The Sheltering Sky

by Paul Bowles

there was the certitude of an infinite sadness at the core of his consciousness,

Port said: “I had a strange dream yesterday. I’ve been trying to remember it, and just this minute I did.” “No!” cried Kit with force. “Dreams are so dull! Please!”

“Humanity?” cried Port. “What’s that? Who is humanity? I’ll tell you. Humanity is everyone but one’s self. So of what interest can it possibly be to anybody?”

HIS CRY WENT ON through the final image: the spots of raw bright blood on the earth. Blood on excrement. The supreme moment, high above the desert, when the two elements, blood and excrement, long kept apart, merge. A black star appears, a point of darkness in the night sky’s clarity. Point of darkness and gateway to repose. Reach out, pierce the fine fabric of the sheltering sky, take repose.