“I ask myself whether his rush had really carried him out of that mist in which he loomed interesting if not very big, with floating outlines - a straggler yearning inconsolably for his humble place in the ranks. And besides, the last word is not said, - probably shall never be said. Are not our lives too short for that full utterance which through all our stammerings is of course our only and abiding intention?...There is never time to say our last word - the last word of our love, of our desire, faith, remorse, submissions, revolt....My last words about Jim shall be few. I affirmed that he achieved greatness.”

“Are not our lives too short for that full utterance which through all our stammerings is of course our only and abiding intention?”

“But anyhow it is true that this, which is our first poem, might very well be our last poem too. It might well be the last word as well as the first word spoken by man about his mortal lot, as seen by merely mortal vision. If the world becomes pagan and perishes, the last man left alive would do well to quote the Iliad and die.”

“In other words, you are our last possible hope. You are our only hope.”

“At last- I had already given up hope- he broke throught the magic wall; at last helped me; at last he said a few words. Those were the only words I heard him speak today. 'You are tiring yourself Joseph,' he said softly, his voice full of that touching friendlness and solicitude you know so well. That was all. 'You are tiring yourself Joseph.”

“If death is like a sonnet then life would be a haiku. The sonnet, a lyrical poem, the beauty and magic with the last breath~ love, words fading and floating off into the abyss that is space whilst our everyday lives or days more important than normal become just a mere whisper in only a few short syllables through which we convey with our hearts the truth of the universe in a single moment briefly.”