Good stories

Some of these things are true
and some of them lies.
But they are all good stories.

        Hilary Mantel, Wolf Hall

 

 

 

 

 

 

Stay out

True happiness, we are told,
consists in getting out of one's self;
but the point is not only to get out -
you must stay out;
and to stay out
you must have some absorbing errand.

             Henry James, Roderick Hudson

 

 

 

 

The era of tea

The joy of the new, hip, happening, double-espresso Dublin
is that you can blame any strange mood on coffee deprivation.
This never worked in the era of tea,
at least not at the same level of street cred.

            Tana French, In the Woods

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dangerous inclinations

The spiritual disposition of a poet inclines to catastrophe.

        Osip Mandelstam, Selected Essays

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Well played

Whereas elsewhere in Europe,
no educated man would be caught dead speaking a vernacular,
the Irish thought that all language was a game.

            Thomas Cahill, How the Irish Saved Civilization 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Anyone can do it

Repentance need not be multilateral.

Bayard Rustin as quoted by Andrew Young,
The Free Press Interview, March 2026

Poem: Long Thoughts - Short Walks

some believe in general motors,
others in market purity;
some believe in earnings per share
and their financial security-
still more believe in politics,
and everything they've read;
but i believe the sun
when its shining on my head.

                A. Cohen