1Q84: Book 3

by Haruki Murakami

Beyond the garden and lawn was the dark line of the pine windbreak, through which came the sound of waves. The rough waves of the Pacific. It was a thick, darkish sound, as if many souls were gathered, each whispering his story. They seemed to be seeking more souls to join them, seeking even more stories to be told.

Sometimes faint scraps of her dream would get caught on the wall of her consciousness,

“So how old were you on your birthday last month?” Tengo asked, changing subjects. “Twenty-three. A full-fledged adult.” “Of course,” Tengo said. He was already thirty, but yet to have a sense of himself as an adult. It just felt to him like he had spent thirty years in the world.

most people in the world don’t really use their brains to think. And people who don’t think are the ones who don’t listen to others.

The suit was pink, but an odd sort of pink, like some other color had been accidentally mixed in. They had probably been aiming for a classy, subdued sort of hue, but because they didn’t get it right, the pink of her suit sank deeply back into diffidence, concealment, and resignation. Thanks to this, the brand-new white blouse peeking out of the collar looked like some indiscreet person who had wandered into a wake.

There was an inexhaustible source of clouds in some land far to the north. Decisive people, minds fixed on the task, clothed in thick, gray uniforms, working silently from morning to night to make clouds, like bees make honey, spiders make webs, and war makes widows.

"like war makes widows"

Somehow the world survived the Nazis, the atomic bomb, and modern music.

The moon that, as a crescent, shaved slivers from the soul – or, as a new moon, silently bathed the earth in its own loneliness. That moon.