The Only People In This World I

I Had Long Since Insisted Upon Interpreting The Things That Fate Forced Me To Do As Victories Of My Own Will And Intelligence, And Now This Bad Habit Had Grown Into A Sort Of Frenzied Arrogance. In The Nature Of What I Was Calling My Intelligence There Was A Touch Of Something Illegitimate, A Touch Of The Sham Pretender Who Has Been Placed On The Throne By Some Freak Chance. This Dolt Of A Usurper Could Not Foresee The Revenge That Would Inevitably Be Wreaked Upon His Stupid Despotism.

Abruptly He Thrust His Snow-drenched Leather Gloves Against My Cheeks. I Dodged. A Raw Carnal Feeling Blazed Up Within Me, Branding My Cheeks. I Felt Myself Staring At Him With Crystal Clear Eyes... From That Time On I Was In Love With Omi.

Dreams, Memories, The Sacred--they Are All Alike In That They Are Beyond Our Grasp. Once We Are Even Marginally Separated From What We Can Touch, The Object Is Sanctified; It Acquires The Beauty Of The Unattainable, The Quality Of The Miraculous. Everything, Really, Has This Quality Of Sacredness, But We Can Desecrate It At A Touch. How Strange Man Is! His Touch Defiles And Yet He Contains The Source Of Miracles.

Just Let Matters Slide. How Much Better To Accept Each Sweet Drop Of The Honey That Was Time, Than To Stoop To The Vulgarity Latent In Every Decision. However Grave The Matter At Hand Might Be, If One Neglected It For Long Enough, The Act Of Neglect Itself Would Begin To Affect The Situation, And Someone Else Would Emerge As An Ally. Such Was Count Ayakura's Version Of Political Theory.

The Highest Point At Which Human Life And Art Meet Is In The Ordinary. To Look Down On The Ordinary Is To Despise What You Can't Have. Show Me A Man Who Fears Being Ordinary, And I'll Show You A Man Who Is Not Yet A Man.