Talking, Talking. Spinning A Web Of Words,

In University Courses We Do Exercises. Term Papers, Quizzes, Final Examinations Are Not Meant For Publication. We Move Through A Course On Dostoevsky Or Poe As We Move Through A Mildly Good Cocktail Party, Picking Up The Good Bits Of Food Or Conversation, Bearing With The Rest, Going Home When It Comes To Seem The Reasonable Thing To Do. Art, At Those Moments When It Feels Most Like Art -- When We Feel Most Alive, Most Alert, Most Triumphant -- Is Less Like A Cocktail Party Than A Tank Full Of Sharks.

Art Gropes. It Stalks Like A Hunter Lost In The Woods, Listening To Itself And To Everything Around It, Unsure Of Itself, Waiting To Pounce.

As A Rule Of Thumb I Say, If Socrates, Jesus And Tolstoy Wouldn't Do It, Don't.

When I Was A Child I Truly Loved: Unthinking Love As Calm And Deep As The North Sea. But I Have Lived, And Now I Do Not Sleep.

They Watch On, Evil, Incredibly Stupid, Enjoying My Destruction. 'poor Grendel's Had An Accident,' I Whisper. 'so May You All.