“A fire had begun to spread in me. It was burning now in my stomach and my lungs were dry as old leaves, my heart had a herded pressure which gave promise to explode.”

“I had always known in my heart that the experience would never leave me, that it was now woven into my very fibers, an inextricable part of my past, but I had hoped never to have to recollect it, consciously, and in full, ever again. Like an old wound, it gave off a faint twinge now and again, but less and less often, less and less painfully, as the years went on and my happiness, sanity and equilibrium were assured. Of late, it had been like the outermost ripple on a pool, merely the faint memory of a memory.”

“If the fire of the love to you wouldn’t dry themthe floods of tears for you would sweep me awayAnd if the water from my two eyes wouldn’t come to my aidthe fire of the grief over you would burn my heart wailing”

“my path had led me at that time into a new life, which had now grown old and is dead”

“I was like a clock that had exploded- my springs were hanging out, my hands were cockeyed, and my numbers were falling off.”

“I thought about death and was gripped by feelings which choked my chest and made my throat dry, a sudden pushing and shoving in my guts. It was a sort of chronic ailment I had. Once that feeling and that agitation of my whole body had begun, I wouldn't be able to shake it off until I got to asleep. And I couldn't recall it with the same impact in the daytime.”