if frightened that I should escape him—hugged me tightly with all the strength of irrepressible desire. "'I love you!' he whispered, 'I love you madly! I cannot live without you any longer.' "'Nor can I,' said I, faintly; 'I have struggled against my passion in vain, and now I yield to it, not tamely, but eagerly, gladly. I am your's, Teleny! Happy to be your's, your's for ever and your's alone!' "For all answer there was a stifled hoarse cry from his innermost breast; his eyes were lighted up with a flash of fire; his craving amounted to rage; it was that of the wild beast seizing his prey; that of the lonely male finding at last a mate. Still his intense eagerness was more than that; it was also a soul issuing forth to meet another soul. It was a longing of the senses, and a mad intoxication of the brain. "Could this burning, unquenchable fire that consumed our bodies be called lust? We clung as hungrily to one another as the famished animal does when it fastens on the food it devours; and as we kissed each other with ever-increasing greed, my fingers were feeling his curly hair, or paddling the soft skin of his neck. Our legs being clasped together, his phallus, in strong erection, was rubbing against mine no less stiff and stark. We were, however, always shifting our position, so as to get every part of our bodies in as close a contact as possible; and thus feeling, clasping, hugging, kissing, and biting each other, we must have looked, on that bridge amidst the thickening fog, like two damned souls suffering eternal torment.

• From An Unquiet Mind: A Memoir of Moods and Madness (1995)

  These comings and goings, this grace and godlessness, have become such a part of my life that the wild colors and sounds now have become less strange and less strong; and the blacks and grays that inevitably follow are, likewise, less dark and frightening. “Beneath those stars,” Melville once said, “is a universe of gliding monsters.” But, with time, one has encountered many of the monsters, and one is increasingly less terrified of those still to be met. Although I continue to have emergences of my old summer manias, they have been gutted not only of most of their terror, but of most of their earlier indescribable beauty and glorious rush as well: sludged by time, tempered by a long string of jading experiences, and brought to their knees by medication, they now coalesce, each July, into brief, occasionally dangerous cracklings together of black moods and high passions. And then they, too, pass. One comes out of such experiences with a more surrounding sense of death, and of life. Having heard so often, and so believably, John Donne’s bell tolling softly that “Thou must die,” one turns more sharply to life, with an immediacy and appreciation that would not otherwise exist. We all build internal sea walls to keep at bay the sadnesses of life and the often overwhelming forces within our minds. In whatever way we do this—through love, work, family, faith, friends, denial, alcohol, drugs, or medication—we build these walls, stone by stone, over a lifetime. One of the most difficult problems is to construct these barriers of such a height and strength that one has a true harbor, a sanctuary away from crippling turmoil and pain, but yet low enough, and permeable enough, to let in fresh seawater that will fend off the inevitable inclination toward brackishness. For someone with my cast of mind and mood, medication is an integral element of this wall: without it, I would be constantly beholden to the crushing movements of a mental sea; I would, unquestionably, be dead or insane. But love is, to me, the ultimately more extraordinary part of the breakwater wall: it helps to shut out the terror and awfulness, while, at the same time, allowing in life and beauty and vitality. When I first thought about writing this book, I conceived of it as a book about moods, and an illness of moods, in the context of an individual life. As I have written it, however, it has somehow turned out to be very much a book about love as well: love as sustainer, as renewer, and as protector. After each seeming death within my mind or heart, love has returned to re-create hope and to restore life. It has, at its best, made the inherent sadness of life bearable, and its beauty manifest. It has, inexplicably and savingly, provided not only cloak but lantern for the darker seasons and grimmer weather.

• From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)

  All these interjections breaking from me, in that wildness of expression that justly passes for eloquence in love, drew from him all the returns my fond heart could wish or require. Our caresses, our questions, our answers, for some time observed no order; all crossing, or interrupting one another in sweet confusion, whilst we exchanged hearts at our eyes, and renewed the ratifications of a love unabated by time or absence: not a breath, not a motion, not a gesture on either side, but what was strongly impressed with it. Our hands, locked in each other, repeated the most passionate squeezes, so that their fiery thrill went to the heart again. Thus absorbed, and concentered in this unutterable delight, I had not attended to the sweet author of it being thoroughly wet, and in danger of catching cold; when, in good time, the landlady, whom the appearance of my equipage (which, bye the bye Charles knew nothing of) had gained me an interest in, for me and mine interrupted us by bringing in a decent shift of linen and clothes; which now, somewhat recovered into a calmer composure by the coming in of a third person, I pressed him to take the benefit of, with a tender concern and anxiety that made me tremble for his health.