Sweet Sensation Quotes

Floating, falling, sweet intoxication. Touch me, trust me, savor each sensation. Let the dream begin, let your darker side give in to the power of the music of the night.

There is no shortage of good days. It is good lives that are hard to come by. A life of good days lived in the senses is not enough. The life of sensation is the life of greed; it requires more and more. The life of the spirit requires less and less; time is ample and its passage sweet. Who would call a day spent reading a good day? But a life spent reading -- that is a good life.

And for just a moment I had reached the point of ecstasy that I always wanted to reach, which was the complete step across chronological time into timeless shadows, and wonderment in the bleakness of the mortal realm, and the sensation of death kicking at my heels to move on, with a phantom dogging its own heels, and myself hurrying to a plank where all the angels dove off and flew into the holy void of uncreated emptiness, the potent and inconceivable radiancies shining in bright Mind Essence, innumerable lotuslands falling open in the magic mothswarm of heaven. I could hear an indescribable seething roar which wasn't in my ear but everywhere and had nothing to do with sounds. I realized that I had died and been reborn numberless times but just didn't remember especially because the transitions from life to death and back to life are so ghostly easy, a magical action for naught, like falling asleep and waking up again a million times, the utter casualness and deep ignorance of it. I realized it was only because of the stability of the intrinsic Mind that these ripples of birth and death took place, like the action of the wind on a sheet of pure, serene, mirror-like water. I felt sweet, swinging bliss, like a big shot of heroin in the mainline vein; like a gulp of wine late in the afternoon and it makes you shudder; my feet tingled. I thought I was going to die the very next moment. But I didn't die...

She brought herself away from the disagreeably clinging thought by her usual method - imagining the sweet sharp sensation of being burned alive.

The most racking pangs succeeded: a grinding in the bones, deadly nausea, and a horror of the spirit that cannot be exceeded at the hour of birth or death. Then these agonies began swiftly to subside, and I came to myself as if out of a great sickness. There was something strange in my sensations, something indescribably sweet. I felt younger, lighter, happier in body; within I was conscious of a heady recklessness, a current of disordered sensual images running like a millrace in my fancy, a solution of the bonds of obligation, an unknown but innocent freedom of the soul. I knew myself, at the first breath of this new life, to be more wicked, tenfold more wicked, sold a slave to my original evil and the thought, in that moment, braced and delighted me like wine.

Selden and Lily stood still, accepting the unreality of the scene as a part of their own dream-like sensations. It would not have surprised them to feel a summer breeze on their faces, or to see the lights among the boughs reduplicated in the arch of a starry sky. The strange solitude about them was no stranger than the sweetness of being alone in it together.

She said, I'm going to miss you when you when I wake up. Don't wake up, he answered. But he did. Kestrel, beside him on the grass, said. "Did I wake you? I didn't mean to." It took him a velvety moment to understand that this was real. The air was quiet. An insect beat it's clear wings. She brushed hair from his brow. Now he was very awake. "You were sleeping so sweetly," she said. "Dreaming" He touched her tender mouth. "About what?" "Come closer, and I will tell you." But he forgot. He kissed her, and became lost in the exquisite sensation of his skin becoming too tight for his body. He murmured other things instead. A secret, a want, a promise. A story, in its own way. She curled her fingers into the green earth

It’s a sensation I’ve come to love as I’ve traveled more, the way a new place signals itself instantly and without pretense. The air has a different weight from what you’re used to; it carries smells you can’t quite identify, a faint whiff of wood smoke or diesel fuel, maybe, or the sweetness of something blooming in the trees. The same sun comes up, but looking slightly different from what you know.

And so, from the first, we separated our pleasure. She lay on the rug and I lay at right angles to her so that only our lips might meet. Kissing in this way is the strangest of distractions. The greedy body that clamors for satisfaction is forced to content itself with a single sensation and, just as the blind hear more acutely and the deaf can feel the grass grow, so the mouth becomes the focus of love and all things pass through it and are re-defined. It is a sweet and precise torture.

There's a strange sensation - you recall it from childhood - about sleeping in the afternoon. You rise into a different world from the one in which you lay down. The shadows have been rearranged. There's a sensation of sad sweetness, as if something has been overlooked. I used to feel it coming out of the movies just before dinnertime, after the matinee. How, I wondered, did Broadway actors face it, this bittersweet sense of time's slipping past.

There was something strange in my sensations, indescribably new and incredibly sweet. I knew myself, at the first breath of this new life, to be tenfold more wicked and the thought delighted me like wine.

There is nothing. Only warm, primordial blackness. Your conscience ferments in it — no larger than a single grain of malt. You don't have to do anything anymore. Ever. Never ever. An inordinate amount of time passes. It is utterly void of struggle. No ex-wives are contained within it [...] The song of death is sweet and endless... But what is this? Somewhere in the sore, bloated *man-meat* around you — a sensation! [...] The limbed and headed machine of pain and undignified suffering is firing up again. It wants to walk the desert. Hurting. Longing. Dancing to disco music.

The life of sensation is the life of greed; it requires more and more. The life of the spirit requires less and less; time is ample and its passage sweet.

And Will knew what it was to see his dæmon. As she flew down to the sand, he felt his heart tighten and release in a way he never forgot. Sixty years and more would go by, and as an old man he would still feel some sensations as bright and fresh as ever: Lyra's fingers putting the fruit between his lips under the gold-and-silver trees; her warm mouth pressing against his; his dæmon being torn from his unsuspecting breast as they entered the world of the dead; and the sweet rightfulness of her coming back to him at the edge of the moonlight dunes.

I’m in control. But it’s a lie, because now I’ve tasted him. His lips are salty-sweet with yesterday’s laughter … digging in the black sands beneath Wonderland’s sunshine, playing leapfrog atop mushroom caps, and resting in the shade of black satin wings. I try to shake off the spell, but he angles his face and deepens the kiss. “Embrace me … embrace your destiny.” He breaks the barrier of my lips, touching his tongue to mine, a sensation too wickedly delicious to deny. As our tongues entwine, his lullaby purrs through my blood and bones, carrying me to the stars. Behind closed eyes, I’m floating against a velvet sky, lungs filled with night air. On some level, I know I’m still in the middle of a fire-warmed chamber, yet my wings pantomime flight on a cool breeze. I’m dancing with Morpheus in the heavens, no longer imprisoned by gravity. Fluttering our wings in unison, we twist and whirl a weightless waltz among stars that coil and uncoil in feathery sparks high above Wonderland’s warped and wonderful landscapes. Each time we spin, then return to each other’s arms, I laugh, because at last I’m me. I’m a me I’ve longed to be in my innermost fantasies—spontaneous, impetuous, and seductive.

Shadows of Shadows passing... It is now 1831... and as always, I am absorbed with a delicate thought. It is how poetry has indefinite sensations to which end, music is an essential, since the comprehension of sweet sound is our most indefinite conception. Music, when combined with a pleasurable idea, is poetry. Music without the idea is simply music. Without music or an intriguing idea, color becomes pallour, man becomes carcass, home becomes catacomb, and the dead are but for a moment motionless.

In this way Penelope's happy and sad feelings got all mixed up together, until they were not unlike one of those delicious cookies they have nowadays, the ones with a flat circle of sugary cream sandwiched between two chocolate-flavored wafers. In her heart she felt a soft, hidden core of sweet melancholy nestled inside crisp outer layers of joy, and if that is not the very sensation most people feel at some point or other during the holidays, then one would be hard pressed to say what is.

You feel sexual excitement in genitals, horror in stomach, sadness and happiness in heart, physical pain in various parts of the body. What if you start feeling all of this at just one place: In your forehead. Then nothing can hurt you or control you. Even if somebody burns your body, you will feel nothing but a sweet sensation in forehead. It's possible even in 21st century. Disconnect from this crappy society and seek.

He turned back to Lara, his alert gaze raking over her tearful face. Somehow the solid reality of his presence eased her panic. He folded her in his arms, anchoring her against his chest, murmuring quietly into her hair. Sniffling, Lara reached inside his waistcoat until her palm rested over the steady beat of his heart. The sensation of his warm breath sinking down to her scalp me her quiver. It was so terribly intimate, crying in his arms... even more personal than making love. But he had never felt so much like a husband to her as he did in this moment. Quieting, she inhaled his familiar scent and let out a shaky sigh.

The sky was wide and inviting, and the grass was cool and sweetly refreshing under my bare feet as I walked across the undulating field towards the river. It was a short walk, only a mile or so, but I did not hurry it, letting my soul soak up the glorious sensation of freedom and lightness.

