“He took her into his arms again, using all his strength to be gentle, and let his lips touch hers so lightly he could hardly feel it.”

“Alexander tilted his head and kissed her deeply on the lips. He let go of her hands, and she wrapped her arms around his neck, pressing herself against him. They kissed as if in a fever… they kissed as if the breath were leaving their bodies.”

“He must have loved her so incredibly hard. So hard that he would never ask for her lips again and would go to his grave without them.”

“Then he kissed her. At his lips' touch she blossomed for him like a flower and the incarnation was complete.”

“He knew that when he kissed this girl, and forever wed his unutterable visions to her perishable breath, his mind would never romp again like the mind of God. So he waited, listening for a moment longer to the tuning-fork that had been struck upon a star. Then he kissed her. At his lips’ touch she blossomed for him like a flower and the incarnation was complete.”

“Her lips touched his brain as they touched his lips, as though they were a vehicle of some vague speech and between them he felt an unknown and timid preasure, darker than the swoon of sin, softer than sound or odor.”

“It took all of her considerable strength to heave the girl’s wrapped body into her arms, pivot, and let it thump into the trunk.”

“Tessa touched his wrist lightly with her hand. "Be brave," she said. "It's not a duck, is it?”

“Most of all she loved that when she hugged him her head would rest neatly just below his chin, where she could feel his breath lightly blowing her hair and tickling her head.”

“Her lips on his could tell him better than all her stumbling words.”