Wiesenbornweg in Heusenstamm near Frankfurt am Main; 2014-07-26
Allah is great, no doubt, and Juxtaposition his prophet. Lo, as I pace in the street, from the peasant-girl to the princess, all that is Nature's is I, and I all things that are Nature's. Yes, as I walk, I behold, in a luminous, large intuition, that I can be and become anything that I meet with or look at: I am the sunny slab of the ruin buzzing about me; yea, and detect, as I go, by a faint but a faithful assurance, e'en from the stones of the street, as from rocks or trees of the forest, something of kindred, a common, though latent vitality, greets me; and to escape from our strivings, mistakings, misgrowths, and perversions, fain could demand to return to that perfect and primitive silence, fain be enfolded and fixed, as of old, in their rigid embraces, but the women, alas! they don't look at it that way. And as I walk on my way, I behold them consorting and coupling; faithful it seemeth, and fond, very fond, very probably faithful; and could we eliminate only this vile hungering impulse, this demon within us of drumming and shouting, and amid placid regards and mildly courteous greetings yield to the calm and composure and gentle abstraction that reign o'er mild monastic faces in quiet collegiate cloisters. But, oh, great Heavens, oh, … It is the simplest thing, but surely wholly uncalled for.
Amours de Voyage, by Arthur Hugh Clough [redacted]