Something else gets under your skin, keeps you working days and nights at the sacrifice of your sleeping and eating and attention to your family and friends, something beyond the love of puzzle solving. And that other force is the anticipation of understanding something about the world that no one has ever understood before you. Einstein wrote that when he first realized that gravity was equivalent to acceleration -- an idea that would underlie his new theory of gravity -- it was the "happiest thought of my life." On projects of far smaller weight, I have experienced that pleasure of discovering something new. It is an exquisite sensation, a feeling of power, a rush of the blood, a sense of living forever. To be the first vessel to hold this new thing. All of the scientists I've known have at least one more quality in common: they do what they do because they love it, and because they cannot imagine doing anything else. In a sense, this is the real reason a scientist does science. Because the scientist must. Such a compulsion is both blessing and burden. A blessing because the creative life, in any endeavor, is a gift filled with beauty and not given to everyone, a burden because the call is unrelenting and can drown out the rest of life. This mixed blessing and burden must be why the astrophysicist Chandrasekhar continued working until his mid-80's, why a visitor to Einstein's apartment in Bern found the young physicist rocking his infant with one hand while doing mathematical calculations with the other. This mixed blessing and burden must have been the "sweet hell" that Walt Whitman referred to when he realized at a young age that he was destined to be a poet. "Never more," he wrote, "shall I escape.

You like excitement and emotion and change, you like remarkable sensations, whereas I go in for a holy calm, for sweet repose.

You're terrific as far as I'm concerned," replied Charlotte, sweetly, "and that's what counts. You're my best friend, and I think you're sensational. Now stop arguing and go get some sleep!

When I wake, I have a brief, delicious feeling of happiness that is somehow connected with Peeta. Happiness, of course, is a complete absurdity at this point, since at the rate things are going, I'll be dead in a day. And that's the best-case scenario, if I'm able to eliminate the rest of the field, including myself, and get Peeta crowned as the winner of the Quarter Quell. Still, the sensation's so unexpected and sweet I cling to it, if only for a few moments. Before the gritty sand, the hot sun, and my itching skin demand a return to reality.

It wasn’t an awe striking moment; I didn’t lose my breath or stumble over my words. It was gradual, like going to sleep. It happens slowly, at first, you’re restless, and you think it will never happen, and then the spell of seductive sleep falls upon you. And you’re in that wonderful stage of ease and peacefulness where you’re still awake but know your being slowly consumed by this wonderful sweet sensation. Then it devours you, and you forget everything else around you, and you just focus on what is going on in the here and now. And there is never one moment during this-this dream that you know with your entire mind that it’s true. Your body knows, your heart knows but not your mind. Your mind is the only thing unaware of this action, it’s helpless, and so it relies on every other part of the body to make the right decisions. The sad part? The mind doesn’t even know it’s helpless, but it doesn’t matter, because in those moments when you’re under that spell, the brain couldn’t be happier.

Clearly, she was enjoying herself to see that woman hurt. It was nothing she had desired. Nor did it seem as if she could control it, this inhuman sweet sensation to see another human being squirming. It hit her like a stone, the knowledge that there is pleasure in hurting. A strong three-dimensional pleasure, an exclusive masculine delight that is exhilarating beyond all measure. And this too is God's gift to man? She wondered.

Had they nothing else to say to each other? Yet their eyes were full of more serious statements; and while they sought for commonplace sentences, they each felt the same languor. It was like a murmur of the soul, profound and continuous, dominating that of the voices. Surprised at this unexpected sweetness, it did not occur to them to discuss the sensation or discover the cause. Future happiness, like tropical shores, projects over the vastness that precedes it, its innate indolence, and wafts a scented breeze that intoxicates and dispels any anxiety about the unseen horizon.

My delightful, my love, my life, I don’t understand anything: how can you not be with me? I’m so infinitely used to you that I now feel myself lost and empty: without you, my soul. You turn my life into something light, amazing, rainbowed—you put a glint of happiness on everything—always different: sometimes you can be smoky-pink, downy, sometimes dark, winged—and I don’t know when I love your eyes more—when they are open or shut. It’s eleven p.m. now: I’m trying with all the force of my soul to see you through space; my thoughts plead for a heavenly visa to Berlin via air . . . My sweet excitement . . . Today I can’t write about anything except my longing for you. I’m gloomy and fearful: silly thoughts are swarming—that you’ll stumble as you jump out of a carriage in the underground, or that someone will bump into you in the street . . . I don’t know how I’ll survive the week. My tenderness, my happiness, what words can I write for you? How strange that although my life’s work is moving a pen over paper, I don’t know how to tell you how I love, how I desire you. Such agitation—and such divine peace: melting clouds immersed in sunshine—mounds of happiness. And I am floating with you, in you, aflame and melting—and a whole life with you is like the movement of clouds, their airy, quiet falls, their lightness and smoothness, and the heavenly variety of outline and tint—my inexplicable love. I cannot express these cirrus-cumulus sensations. When you and I were at the cemetery last time, I felt it so piercingly and clearly: you know it all, you know what will happen after death—you know it absolutely simply and calmly—as a bird knows that, fluttering from a branch, it will fly and not fall down . . . And that’s why I am so happy with you, my lovely, my little one. And here’s more: you and I are so special; the miracles we know, no one knows, and no one loves the way we love. What are you doing now? For some reason I think you’re in the study: you’ve got up, walked to the door, you are pulling the door wings together and pausing for a moment—waiting to see if they’ll move apart again. I’m tired, I’m terribly tired, good night, my joy. Tomorrow I’ll write you about all kinds of everyday things. My love.

Had they nothing else to say to each other? Yet their eyes were full of more serious statements; and while they sought for commonplace sentences, they each felt the same languor. It was like a murmur of the soul, profound and continuous, dominating that of the voices. Surprised at this unexpected sweetness, it did not occur to them to discuss the sensation or discover the cause. Future happiness, like tropical shores, projects over the vastness that precedes it, its innate indolence, and wafts a scented breeze that intoxicates and dispels any anxiety about the unseen horizon.

A poem, in my opinion, is opposed to a work of science by having, for its immediate object, pleasure, not truth; to romance, by having for its object an indefinite instead of a definite pleasure, being a poem only so far as this object is attained; romance presenting perceptible images with definite, poetry with in definite sensations, to which end music is an essential, since the comprehension of sweet sound is our most indefinite conception. Music, when combined with a pleasurable idea, is poetry; music without the idea is simply music; the idea without the music is prose from its very definitiveness.

He dipped close for a swift, sweet kiss. Pen soaked up every beautiful sensation, as well as how her heart eased its nervous twitch. She beat more steadily now.

confined as he may be, he none the less still preserves in his heart the sweet sensation of freedom, and the knowledge that he can quit this prison whenever he wishes.

But the first glad moment in our first love is a vision which returns to us to the last, and brings with it a thrill of feeling intense and special as the recurrent sensation of a sweet odour breathed in a far off hour of happiness. It is a memory that gives a more exquisite touch to tenderness, that feeds the madness of jealousy, and adds the last keenness to the agony of despair.

I am Kian.” “Mercy ” she replied. Swallowing hard she forced her gaze away from him. She was being too bold in her perusal but she could not stop looking at him. “Kindness ” he whispered. Their eyes locked and Mercy felt a jolt of some foreign but not unwelcome sensation pierce her. “I could use some of you” he said thoughtfully as his cool gaze devoured her. “Most definitely I could use you.” He rose and walked around the pond perusing her body as he came to stand beside her. “The milk of human kindness how sweet the taste.” He actually licked his lips and Mercy shivered her core heating and wetting. Then he lowered himself until they were eye to eye. “I believe I could drink you dry.

Gabriel shuddered with obvious pleasure; Joey, half out of his body with the sensation, pumped in and out with terrible urgency. Forever wouldn’t have been long enough. When Gabriel seized, Joey left himself entirely, flesh overloaded with pleasure, spirit suspended between life and death. “Joey? Are you all right?” Drawing a deep breath, Joey opened his eyes. “Never better. You?” “’Twas sweet.” Gabriel smiled. “And I was thinking. Now that we’ve both had each other – that’s as good as taking vows, isn’t it?

No appetite. No sensation in a dry stomach. No desire. No orchids sweet enough to taste. Not the sort of woman to eat sandwiches on a bus. At least not the sort of woman who would eat in the dark. Not anymore.

I should want to spit at him. Bounce his head off the wall. Tear at his face. But I don't feel angry, I feel nothing. Hollow and weightless. I dig my nails into the palms of my hands just to feel the sensation.

I no longer felt alone and it gave me, not strength, but a sweet sensation of happiness, though I knew sadness was lurking not far off, because all being arises from nonbeing, and everything that exists derives from its opposite.

There is no shortage of good days. It is good lives that are hard to come by. A life of good days lived in the senses is not enough. The life of sensation is the life of greed; it requires more and more. The life of the spirit requires less and less; time is ample and its passage sweet. Who would call a day spent reading a good day? But a life spent reading—that is a good life.

