I Heart Robert Penn Warren

People (apparently) post little blogtags that say what they've been listening to, which is, I guess, as good a way as any to let the soul peek out when the eyes are closed or far away.

I like it. My soul's been craving some peeking. But since the person who doesn't hold some part of my musical taste in shocked contempt is a rare beast (which may be why I continue to date the man I do), I'm going the novel route -- 'swhat my soul likes best anyhow.

So:
"...something happens, or almost always happens, to the gaiety, the brilliance, the communion. You remember the individual words from the old language you spoke together, but you have forgotten the grammar. You remember that steps of the dance, but the music isn't playing anymore. So there you are."
--- Robert Penn Warren, All the King's Men (restored edition), Harcourt 2002, 589.

Did somebody once ask whether memory was more man's burden or blessing? If not, I do.

Also:
"So the summer went on, and we all lived in it. It was a way to live, and when you have lived one way for a while you forget that there was every any other way and that there may be another way again."
ATKM 459