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God is a comedian playing to an audience that is afraid to laugh. VOLTAIRE
Children see magic because they look for it.
I fell asleep each night feeling his hand on my back like a shield. Fathers.
Don’t let anyone tell you that the Prince of Peace never struck anyone.
“You go with Joshua. He needs a friend to teach him to be human. Then I can teach him to be a man.”
“I was thinking about becoming the village idiot, if my father will allow it.” “He has a God-given talent,” Joshua said.
from the beginning, Joshua filled me with divinely inspired worry.
“Well, it is written, two out of three ain’t bad.” “Where is that written?” “Dalmatians 9:7, I think
“You think too much. Thinking will bring you nothing but suffering. Be simple.”
“Do you ever see me cry? I have nothing, so I am slave to nothing. I have nothing to do, so nothing makes me its slave.”
You go to bed every night so tired and beaten that you pray to the Lord to send the angel of death to take you in your sleep so you don’t have to face another morning. It also has its downside.”
“God is willing to forgive you the sin that you carry for being a child of man, but you must forgive yourself for having once been a child.”
“You see, my plan is working. For it is written that ‘if the wise man always appears stupid, his failures do not disappoint, and his success gives pleasant surprise.’”
In my time we had very few words, perhaps a hundred that we used all the time, and thirty of them were synonyms for guilt. In this language you can curse for an hour and never use the same word twice.
“For it is written in our holy books that no Jew shall rat out another Jew, regardless of what a weasel one or the other shall be.” “Is that written?” Maggie whispered. “Is now,” Joshua whispered back.
dove on top of Maggie and Joshua, hoping to shield them,
you are all commanded to go home and perpetrate no weird shit until I have gotten well drunk and had several days to sleep it off.”
“I think I understand hope, I’m just not sure that I am allowed to have any.”
“Would—would you mind?” John said, lifting up his tunic and showing his bare privates, which were covered with sores and greenish scales. “Cover, please cover!” I yelled. “Drop the shirt and step away!” “That’s disgusting,” Joshua said. “Am I unclean? I’ve been afraid to ask my father, and I can’t go to a Pharisee, not with my father being a priest. I think it’s from standing in the water all of the time. Can you heal me?”
“What about a woman and a goat, what’s that?” asked John. “That’s five shekels in Damascus,” I said. “Six if you want to help.” Joshua punched me in the shoulder.
It felt good, there was a rhythm to it, I sort of squoze his throat a bit with every syllable.
(Nimrod was an ancient king who died of suffocation after he wondered aloud in front of his guards what it would be like to have your own head stuck up your ass.)
who was gleefully exposing himself for the viewing pleasure of the Nazarene wives.
She hugged me and I could feel the heat rise in my face, either from shame or love, like there was a difference.
Jesus was a good guy, he didn’t need this shit. JOHN PRINE
If I do manage to escape the angel, I’m not going to be able to make my living as a professional mourner, not if you people don’t have the courtesy to die.
I’m having trouble learning to speak hip-hop. Why is it that one can busta rhyme or busta move anywhere but you must busta cap in someone’s ass? Is “ho” always feminine, and “muthafucka” always masculine, while “bitch” can be either? How many peeps in a posse, how much booty before baby got back, do you have to be all that to get all up in that, and do I need to be dope and phat to be da bomb or can I just be “stupid”?
Then, once again, and not for the last time, the Prince of Peace coldcocked me.
and in that instant profound wood did from my person protrude.
(You know ululation as the sound an ambulance makes. That I get an erection every time one passes the hotel would seem morbid if you didn’t know this story of how Biff Hires a Harlot.)
“if you fuck a Hebrew, make room in the bed for his guilt,”
“Greater love hath no man, than he lay down for his friend.” “That’s a good one, Josh. You should remember that one for later.”
Truth be told, I’d developed a burning sensation when I peed and I was ready for a break from tutoring my friend in the fine art of sinning.
“I’m going to need a new shirt,” I said. “You can have mine,” Titus said. “We should sail closer along the coast, don’t you think?” I said. “On the way, good master,” Titus said. “On the way.” “Your mother eats the fungus from the feet of lepers,” I said. “I’ve been meaning to speak to her about that,” Titus said. “So we understand each other,” I said. “Absolutely,” Titus said. “Crap,” Joshua said. “I forgot to ask the angel about knowing women again.”
“Are you married?” Joshua interrupted before the sailor started into how he had fucked them in a box, with a fox, in a house, with a mouse…
“Right,” I said, “I’m going to take spiritual advice from a guy who fucks turtles.”
We were both making an incoherent terrorized sound that I can only describe as the verbal version of running, sort of an extended rhythmic howl that paused only when the last of each lungful of air squeaked out of us.
Mankind, I suppose, is designed to run on—to be motivated by—temptation. If progress is a virtue then this is our greatest gift. (For what is curiosity if not intellectual temptation? And what progress is there without curiosity?)
“The Master says that ‘the superior man may indeed endure want, but the inferior man, when he experiences want, will give into unbridled excess.’ He’s talking about you, Biff. You’re the inferior man.”
The night was crisp and the stars shone with a cold blue light like loneliness or infinity.
“Oh, foul woe upon you, you have kilt me most dead,”
“Just kidding,” he said. “I’m not kilt.”
“The three jewels of the Tao: compassion, moderation, and humility. Balthasar said compassion leads to courage, moderation leads to generosity, and humility leads to leadership.”
‘There’s no such thing as a conservative hero.’ He was wise, that old man.”
And so it came to pass that through the ages the wall was known as the Ostentatious and Unpleasant Wall of China. At least I hope that’s what happened. It’s not on my Friendly Flyer Miles map, so I can’t be sure.
I realized that there are some things I’d really rather not know about.
They said that they made everybody wait three days. It weeded out the insincere.
“Begging your pardon, master,” I said, “but if you hit him again, I’ll kill you.”
“No. Trust me, you have to leave me now, so you won’t later. I’ll see you again.”
“Good, go frighten some children with your glorious ignorance.”