This splendid vision dwelt in her memory as the most beautiful thing that it was possible to dream, so that now she strove to recall her sensation. That still lasted, however, but in a less exclusive fashion and with a deeper sweetness. Her soul, tortured by

He was a stranger, an alien creature, impossible to reach or understand. And still she wanted to try. “Tell me what you need.” “This,” he whispered, watching her lips move against his palm. “Just this.” He rose over her, pinning her against the cushions, and stroked her hair with a tenderness that seemed misplaced among the sultry sensations it awakened in her. “Do your clients pleasure you?” she asked hoarsely, her head tilting and following his fingers as they massaged her neck. “If that’s what they want. You pleasure me, Billie. The sight of you. The sound of your voice. I want to hear it all sorts of ways. Laughing. Whispering. Moaning. Crying out.” He caught her mouth in a lush, hungry kiss, and there was nothing sweet or grateful about it this time. Erotic delight arrowed through her with each sleek thrust of his tongue between her lips, a sultry promise of what he would do to her if she let him.

I felt Nairobi's foreignness — or really, my own foreignness in relation to it — immediately, even in the first strains of morning. It's a sensation I've come to love as I've traveled more, the way a new place signals itself instantly and without pretense. The air has a different weight from what you're used to; it carries smells you can't quite identify, a faint whiff of wood smoke or diesel fuel, maybe, or the sweetness of something blooming in the trees. The same sun comes up, but looking slightly different from what you know.

His eyes flared, and he tightened his grip on her arm. “Don’t press me, Meg.” She didn’t miss the intimate use of her Christian name, but there was no mistaking the threat this time. His voice was deep and liquid and seemed to wrap around her. She knew she shouldn’t provoke him, but he brought out a mischievous side of her long forgotten. Lifting one brow, she asked, “Or what?” Before the taunt had left her mouth, she was in his arms again and jerked firmly against the broad chest she’d just admired. She gasped. Not from shock, but from the realization of how much she liked being pressed against him. Of how she savored the sensation of her breasts and hips molded against the hard length of his body, of melting against him, of being secured in his arms. A wave of heated awareness shuddered through her. His eyes were hooded, his expression dark and full of promise. “Or I will prove to you just how innocent you are, my sweet, and how very little control you have over a man and a man’s desires.

But oft, in lonely rooms, and mid the din Of towns and cities, I have owed to them, In hours of weariness, sensations sweet, Felt in the blood, and felt along the heart, And passing even into my purer mind With tranquil restoration;—feelings too Of unremembered pleasures; such, perhaps, As have made no trivial influence On that best portion of a good man's life; His little, nameless, unremembered acts Of kindness and of love.

Bob grinned. 'Wear that white swimsuit you bought last week, OK?' he said. 'I want all the other guys to wish you were their girlfriend.' Sara felt vaguely uncomfortable, but she ignored the sensation. Bob just wanted her to look her best, she figured. There was nothing wrong with that.

If I were today on my deathbed, I would name my love of the color blue and making love with you as two of the sweetest sensations I knew on this earth. But are you certain-- one would like to ask-- that it was sweet? --No, not really, or not always. If I am to enforce a rule of "brutal honesty," perhaps not even often. It often happens that we treat pain as if it were the only real thing, or at least the most real thing: when it comes round, everything before it, around it, and, perhaps, in front of it, tends to seem fleeting, delusional. Of all the philosophers, Schopenhauer is the most hilarious and direct spokesperson for this idea: "As a rule we find pleasure much less pleasurable, pain much more painful than we expected." You don't believe him? He offers this quick test: "Compare the feelings of an animal engaged in eating another with those of the animal being eaten.

Had they nothing else to say to one another? Yet their eyes were full of more serious speech, and while they forced themselves to find trivial phrases, they felt the same languor stealing over them both. It was the whisper of the soul, deep, continuous, dominating that of their voices. Surprised with wonder at this strange sweetness, they did not think of speaking of the sensation or of seeking its cause. Coming joys, like tropical shores, throw over the immensity before them their inborn softness, an odorous wind, and we are lulled by this intoxication without a thought of the horizon that we do not even know.

But, oh, how sweet it was to love for once with the love of real life; for now he knew that nothing of what he had imagined to be love was real love, neither the turgid longing of the lonely youth, nor the passionate yearning of the dreamer, nor yet the nervous foreboding of the child. These were currents in the ocean of love, single reflections of its full light, fragments of love as the meteors rushing through space are splinters of a world--for that was love; a world complete in itself, fully rounded, vast, and orderly. It was no medley of confused sensations and moods rushing one upon another! Love was like nature, ever changing, ever renewing; no feeling died and no emotion withered without giving life to the seed of something still more perfect which was embedded in it.

A predator’s intention…… It is my intention to cause you fear such as you have never known. It is my desire to take your fear to a whole new level of terror. I can smell your fear as its sweet scent flows through my universe. This small universe that I have created and am permitting you to exist in. I say these things because you only exist right now because I have allowed it, for if I should choose, I could snuff you out as if extinguishing a candle flame. I will make you thank me later for allowing you to breathe. I will mix you a concoction of fear, pain, uncertainty, and arousal, such as you have never known. You see my curious little prey these all create very similar physical reactions. My little prey… they have common traits on the emotional side too. Curious prey, curious prey, let me growl my intentions into your curious ear. I will keep you in a constant state of fear, pain, uncertainty, and arousal. I know exactly what I am doing; I am a skilled and professional predator. It is my full intention to own you! I will keep you in a constant emotional whirlpool. This is the universe of my making, and you exist in it by my power, and by my choice. I want you in a constant state of fear, physical discomfort, pain, uncertainty, and arousal. I am purposely blurring the lines between your emotions, and your physical sensations. As I do this… I am creating a desire and a craving within you to be man handled and taken by me. I am intentionally working you into a state of intense arousal, and desperation. I am conditioning you to crave your new life as my prey…

It was more than a kiss...it was a sentence of unbroken kisses, the hot sweet syllables of lips and tongue making her drunk on sensation.

The life of sensation is the life of greed; it requires more and more. The life of spirit requires less and less; time is ample and its passage sweet

I was dead. That was really the only explanation I had for the sensation that I was lying in a comfy bed, cool, clean-smelling sheets pulled up to my chin, and a soft hand stroking my hair. That was nice. Being dead seemed pretty sweet, all things considered. Especially if ti meant I got to nap for all eternity. I snuggled deeper into the covers. The hand on my hair moved to my back, and I realized someone was singing softly. The voice was familiar, and something about it made my chest ache. Well, that was to be expected. Angels’ songs would be awfully poignant. “’I was working as a waitress in a cocktail bar, when I met you…’” the voice crooned. I frowned. Was that really an appropriate song for the Heavenly Host to be- Realization crashed into me. “Mom!

A rush of sensation pulsed through her, lingering long after his touch. The towel quickly fell free. He caught it before it slipped to the ground and slung it over his shoulder. “Consider this your first time,” he said, his tone low and sultry. Good Lord... Paige could hardly blink. If this was any indication of the doc’s bedside manner, she could only hope for long-term, intensive treatment.

and goes with it. There is a sensation first of being rocked, of a delicious spiralling sweetness which makes her begin to turn her head helplessly from side to side, and a tuneless humming comes from between her closed lips, this is flying, this, oh love, oh desire, oh this is something impossible to deny, binding, giving, making a strong circle: binding, giving . . . flying. “Oh Ben, oh my dear, yes,

...the sensation was so startlingly intense that I couldn‘t help it, I slipped into the shadow. "What in the name of—" Simon jerked backward, voice shocked. "Gods and suns, Lily, where did you go?" I froze where I was, embarrassment flowing over me in a fiery tide that burned everything else away. Sweet lords of hell, what had I done? I was fairly certain that vanishing during such a moment was just not done.

Had they nothing else to say to one another? Yet their eyes were full of more serious speech, and while they forced themselves to find trivial phrases, they felt the same languor stealing over them both. It was the whisper of the soul, deep, continuous, dominating that of their voices. Surprised with wonder at this strange sweetness, they did not think of speaking of the sensation or of seeking its cause. Coming joys, like tropical shores, throw over the immensity before them their inborn softness, an odorous wind, and we are lulled by this intoxication without a thought of the horizon that we did not even know.

The sound was so icy and bleak that he imagined his daughter had seen in her dreams the unavoidable future, all the sorrow and confusion to come, and he felt himself shrink in horror. But the moment passed, and soon Sebastian and Monica sank again, or they rose, for there seemed to be no physical dimensions in the space they swam or tumbled through, only sensation, only pleasure so focused, so pointed it was a reminder of pain.

