1922 · CLOSE READING
Diary of a Drug Fiend
Diary of a Drug Fiend (1922), PDF p. 185
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Indian Summer 171
But not in the unutterable anguish of which the
poet was writing. It is a formless calm. But love!
We had never loved like this before. We had defiled
love with the grossness of the body.
The body is an instrument of infinite pleasure;
but excitement and desire sully its sublimity. We
were conscious of every nerve to the tiniest filament ;
and for this one must be ineffably aloof from movement.
H. makes one want to scratch, and scratching is
infinite pleasure. But that is only a relic of animal
appetite.
After a little while, one is able to enjoy the feeling
that makes one want to scratch in itself. It is an
impersonal bliss perfectly indescribable and indescrib-
ably perfect.
I cannot measure the majesty of my consciousness;
but I can indicate the change in the whole character
of my consciousness. |
I am writing this in the mood of the recording angel.
I am living in eternity, and temporal things have
become tedious and stupid symbols. My words are
veils of my truth. But I experience quite definite
delight in this diary.
King Lamus is always at the root of my brain. He
is Jupiter and I have sprung from his thought ; Minerva,
Goddess of Wisdom !
The most tremendous events of life are unworthy
trifles. The sublimity of my conceptions sweeps onward
from nowhere to nowhere. Behind my articulate
anthem is a stainless silence.
I am not writing for any reason, not even for myself
to read; the action is automatic.
I am the first-born child of King Lamus without
a mother. I am the emanation of his essence.
I lay all night without moving a muscle. The near-
ness of my husband completed the magnetic field of
our intimacy. Act, word, and thought were equally
abolished. The elements of my consciousness did not
represent me at all. They were sparks struck off from
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