“The desert sharpened the sweet ache of his longing, amplified it, gave shape to it in sere geology and clean slant of light.”

“nothing she did
or said

was quite
what she meant

but still her life
could be called a monument

shaped in a slant
of available light

and set to the movement
of possible music”

“I felt his hot tears and the loneliness of man and the sweetness of all men and the aching haunting beauty of the living”

“He saw the beauties of his shape and face,
His female sweetness, and his manly grace”

“In the deserts, however arid, I have never felt homesick for green fields and woods in spring, but now that I was in England I longed with an ache that was almost physical to be back in Arabia.”

“There's a certain slant of light,
On winter afternoons,
That oppresses, like the weight
Of cathedral tunes.”

“While he was climbing the litter-strewn steps his left ball gave a sharp twinge, on and off like a light-switch, then again after he had sat down. Nothing. Just one of the aches and pains that come and go. No significance.”

“it wont be long now it wont be long
man is making deserts of the earth
it wont be long now
before man will have used it up
so that nothing but ants
and centipedes and scorpions
can find a living on it
man has oppressed us for a million years
but he goes on steadily
cutting the ground from under
his own feet making deserts deserts deserts”

“Because your eyes are slant and slow,
Because your hair is sweet to touch,
My heart is high again; but oh,
I doubt if this will get me much.”

“It was the touch of the imperfect upon the would-be perfect that gave the sweetness, because it was that which gave the humanity”