Men deft men mental men of loving men all men Vile men virtuous men same men from which men Sweet and men of mercy men such making men said Has each man that sees it Cry as men to the men sensate Conceptual recognition the men And their poverty speaking to the men Is about timeliness men is about Previous palpability from which The problematic politics adorable And humble especially Young men of sheepish privilege becoming Sweet new style

Having proven that solitary pleasures are as delicious as any others and much more likely to delight, it becomes perfectly clear that this enjoyment, taken in independence of the objectwe employ, is not merely of a nature very remote from what could be pleasurable to thatobject, but is even found to be inimical to that object’s pleasure: what is more, it may becomean imposed suffering, a vexation, or a torture, and the only thing that results from this abuse isa very certain increase of pleasure for the despot who does the tormenting or vexing; let usattempt to demonstrate this.”Voluptuous emotion is nothing but a kind of vibration produced in our soul by shockswhich the imagination, inflamed by the remembrance of a lubricious object, registers uponour senses, either through this object’s presence, or better still by this object’s being exposedto that particular kind of irritation which most profoundly stirs us; thus, our voluptuoustransport Ä this indescribable convulsive needling which drives us wild, which lifts us to thehighest pitch of happiness at which man is able to arrive Ä is never ignited save by twocauses: either by the perception in the object we use of a real or imaginary beauty, the beautyin which we delight the most, or by the sight of that object undergoing the strongest possiblesensation; now, there is no more lively sensation than that of pain; its impressions are certainand dependable, they never deceive as may those of the pleasure women perpetually feign andalmost never experience; and, furthermore, how much self-confidence, youth, vigor, healthare not needed in order to be sure of producing this dubious and hardly very satisfyingimpression of pleasure in a woman. To produce the painful impression, on the contrary,requires no virtues at all: the more defects a man may have, the older he is, the less lovable,the more resounding his success. With what regards the objective, it will be far more certainlyattained since we are establishing the fact that one never better touches, I wish to say, that onenever better irritates one’s senses than when the greatest possible impression has been produced in the employed object, by no matter what devices; therefore, he who will cause themost tumultuous impression to be born in a woman, he who will most thoroughly convulsethis woman’s entire frame, very decidedly will have managed to procure himself the heaviest possible dose of voluptuousness, because the shock resultant upon us by the impressionsothers experience, which shock in turn is necessitated by the impression we have of thoseothers, will necessarily be more vigorous if the impression these others receive be painful,than if the impression they receive be sweet and mild; and it follows that the voluptuousegoist, who is persuaded his pleasures will be keen only insofar as they are entire, willtherefore impose, when he has it in his power to do so, the strongest possible dose of painupon the employed object, fully certain that what by way of voluptuous pleasure he extractswill be his only by dint of the very lively impression he has produced.

Your idea of love is rather primitive. It is not a series of sensations, independent of each other. . . ." I realised how every time I had fallen in love it had been like that: a sudden emotion, roused by a face, a gesture or a kiss, which I remembered only as incoherent moments of excitement. "It is something different," said Anne. "There are such things as lasting affection, sweetness, a sense of loss . . . but I suppose you wouldn't understand.

And as he whispered sweet nothings in her ear, she had the strangest sensation, almost as if she could see her entire future laid out before her. Each day was richer and fuller than the last, and every day she was falling, falling, falling . . .

The Yamato spirit is not a tame, tender plant, but a wild--in the sense of natural--growth; it is indigenous to the soil; its accidental qualities it may share with the flowers of other lands, but in its essence it remains the original, spontaneous outgrowth of our clime. But its nativity is not its sole claim to our affection. The refinement and grace of its beauty appeal to our æsthetic sense as no other flower can. We cannot share the admiration of the Europeans for their roses, which lack the simplicity of our flower. Then, too, the thorns that are hidden beneath the sweetness of the rose, the tenacity with which she clings to life, as though loth or afraid to die rather than drop untimely, preferring to rot on her stem; her showy colours and heavy odours--all these are traits so unlike our flower, which carries no dagger or poison under its beauty, which is ever ready to depart life at the call of nature, whose colours are never gorgeous, and whose light fragrance never palls. Beauty of colour and of form is limited in its showing; it is a fixed quality of existence, whereas fragrance is volatile, ethereal as the breathing of life. So in all religious ceremonies frankincense and myrrh play a prominent part. There is something spirituelle in redolence. When the delicious perfume of the sakura quickens the morning air, as the sun in its course rises to illumine first the isles of the Far East, few sensations are more serenely exhilarating than to inhale, as it were, the very breath of beauteous day.

Those were the terms in which my parents, keen for me to grow up well grounded in cynicism, explained things to me. Sweets, chocolates and crisps were all very well, but to buy them by the checkout, on an impulse, was falling into a trap. Instead, I was taught the pleasure of watching other people fall into it and feeling smug. The fact that the sensation of smugness was more pleasurable to me than that of salt or sugar tells you all you need to know about the kind of monster who comes to prominence in modern Britain.

--Suddenly the bus driver stops with a jolt, turns off his lights. A moose has come out of the impenetrable wood and stands there, looms, rather, in the middle of the road. It approaches; it sniffs at the bus's hot hood. Towering, antlerless, high as a church, homely as a house (or, safe as houses). A man's voice assures us 'Perfectly harmless. . . .' Some of the passengers exclaim in whispers, childishly, softly, 'Sure are big creatures.' 'It's awful plain.' 'Look! It's a she!' Taking her time, she looks the bus over, grand, otherworldly. Why, why do we feel (we all feel) this sweet sensation of joy? 'Curious creatures,' says our quiet driver, rolling his r's. 'Look at that, would you.' Then he shifts gears. For a moment longer, by craning backward, the moose can be seen on the moonlit macadam; then there's a dim smell of moose, an acrid smell of gasoline.

You have a mouth made for kissing," he murmured, angling her to face him. "Did you know that?" She shook her head. "So soft and generous." Leaning in, he tipped her chin with the heel of his hand. "Sweet." "No man's ever called me sweet." "Has any other man kissed you?" Again, she gave a little shake of the head. "Well, then. That's why." He brushed his lips over hers, just lightly, sending pure sensation frizzing through her veins. He hummed with satisfaction. "You taste of ripe plums." She couldn't help it. She laughed. "Now that's just absurd." "Why?" "Because it's too early in the year for ripe plums." His husky chuckle shook them both. "You're entirely too logical for your own good. A thorough kissing can mend that." "I don't want mending." "Perhaps not. But I think you do want kissing." He nuzzled the curve of her cheek, and his voice dropped to a sensual whisper. "Don't you?" She did. Oh, she did.

California during the 1940s had Hollywood and the bright lights of Los Angeles, but on the other coast was Florida, land of sunshine and glamour, Miami and Miami Beach. If you weren't already near California's Pacific Coast you headed for Florida during the winter. One of the things which made Miami such a mix of glitter and sunshine was the plethora of movie stars who flocked there to play, rubbing shoulders with tycoons and gangsters. Sometimes it was hard to tell the difference between the latter two. Miami and everything that surrounded it hadn't happened by accident. Carl Fisher had set out to make Miami Beach a playground destination during the 1930s and had succeeded far beyond his dreams. The promenade behind the Roney Plaza Hotel was a block-long lovers' lane of palm trees and promise that began rather than ended in the blue waters of the Atlantic. Florida was more than simply Miami and Miami Beach, however. When George Merrick opened the Biltmore Hotel in Coral Gables papers across the country couldn't wait to gush about the growing aura of Florida. They tore down Collins Bridge in the Gables and replaced it with the beautiful Venetian Causeway. You could plop down a fiver if you had one and take your best girl — or the girl you wanted to score with — for a gondola ride there before the depression, or so I'd been told. You see, I'd never actually been to Florida before the war, much less Miami. I was a newspaper reporter from Chicago before the war and had never even seen the ocean until I was flying over the Pacific for the Air Corp. There wasn't much time for admiring the waves when Japanese Zeroes were trying to shoot you out of the sky and bury you at the bottom of that deep blue sea. It was because of my friend Pete that I knew so much about Miami. Florida was his home, so when we both got leave in '42 I followed him to the warm waters of Miami to see what all the fuss was about. It would be easy to say that I skipped Chicago for Miami after the war ended because Pete and I were such good pals and I'd had such a great time there on leave. But in truth I decided to stay on in Miami because of Veronica Lake. I'd better explain that. Veronica Lake never knew she was the reason I came back with Pete to Miami after the war. But she had been there in '42 while Pete and I were enjoying the sand, sun, and the sweet kisses of more than a few love-starved girls desperate to remember what it felt like to have a man's arm around them — not to mention a few other sensations. Lake had been there promoting war bonds on Florida's first radio station, WQAM. It was a big outdoor event and Pete and I were among those listening with relish to Lake's sultry voice as she urged everyone to pitch-in for our boys overseas. We were in those dark early days of the war at the time, and the outcome was very much in question. Lake's appearance at the event was a morale booster for civilians and servicemen alike. She was standing behind a microphone that sat on a table draped in the American flag. I'd never seen a Hollywood star up-close and though I liked the movies as much as any other guy, I had always attributed most of what I saw on-screen to smoke and mirrors. I doubted I'd be impressed seeing a star off-screen. A girl was a girl, after all, and there were loads of real dolls in Miami, as I'd already discovered. Boy, was I wrong." - Where Flamingos Fly

It wasn't the first time the two of them had kissed but it was the first time they were both aware of what it was. the act itself wasn't any different, still lips upon lips, capped and wet and warm. But the intention was. This kiss was a question, an answer, fingers crossed, and a promise kept. it was hope. it was possibility. It was sparks across Wren's skin and a flutter in her stomach. It was roving hands and soft touches and lingering heat. It was bark pressed against her. back. It was tiny gasps, Tamsin's mouth splitting into a smile that Wren matched with her own. Wren wanted to remember every second, wanted to be aware of every single sensation, but it was like trying to count the stars. Never before had she been so conscious of how many ways to was possible to feel. To want. to need. The second kiss was much of the same. The third was somehow even more. After that, Wren stopped counting. She focused instead on the way her skin shivered beneath the witch's touch, how she had never before considered the neck to be a place particularly suited for kissing (oh, how foolish she had been), how tender a tongue could be. Kissing the witch gave Wren the same sensation magic did. Kissing Tamsin made Wren feel like magic too.

