“Beautiful conventions received them--while beyond the barrier Maurice wandered, the wrong words on his lips, the wrong desires in his heart, and his arms full of air.”

“What spooked him was how the lack of a barrier ratcheted up not only the physical sensation but also the pound of his heart, the inability to get air into his lungs.”

“His was a burning love, a fire that set my soul alight and weakened me with desire for him, for his arms, for his heart.”

“His moral courage led him to question a great wrong and refuse, backed by his men, to take part in a horrific slaughter of innocents, when other men, such as Harry Richmond, took advantage of being suddenly unfettered by conventional standards to do whatever the darkest side of human nature desired.”

“His heart was as great as the world, but there was no room in it to hold the memory of a wrong”

“His guitar bore his longing up into the darkness like sparks, a music profound in its objectless desire, beautiful beyond solace or solution”