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A great and torturous circle
“Oh, Joss, it’s a great and tortuous circle. We have found each other, time and again, across time and across worlds. Which of us began which poison? I am, and am not, a product of my own mind. I was shaped, as you were shaped. Sraosha trained up Verta, and Verta trained up me—and I found you. And we fight and hate and wound and take down entire worlds with us, century after century. And for what purpose? Do we truly make world better? Or are we simply forces of destruction? I have to believe there is some reason to all of this, some greater plan, some great melody that…
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No man chooses evil because it is evil…
No man chooses evil because it is evil; he only mistakes it for happiness, the good he seeks. — Mary Wollstonecraft From A Vindication of the Rights of Men. This is, indeed, the mother of Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (Mary Godwin), the author of Frankenstein. Their body is of work is often misquoted between them, but they were both revolutionaries. Sadly, they never knew each other as Wollstonecraft died shortly after giving birth to her daughter. This quote is one of those that speaks to the heart of Watcher of the Skies. In it is Joss Raddick’s Bildungsroman, of sorts, as a godling coming into his power and self awareness. But it’s also about power and…
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“You speak of Lord Byron and me…”
“You speak of Lord Byron and me; there is this great difference between us. He describes what he sees, I describe what I imagine. Mine is the hardest task.” — John Keats to his brother George, 1819. For more on the issue, there’s a bit here.
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“People’s dream…
“People’s dreams are made out of what they do all day. The same way a dog that runs after rabbits will dream of rabbits. It’s what you do that makes your soul, not the other way around.” — Barbara Kingsolver It’s what you do that makes your soul.
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Wordsworth, to his wife & from “The Fountain”
“Fill your paper with the breathings of your heart.” — William Wordsworth, Letter to his Wife (April 29 1812). My eyes are dim with childish tears, My heart is idly stirred, For the same sound is in my ears Which in those days I heard. Thus fares it still in our decay: And yet the wiser mind Mourns less for what age takes away Than what it leaves behind. — William Wordsworth, “The Fountain,” st. 8 & 9 (1799).
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I didn’t have much to tell him
I didn’t have much to tell him. “I fought in the war,” I said. “I had a child. Though I have not watched him grow, for I was not well acquainted with his mother. Not properly, anyway. I fear I have disappointed you in not living a truly upright existence.” He laughed. “As if I could tame you, Joss! You, creature of lightning and water and energy. Gods, if I could ever bottle but a fraction of your essence, or whatever it makes you what you are, I would be a king among men. You never have fit into my understanding of the world. Nor by Diana’s nor Mary’s law.…