There it was again, that strange sensation. Sort of floaty. Completely lovely. “Why aren’t we kissing yet?” “The same question had crossed my mind.” He leaned closer and pressed his lips to mine. I could never get enough of this sweet, crazy kissing. How did anyone ever get anything done when they were falling in love?

The second sort was waking up alone. That was characterised by an awareness that he was alone in bed, alone in life, alone in the world, and it could sometimes fill him with a sweet sensation of freedom, and at other times with a melancholy that could perhaps be called loneliness, but which was perhaps just a glimpse of what anyone’s life really is: a journey from the attachment of the umbilical cord to a death where we are finally separated from everything and everyone. A brief glimpse at the moment of awakening before all our defence mechanisms and comforting illusions slot into place again and we can face life in all its unreal glory. Then

Haven't I told you scores of times, that you're always beginners, and the greatest satisfaction was not in being at the top, but in getting there, in the enjoyment you get out of scaling the heights? That's something you don't understand, and can't understand until you've gone through it yourself. You're still at the state of unlimited illusions, when a good, strong pair of legs makes the hardest road look short, and you've such a mighty appetite for glory that the tiniest crumb of success tastes delightfully sweet. You're prepared for a feast, you're going to satisfy your ambition at last, you feel it's within reach and you don't care if you give the skin off your back to get it! And then, the heights are scaled, the summits reached, and you've got to stay there. That's when the torture begins; you've drunk your excitement to the dregs and found it all too short and even rather bitter, and you wonder whether it was really worth the struggle. From that point there is no more unknown to explore, no new sensations to experience. Pride has had its brief portion of celebrity; you know that your best has been given and you're surprised it hasn't brought a keener sense of satisfaction. From that moment the horizon starts to empty of all hopes that once attracted you towards it. There's nothing to look forward to but death. But in spite of that you cling on, you don't want to feel you're played out, you persist in trying to produce something, like old men persist in trying to make love, with painful, humiliating results. ... If only we could have the courage to hang ourselves in front of our last masterpiece!

Montana A great many small failures have brought me to this Dark room where, against the teachings of the church, I lie in the forgiving dark with you and we kiss And loosen our clothing and feel the hot urge Toward nakedness, man's natural destination, The slow unbuttoning, unclasping, until at last We lie revealed. The fine sensation Of you on my skin. A slender woman as vast As Montana and I am now heading west On a winding road through the dark contours Of mountains and into a valley, coming to rest In a meadow that I recognize as yours. This is what I drove across North Dakota to find: This sweet nest. And put all my failed life behind.

Had they nothing else to say to each other? Yet their eyes were full of a more serious conversation; and while they forced themselves to find commonplace remarks, they felt the same languor invading them both; it was like a murmur of the soul, deep, continuous, louder than the murmur of their voices. Surprised by a sweetness new to them, they did not think of describing the sensation to each other or of discovering its cause. Future joys, like tropical shores, project over the immensity that lies before them their native softness, a fragrant breeze, and one grows drowsy in that intoxication without even worrying about the horizon one cannot see.

One moment he was flinching and the next there was a slow, sweet wave that dragged him down ... it was a haze. The haze you experience when your eyes are heavy and you are about to fall asleep, where your limbs are tired, and your whole body is weighed down, and there is this soft pleasant sensation as you surrender to exhaustion.

Though absent long, These forms of beauty have not been to me, As is a landscape to a blind man's eye: But oft, in lonely rooms, and mid the din Of towns and cities, I have owed to them, In hours of weariness, sensations sweet, Felt in the blood, and felt along the heart, And passing even into my purer mind With tranquil restoration

I-I just want to be safe from him. From all of them.” Sebastian drew his head back to look down into her flushed face. “You are safe,” he said in a low voice. He lifted one of his hands to her face, caressing the plane of her cheekbone, letting his fingertip follow the trail of pale golden freckles across the bridge of her nose. As her lashes fluttered downward, he stroked the slender arcs of her brows, and cradled the side of her face in his palm. “Evie,” he murmured. “I swear on my life, you will never feel pain from my hands. I may prove a devil of a husband in every other regard… but I wouldn’t hurt you that way. You must believe that.” The delicate nerves of her skin drank in sensations thirstily… his touch, the erotic waft of his breath against her lips. Evie was afraid to open her eyes, or to do anything that might interrupt the moment. “Yes,” she managed to whisper. “Yes… I—” There was the sweet shock of a probing kiss against her lips… another… She opened to him with a slight gasp.

You don’t concern yourself much with being liked, do you?” Tristan asked, half amused. No, I don’t.” He was doubtful that Tristan would be capable of understanding that, but the sensation of being liked was extraordinarily dull. It was the closest thing to vanilla that Callum could think of, though nothing was truly comparable. Being feared was a bit like anise, like absinthe. A strange and arousing flavor. Being admired was golden, maple-sweet. Being despised was woodsy, sulfuric aroma, smoke in his nostrils, something to choke on, when done properly. Being envied was tart, a citrusy tang, like green apple. Being desired was Callum’s favorite. That was smoky, too, in a sense, but more sultry, cloaked and perfumed in precisely what it was. It smelled like tangled bedsheets. It tasted like a flicker of a candle flame. It felt like a sigh, a quiet one; concessionary and pleading. He could always feel it on his skin, sharp as a blade. Piercing, like the groan of a lover in his ear. “Being liked is fairly ordinary, I’m afraid,” Callum said. “Intensely commonplace.

Aware she’d likely never tasted such a thing before, she took a cautious sip. Nothing came up. “The straw’s defective.” Dev shot her a quick grin. It altered his face, turning him strikingly beautiful. But that wasn’t the odd part. The odd part was that seeing him smile made her heart change its rhythm. She lifted her hand a fraction, compelled to trace the curve of his lips, the crease in his cheek. Would he let her, she thought, this man who moved with the liquid grace of a soldier . . . or a beast of prey? “Did I say milk shake?” he said, withheld laughter in his voice. “I meant ice cream smoothie—with enough fresh fruit blended into it to turn it solid.” Glancing at her when she didn’t move, he raised an eyebrow. She felt a wave of heat across her face, and the sensation was so strange, it broke through her fascination. Looking down, she took off the lid after removing the straw and stared at the swirls of pink and white that dominated the delicious-smelling concoction. Intrigued, she poked at it with the tip of her straw. “I can see pieces of strawberry, and what’s that?” She looked more closely at the pink-coated black seeds. “Passion fruit?” “Try it and see.” Handing her his water bottle, he started the car and got them on their way. “How would I know?” She put his water in the holder next to the unopened bottle. “And I need a spoon for this.” Reaching into a pocket, he pulled out a plastic-wrapped piece of cutlery. “Here.” “You did that on purpose,” she accused. “Did you want to see how hard I’d try to suck the mixture up?” Another smile, this one a bare shadow. “Would I do that?” It startled her to realize he was teasing her. Devraj Santos, she thought, wasn’t supposed to have a sense of humor. That was something she just knew. And, it was wrong. That meant the shadow-man didn’t know everything, that he wasn’t omnipotent. A cascade of bubbles sparkled through her veins, bright and effervescent. “I think you’re capable of almost anything.” Dipping in the spoon, she brought the decadent mixture to her lips. Oh! The crisp sting of ice, the cream rich and sweet, the fruit a tart burst of sensation. It was impossible not to take a second bite. And a third.

And just for a moment I had reached the point of ecstasy that I always wanted to reach, which was a complete step across chronological time into timeless shadows, and the wonderment in the bleakness of the mortal realm, and the sensation of death kicking at my heels to move on.. I realised that I had died and been reborn numberless times but just didn't remember especially because the transitions from life to death and back to life are so ghostly easy, a magical action for naught, like falling asleep and waking up again a million times, the utter casualness and deep ignorance of it.. I felt sweet, swinging bliss, like a big shot of heroin in the mainline vein; like a gulp of wine late in the afternoon and it makes you shudder; my feet tingled.

Once as a child, Phoebe had been caught outside in a summer storm, and had seen a butterfly knocked from the air by raindrops. It had fluttered and fallen to the ground, bombarded from every direction. The only choice had been to fold its wings, take shelter and wait. This man was the storm and the shelter, pulling her into a deep, encompassing darkness where there was too much to feel- hot soft firm sweet hungry rough silken tugging. She strained helplessly in his arms, although she didn't know whether she was trying to escape or press closer. She had craved this, the hardness and heat of his body against hers, the sensation familiar and yet not at all familiar. She had feared this, a man with a will and power that matched her own, a man who would desire and possess every last part of her without mercy.

