“The willow is full plumage and is no help, with its insinuating whispers.Rendevous, it says. Terraces;the sibilants run up my spine, a shiver as if in fever. The summer dress rustles against the flesh of my thighs, the grass grows underfoot, at the edges of my eyes there are movements, in the branches; feathers, flittings, grace notes, tree into bird, metamorphosis run wild. Goddesses are possible now and the air suffuses with desire...Winter is not so dangerous. I need hardness, cold, rigidity; not this heaviness, as if I'm a melon on a stem, this liquid ripeness. ”

“I walk without flinching through the burning cathedral of the summer. My bank of wild grass is majestic and full of music. It is a fire that solitude presses against my lips.”

“Don't fall in love with me, Willow. I'm no good for you or any other woman. You and I...Well, let's just say we were never meant to be. I'm a tumbleweed; I go wherever the wings of change blow me. But above all else, I'm a man with a man's needs. And you, my dear, are a very beautiful and desirable woman." His hands cupped her shoulders firmly. "Help me, Willow. Run away. Run as fast as you can, because you deserve so much more than I have to offer.”

“He is simply a shiver looking for a spine to run up.”

“i will wade out till my thighs are steeped in burning flowersI will take the sun in my mouthand leap into the ripe air Alive with closed eyesto dash against darknessin the sleeping curves of my body”

“Outside, I could smell the Zebra. Even if for some reason I stopped feeling cold or hot or rain or sun, I bet I could close my eyes and still tell which season I was in just by the smell of the trees and dirt there. Spring was sweet mud and flowers. Fall has a kind of moldy edge to it, and winter was all dust and bark. As for summer, the Zebra carried a mossy, thick aroma full of baking leaves and oozing sap, which I guessed was its growing smell.”