Tag Archives: Excerpt

By the time the last work on the towers of Notre-Dame-de-Paris completed that shape against the sky, the night was my native country. I remember its peaked roof and flying buttresses every night, as I drift up the hill to … Continue reading →

The door of the laboratory opens, and the man walks in.  “And what do you think you’re doing this time of night?” Mina’s voice is calm, more than some would be. “I’m at work.” Her face composes itself. I can … Continue reading →

I wait, just outside the barrier. The night is shrill with crickets; they sense the end of time and sing, calling to each other. The air wraps us round with caressing warmth, so that early-evening sip suffices to keep me … Continue reading →

“Life’s what you make of it,” she says, which was cliche when I was young eight hundred years ago. “And life is change. The only thing immortal is cancer.” Her tone shifts, into the dreamy music of the storyteller, “Once … Continue reading →

I am reading Cantor’s paper on the transfinite numbers, with the famed diagonal argument — reminiscent of my youth, because I first read that argument in Latin, either in my living youth or at a time when the memory of … Continue reading →

“Did you want to walk?” He nods, looking eager for the first time. Yes, in the moonlight, he can pass for mortal. “I’ll set the next batch,” and that’s a matter of a few minutes, and then she closes the … Continue reading →