That wondrous instant of our meeting — my mind’s eye sees you standing there, a vision transient and fleeting, true beauty’s spirit, pure and rare. In toils of hopeless grief confounded, amid life’s noise and stress it seems for long that tender voice resounded and those sweet features came in dreams. Years passed; the storms that life engenders dispersed my former hopes of grace and I forgot those accents tender, the heavenly beauty of your face. And in my dark incarceration my days passed like the clouds above, bereft alike of inspiration, of tears, of life itself, of love. My soul awoke to new existence, again you stood before me there, a vision lasting but an instant, true beauty’s spirit, pure and rare. My heart relives the old sensation and once more steal down from above, God’s benediction, inspiration, and tears, and life itself and love.

As her gentle voice continued, Rhys had the sensation of floating, the red tide of fever easing. How strange and lovely it was to lie here half dozing in her arms, possibly even better than fucking... but that thought led to the indecent question of what it might be like with her... how she might lie quietly beneath him while he devoured all that petal softness and vanilla sweetness... and slowly he fell asleep in Lady Helen's arms.

Sugar was a rarity in eighteenth century America. Even after cane plantations were planted in the Caribbean, it remained a luxury good beyond the reach of most Americans...It wasn't until late in the nineteenth century that sugar became plentiful and cheap enough to enter the lives of many Americans...; before then the sensation of sweetness in the lives of most people came chiefly from the flesh of fruit. And in America that usually meant the apple

Okay, okay . . . where do you hear it coming from?” “Around here somewhere.” “Always in this spot?” “No. Not always. You are going to think I am even more insane, but I swear it is following me around.” “Maybe it is my new powers. The power to drive you mad.” She wriggled her fingers at him theatrically as if she were casting a curse on him. “You already drive me mad,” he teased, dragging her up against him and nibbling her neck with a playful growling. “Ah hell,” he broke off. “I really am going mad. I cannot believe you cannot hear that. It is like a metronome set to some ridiculously fast speed.” He turned and walked into the living room, looking around at every shelf. “The last person to own this place probably had a thing for music and left it running. Listen. Can you hear that?” “No,” she said thoughtfully, “but I can hear you hearing it if I concentrate on your thoughts. What in the world . . . ?” Gideon turned, then turned again, concentrating on the rapid sound, following it until it led him right up to his wife. “It is you!” he said. “No wonder it is following me around. Are you wearing a watch?” He grabbed her wrist and she rolled her eyes. “A Demon wearing a watch? Now I have heard everything.” Suddenly Gideon went very, very still, the cold wash of chills that flooded through him so strong that she shivered with the overflow of sensation. He abruptly dropped to his knees and framed her hips with his hands. “Oh, Legna,” he whispered, “I am such an idiot. It is a baby. It is our baby. I am hearing it’s heartbeat!” “What?” she asked, her shock so powerful she could barely speak. “I am with child?” “Yes. Yes, sweet, you most certainly are. A little over a month. Legna, you conceived, probably the first time we made love. My beautiful, fertile, gorgeous wife.” Gideon kissed her belly through her dress, stood up, and caught her up against him until she squeaked with the force of his hug. Legna went past shock and entered unbelievable joy. She laughed, not caring how tight he held her, feeling his joy on a thousand different levels. “I never thought I would know this feeling,” he said hoarsely. “Even when we were getting married, I never thought . . . It did not even enter my mind!” Gideon set her down on her feet, putting her at arm’s length as he scanned her thoroughly from head to toe. “I cannot understand why I did not become aware of this sooner. The chemical changes, the hormone levels alone . . .” “Never mind. We know now,” she said, throwing herself back up against him and hugging him tightly. “Come, we have to tell Noah . . . and Hannah! Oh, and Bella! And Jacob, of course. And Elijah. And we should inform Siena—” She was still rattling off names as she teleported them to the King’s castle.

She had no will of her own now, no consecutive thought, no power of concentration; she was being dashed and hurtled into a chaos that blinded her, some bottomless pit, some sweet, appalling nothingness. [...] Papa who played her on a thousand strings, she dancing to his tune like a doll on wires - Papa who harped at her and would not let her be. He was cruel, he was relentless, he was like some oppressive, suffocating power that stifled her and could not be warded off; he gave her all these bewildering sounds and sensations without causing so that she was like a child stuffed with sweets cloying and rich; they were rammed down her throat and into her belly, filling her, exhausting her, making her a drum of excitement and anguish and emotion that was gripping in its savage intensity. It was too much for her, too strong. She felt as though she were a dry stack in a deep wood, and he had put a match to her and was watching her burn.

Sichuan pepper is the original Chinese pepper, used long before the more familiar black or white pepper stole in over the tortuous land routes of the old Silk Road. It is not hot to taste, like the chilli, but makes your lips cool and tingly. In Chinese they call it ma, this sensation; the same word is used for pins-and-needles and anaesthesia. The strange, fizzing effect of Sichuan pepper, paired with the heat of chillies, is one of the hallmarks of modern Sichuanese cookery. The

Most of my life, I've felt more connected to the Dead than the Living." Maura moved closer. "Maybe you just need to live a little more." He breathed her in, her smell intoxicating. "Maybe you can show me." She swallowed the space between them, kissed him slow. The sensation of her mouth was honey, sweet and sticky and thick. He kissed her back, and it was agony, this kiss, the way it consumed him. She pulled him in, close, closer, desire pushing every other thought to the back of his mind.

You play with great skill," he said. "Thank you." "Is that your favorite piece?" "It's my most difficult," Helen said, "but not my favorite." "What do you play when there's no one to hear?" The gentle question, spoken in that accent with vowels as broad as his shoulders, caused Helen's stomach to tighten pleasurably. Perturbed by the sensation, she was slow to reply. "I don't remember the name of it. A piano tutor taught it to me long ago. For years I've tried to find out what it is, but no one has ever recognized the melody." "Play it for me." Calling it up from memory, she played the sweetly haunting chords, her hands gentle on the keys. The mournful chords never failed to stir her, making her heart ache for things she couldn't name. At the conclusion, Helen looked up from the keys and found Winterborne staring at her as if transfixed. He masked his expression, but not before she saw a mixture of puzzlement, fascination, and a hint of something hot and unsettling. "It's Welsh," he said. Helen shook her head with a laugh of wondering disbelief. "You know it?" "'A Ei Di'r Deryn Do.' Every Welshman is born knowing it." "What is it about?" "A lover who asks a blackbird to carry a message to his sweetheart." "Why can't he go to her himself?" Helen realized they were both speaking in hushed tones, as if they were exchanging secrets. "He can't find her. He's too deep in love- it keeps him from seeing clearly." "Does the blackbird find her?" "The song doesn't say," he said with a shrug. "But I must know the ending to the story," Helen protested. Winterborne laughed. It was an irresistible sound, rough-soft and sly. When he replied, his accent had thickened. "That's what comes o' reading novels, it is. The story needs no ending. That's not what matters." "What matters, then?" she dared to ask. His dark gaze held hers. "That he loves. That he's searching. Like the rest of us poor devils, he has no way of knowing if he'll ever have his heart's desire.

Our infant muscles let go and mold to the shape of our mother's bodies when we are securely held. Our bodies learn the meaning of the sensations of hunger and thirst from the interpersonal sweetness of our need being seen, met and satisfied by our mother as food is offered. We take in her attentiveness along with the nourishment, and this shapes our openness to all kinds of nurturance throughout our lives. Our hearts beat more slowly and our amygdalae calm when she is in a ventral state, her presence reassuring us of the possibility of safety in connection.

In contrast to our society’s mistaken emphasis on positive emotions in our relationship with God, the great Spanish mystic and poet John of the Cross (1542–1591), who is most famous for his reflections on the “dark night of the soul,” also wrote a piece called “Advice on Disregarding Spiritual Sweetness.” In this work St. John compliments the person who loves God without feeling any emotional sweetness, for that individual is focusing on truly loving God and not the feelings. To set our will on gratifying and soothing sensations, to concentrate on capturing them and basking in them, is simply to set our will on what God has created, instead of God Himself. Thereby, we turn those created feelings into the end instead of a means—and a non-necessary means at that. According to St. John, we are ignorant if we suppose that because we fail to have any sweetness or bliss God is failing us. Similarly, we are uninstructed if we presume that in having such delectable emotions we have God. But the height of ignorance, he claims, is if we would follow God only to seek the sweetness and consequently stopped our yearning for God to wallow in delightful feelings when we acquired them.

