Instead I Will Say, "take Me To

Knowing Was A Temptation. What You Don't Know Won't Tempt You.

I Wait. I Compose Myself. My Self Is A Thing I Must Now Compose, As One Composes A Speech. What I Must Present Is A Made Thing, Not Something Born.

The Three Of Them Were Beautiful, In The Way All Girls Of That Age Are Beautiful. It Can't Be Helped, That Sort Of Beauty, Nor Can It Be Conserved; It's A Freshness, A Plumpness Of The Cells, That's Unearned And Temporary, And That Nothing Can Replicate. None Of Them Was Satisfied With It, However; Already They Were Making Attempts To Alter Themselves Into Some Impossible, Imaginary Mould, Plucking And Pencilling Away At Their Faces. I Didn't Blame Them, Having Done The Same Once Myself.

The Temptation Is To Stay Inside; To Subside Into The Kind Of Recluse Whom Neighborhood Children Regard With Derision And Little Awe; To Let The Hedges And Weeds Grow Up, To Allow The Doors To Rust Shut, To Lie On My Bed In Some Gown-shaped Garment And Let My Hair Lengthens And Spread Out Over The Pillow And My Fingernails To Sprout Into Claws, While Candle Wax Drips Onto The Carpet. But Long Ago I Made A Choice Between Classicism And Romanticism. I Prefer To Be Upright And Contained—an Urn In Daylight.

I'm A Strict, Strict Agnostic. It's Very Different From A Casual, 'i Don't Know.' It's That You Cannot Present As Knowledge Something That Is Not Knowledge. You Can Present It As Faith, You Can Present It As Belief, But You Can't Present It As Fact.