I wanted to kiss you. I can't explain why. I have no excuses. At any rate, don't worry. It was clearly a mistake, and I promise it won't happen agai-" Again. He kissed her again. Or rather, he kissed her for the first time- and he was so much better at it than she. This kiss could not be mistaken for an accidental collision mouths. Oh, no. He kissed with purpose. His lips had ideas. His tongue had plans. She closed her eyes and melted against him, flattening her hands on his muscled arms. He brushed his lips to hers in a series of chaste, yet masterful kisses. He swept a hand up her spine and into her hair, where he twisted and gathered the tangled locks in his fist. Then he tugged sharply, tipping her face to his and sending electric sensation over her every nerve. When her mouth fell open in a gasp, he reclaimed her lips, sweeping his tongue between them. Her first instinct was to shy away, but Penny fought against it. She reached higher, lacing her arms about his neck and holding tight. His tongue stroked hers, slow and insistent. He tasted of soot and salt and... and of apples, strangely. Tart, smoky, just a hint of sweet. A lush, decadent pleasure unwound within her, snaking through her veins- as though it had lain coiled in anticipation for years. Waiting on this moment. Waiting on this man.

They both gasped as the head of his shaft pushed against the smoldering wet heat of her. Hunting for the right angle,, he bent his knees and drove up to the hilt in a sure, strong thrust. Helen let out a cry, and he hesitated, terrified that he had hurt her. But he felt her body working on his with deep quivers that drew a ragged sound of lust from him. Letting her weight settle more fully onto his shaft, he reached down with his thumb and forefinger to spread her sex open. She whimpered as he pressed against her and rocked upward, lifting her slightly with each thrust. All he could hear were the rasps of their breathing, and the ceaseless rustling of clothes, and the occasional intimate wet sound as he lunged steadily into her. Deep inside she closed in on him sweetly, demanding more, and he gripped her hips and made her ride him relentlessly, using his body to pleasure her. They struggled together amid the rising sensation, pulling closer, closer, until there was no more friction, only the clamping, writhing, throbbing connection that held them fast to each other. Helen moaned, her arms tightening around his neck, and then she fell silent and began to shudder helplessly. The feel of her ecstasy delivered him, the release so complete that it was like losing consciousness, like dying and being reborn.

Hesitantly, Psyche reached out her arms. Instead of a scary shape of a monster, she felt a set of feminine shoulders as refined as her own. She moved her hands over the tender smooth skin, which was warm with life. Just the touch alone gave her a tingling sensation she had never felt before, a stroke of strange pleasure. Cupid leaned over and buried her face on the maiden's breasts then inhaled her sweet-scented skin, inhaling like it was the first rainfall after millennia of droughts, like the last bloom of the last lilac tree on earth. Psyche's eyes fluttered closed, and a soft sigh left her mouth. Without realizing it, she had her delicate arms around the invisible goddess and felt the gentle feathers of her folded wings.

Elspeth reached up a tentative hand to comfort him, palming the cheek that wasn’t covered with woad. He wrapped an arm around her waist and tugged her closer. Her lips parted. His tongue swept in. Her belly clenched, and a warm glow settled between her legs. He left her lips and began kissing her chin, her cheeks, her neck. “Ach! Ye’re sweet, lass.” Pity dissipated like morning mist. Instead, little wisps of pleasure followed his mouth’s path. The stubble of his beard grazed the tops of her breasts, and her nipples tightened almost painfully. She sucked her breath over her teeth to keep from crying out in pleasure and surprise when his palm covered her breast, the pressure sweet even through the stiff boning of her pink silk bodice.

Those who tread these paths should be informed of a matter respecting their confession in which they are apt to err. When they begin to give an account of their sins, instead of the regret and contrition they had been accustomed to feel, they find that love and tranquility sweetly pervade and take possession of their souls: now those who are not properly instructed are desirous of withdrawing from this sensation to form an act of contrition, because they have heard, and with truth, that it is requisite: but they are not aware that they lose thereby the genuine contrition, which is this Intuitive Love, infinitely surpassing any effect produced by self-exertion . . . Be not then troubled about other things when God acts so excellently in you and for you.

Isaiah lazily yet deliberately tilts his head as he stares into my eyes. My entire body hums and a fuzzy sensation fills my head, making it hard to focus. My mouth opens then closes. And as he slowly bends down, my tongue quickly licks my dry lips. I hope I’m doing this right. I want to do this right. Isaiah slips his hand from my chin to cradle my head. His fingers tunnel through my hair, making the back of my neck tingle with anticipation as the pad of his thumb whispers gently against my cheek. His lips hover right next to mine and his warm breath heats my face. The blood pounds so wildly in my veins that he has to sense the vibration. There’s a magnetic pull taking over the small distance between our lips. An energy I can’t resist. My head inclines opposite his and the moment I close my eyes, his mouth brushes mine. Soft. Warm. Gentle. His lips move slowly, exerting pressure. And I feel like I can’t breathe, yet like I’m flying. The pressure ends, but his mouth stays near mine. His hand grips my waist and my spine gives at the shockingly right pleasure of his touch. Isaiah senses my weakness and his hand snakes its way around my waist, his strong arm holds me up. And he explores again. A little pressure on my lower lip. A little pressure on the top. And then I remember that I’m supposed to kiss him back. Nerves send small shock waves through my chest, and my hand trembles as I raise it to his shoulders. I press both my lips into his lower one right as my fingers caress the side of his neck. Isaiah shivers. In a good way, I think. I open my mouth to ask when his lips move fast against mine, sucking in my lower one, causing warmth and excitement to explode in my body, the aftermath of that divine encounter melting every piece of me. I moan, and Isaiah’s arm tightens, bringing my body closer to his. My lips maneuver against his in response. A yes to his pulling me closer. A yes to his lips taking in mine. A yes to the fact that he allows me to perform the same succulent kiss on him. I can’t help it. I permit the tip of my tongue to barely brush his lower lip. Isaiah curls my hair into his fist and I love how my touch affects him, affects me. Wrapping my other arm around his neck, I lose all sense of independence with his sweet taste. I like this. I like this a lot.

Lucian's thick, long finger slid into me, and I groaned----a pained sound. "That's it," he rasped, fingering me with agonizingly slow pushes. "Fuck, that's it." I gasped, my head light, my thighs clamping around his hand, as though I could hold in the sensation. "Spread your legs a little wider, honey. Let me in. Good girl." He cupped my neck with his free hand, his forehead pressed to mine. "One day soon, I'm going to work myself into this tight sweet honey box, fuck you for hours." My thighs trembled, heat swimming me as my lower belly clenched. "Lucian." I wiggled my hips. He added another finger, fucking them up into me at an angle that had me keening in pleasure. "Right here, Em. Right here is where I'm aching to be." I wanted him there so badly. My body moved with him, rocking against his hand. "Right here is where I'll worship." He kissed me gently, a simple meeting of mouths, as his thumb snaked out and found my clit. He pressed down, rougher now that I was worked up and at the edge. Just how I liked. White-hot head sparked and lit, and I came in a rushing wave that had me straining against him. "Say my name." He rubbed my slippery sex, fingers deep inside me. "Lucian." I sobbed. "Lucian." His grip on my nape was warm, reassuring as he kissed me. "That's my girl," he said as I came down from my high, my body trembling. "My girl." My focus came back as he slipped free from my panties. He lifted his hand to his mouth and, holding my eyes with his crystalline-green eyes, sucked his wet fingers clean. A wicked smile curved his lush mouth as his voice rolled over me like warm honey. "Delicious.

He picks one of the boxes on the table this time, a polished-wood box with a swirling pattern etched into its lid. The inside of the box is lined with white silk. The scent is like incense, deep and spiced, and he can feel smoke curling around his head. It is hot, a dry desert air with pounding sun and powder-soft sand. His cheeks flush from the heat and from something else. The feel and sensation of something as luscious as silk falls across his skin in waves. There is music that he cannot discern. A pipe or a flute. And laughter, a high-pitched laugh that blends harmoniously with the music. The taste of something sweet but spicy on his tongue. The feeling is luxurious and lighthearted, but also secretive and sensual. He feels a hand on his shoulder and jumps in surprise, dropping the lid down on the box.

That is the sweet side of longing. Each encounter becomes magnified--the jokey banter with the guys at the butcher shop, the walk home with the woman you just met in yoga. Meeting a close friend for dinner isn't just a pleasant evening--it's life itself. Those two or three or seven hours of feverish conversation--of yelping in outrage at the sins of her small-minded boss, of gushing about the gorgeous novel you're reading, of deconstructing the latest male politician's take on women's reproductive organs--make all the other daily crap we endure more than worth it. University of North Carolina psychologist Barbara Fredrickson says the connection we have during these warm encounters with friends and even strangers is love, a sensation that's biologically identical to the love we feel in its more celebrated forms--romantic, family.

Taking her left hand, he began to slide the moonstone onto her finger, and hesitated. "How did I propose the first time?" He had been nervous, steeling himself for a possible refusal; he could hardly remember a word he'd said. Amusement tugged at her lips. "You laid out the advantages on both sides, and explained the ways in which our future goals were compatible." Rhys absorbed that with chagrin. "No one has ever accused me of being a romantic," he said ruefully. "If you were, how would you propose?" He thought for a moment. "I would begin by teaching you a Welsh word. Hiraeth. There's no equivalent in English." "Hiraeth," she repeated, trying to pronounce it with a tapped R, as he had. "Aye. It's a longing for something that was lost, or never existed. You feel it for a person or a place, or a time in your life... it's a sadness of the soul. Hiraeth calls to a Welshman even when he's closest to happiness, reminding him that he's incomplete." Her brow knit with concern. "Do you feel that way?" "Since the day I was born." He looked down into her small, lovely face. "But not when I'm with you. That's why I want to marry you." Helen smiled. She reached up to curl her hand around the back of his neck, her caress as light as silk gauze being pulled across his skin. Standing on her toes, she drew his head down and kissed him. Her lips were smoother than petals, all clinging silk and tender dampness. He had the sensation of surrendering, some terrible soft sweetness evading him and rearranging his insides. Breaking the kiss, Helen lowered back to her heels. "Your proposals are improving," she told him, and extended her hand as he fumbled to slide the ring onto her finger.

I pulled at the knot again and heard threads begin to pop. “Allow me, Miss Jones,” said Armand, right at my back. There was no gracious way to refuse him. Not with Mrs. Westcliffe there, too. I exhaled and dropped my arms. I stared at the lotus petals in my painting as the new small twists and tugs of Armand’s hands rocked me back and forth. Jesse’s music began to reverberate somewhat more sharply than before. “There,” Armand said, soft near my ear. “Nearly got it.” “Most kind of you, my lord.” Mrs. Westcliffe’s voice was far more carrying. “Do you not agree, Miss Jones?” Her tone said I’d better. “Most kind,” I repeated. For some reason I felt him as a solid warmth behind me, behind all of me, even though only his knuckles made a gentle bumping against my spine. How blasted long could it take to unravel a knot? “Yes,” said Chloe unexpectedly. “Lord Armand is always a perfect gentleman, no matter who or what demands his attention.” “There,” the gentleman said, and at last his hands fell away. The front of the smock sagged loose. I shrugged out of it as fast as I could, wadding it up into a ball. “Excuse me.” I ducked a curtsy and began my escape to the hamper, but Mrs. Westcliffe cut me short. “A moment, Miss Jones. We require your presence.” I turned to face them. Armand was smiling his faint, cool smile. Mrs. Westcliffe looked as if she wished to fix me in some way. I raised a hand instinctively to my hair, trying to press it properly into place. “You have the honor of being invited to tea at the manor house,” the headmistress said. “To formally meet His Grace.” “Oh,” I said. “How marvelous.” I’d rather have a tooth pulled out. “Indeed. Lord Armand came himself to deliver the invitation.” “Least I could do,” said Armand. “It wasn’t far. This Saturday, if that’s all right.” “Um…” “I am certain Miss Jones will be pleased to cancel any other plans,” said Mrs. Westcliffe. “This Saturday?” Unlike me, Chloe had not concealed an inch of ground. “Why, Mandy! That’s the day you promised we’d play lawn tennis.” He cocked a brow at her, and I knew right then that she was lying and that she knew that he knew. She sent him a melting smile. “Isn’t it, my lord?” “I must have forgotten,” he said. “Well, but we cannot disappoint the duke, can we?” “No, indeed,” interjected Mrs. Westcliffe. “So I suppose you’ll have to come along to the tea instead, Chloe.” “Very well. If you insist.” He didn’t insist. He did, however, sweep her a very deep bow and then another to the headmistress. “And you, too, Mrs. Westcliffe. Naturally. The duke always remarks upon your excellent company.” “Most kind,” she said again, and actually blushed. Armand looked dead at me. There was that challenge behind his gaze, that one I’d first glimpsed at the train station. “We find ourselves in harmony, then. I shall see you in a few days, Miss Jones.” I tightened my fingers into the wad of the smock and forced my lips into an upward curve. He smiled back at me, that cold smile that said plainly he wasn’t duped for a moment. I did not get a bow. Jesse was at the hamper when I went to toss in the smock. Before I could, he took it from me, eyes cast downward, no words. Our fingers brushed beneath the cloth. That fleeting glide of his skin against mine. The sensation of hardened calluses stroking me, tender and rough at once. The sweet, strong pleasure that spiked through me, brief as it was. That had been on purpose. I was sure of it.

His tousled hair glittered like pagan gold as he pressed her to her back and dragged his open mouth over her flat stomach. Evie shook her head with groggy denial even as he bent her knees and pushed them upward. "Too tired," she said thickly, "I---wait, Sebastian---" His tongue searched her salty-damp flesh with assuaging licks, persisting until her protests died away. The gentle ministrations of his mouth lulled her into peace, her heartbeat slowing to measured beats. After long, patient minutes, he drew the swollen bud of her clitoris in his mouth and began to suckle and nibble. She jerked at the delicate aggression of his mouth. He drove her higher, his tongue flicking and swirling in a deliberate pattern, his arms clamping around her thighs. It seemed her body was no longer her own, that she existed only to receive this torment of pleasure. Sebastian... she could not voice his name, and yet he seemed to hear her silent plea, and in response he did something with his mouth that launched her into a series of incandescent climaxes. Every time she thought it was over, another ripple of sensation went through her until she was so exhausted that she begged him to stop. Sebastian rose over her, his eyes glittering in his shadowed face. She moved to welcome him, opening her legs, sliding her arms around the powerful length of his back. He nudged inside her swollen flesh, filling her completely. As his mouth came to her ear, she could hardly hear his whisper over the thumping of her heart. "Evie," came his dark voice, "I want something from you... I want you to come one more time." "No," she said weakly. "Yes. I need to feel you come around me." Her head rolled in a slow, negative shake across the pillow. "I can't... I can't..." "Yes, you can. I'll help you." His hand drifted along her body to the place where they were joined. "Let me deeper inside you... deeper..." She moaned helplessly as she felt his fingertips on her sex, skillfully manipulating her spent nerves. Suddenly she felt him sliding even farther as her excited body opened to accept him. "Mmm..." he crooned. "Yes, that's it... ah, love, you're so sweet..." He settled between her bent knees, into the cradle of her hips, driving hard and sure inside her. She encompassed him with her arms and legs, and buried her face in his hot throat, and cried out one last time, her flesh pulsing and tightening to bring him to shattering fulfillment. He shook in her arms, and clenched his hands into the warm spill of her hair as he gave himself over to her completely, worshipping her with every part of his body and spirit.

Lila smiles, reaches into the cloth covering whatever goodies are in the basket, and pulls out a concha. The top of the pastry is a swirl of colors- deep purple, inky blue, pink, green, gold. It reminds me of the galaxy, and I stare for a moment, mesmerized, before I take it from her. My mouth begins to water. "This smells incredible," I say. "What do I owe you?" "It's on the house," she says, already turning away. "Enjoy." I want to argue, but the urge to bite into the pastry is nearly irresistible now. I've never had Mexican pastries before. But first... I pick up my phone from the bench and take a picture of the gorgeous creation. Then, putting it back down, I take a big bite and close my eyes. My mouth explodes with flavors and sensations- sweet, yeasty, warm. In another three bites, I've eaten the entire four-inch ball of dough and am licking my fingers.

The term qualia refers to the internal, subjective, qualitative properties of experiences. This includes things like colors, tastes, and sensations (love, green, sweetness, sharpness, smoothness, and so on). And so, whether what we are perceiving is an accurate representation of the world depends largely on whether qualia, or our subjective experiences, are intrinsic properties of the world or merely a product of the mind—or some combination. Even if we can use tools to measure, test, and enhance our insights about the physical world, the final stop for everything is still the mind. We are always left with and limited by our cognitive and perceptual frameworks. Since we can never experience anything outside of the mind—including the mind itself—we can never know what anything is actually like outside of it. This is often referred to as the egocentric predicament.

She was about to take a step back when his hand slid onto her leg. Slow and lazy. “You don’t wear your scrubs home,” he murmured, his fingers idly stroking just behind her knee, the denim of her jeans no barrier to the sensations sweeping up her leg. Joss willed herself to move but not one damn synapse obeyed. It was as if his fingers had injected them with a paralyzing agent. “No.” Her voice was hushed yet high. Breathy. “It’s against hospital policy.” “Pity.” He smiled at her. “You look hot in them.” If it was possible to orgasm through compliments alone, she’d just moved into the red zone. He was dangerously good for her ego. He was bleary-eyed, rubbing his right hand over his hair, his biceps and abs shifting nicely. A flush of heat surged from the tips of her toes to the top of her head. Sweet baby cheeses. Maybe she was perimenopausal? Thirty-four was young but it wasn’t unheard of…

he snuffed the remaining powder into his other nostril and threw the scrap of thin plastic to the floor. There was no sensation, nothing at all, the world was the same and Billy knew that he had been cheated. Two D’s shot, gone for nothing. He leaned out of the glassless, frameless window and tears mixed with the perspiration on his face. He cried and thought about that for a while and thought how glad he was it was dark and no one could see him crying, not him, eighteen years old. Under his fingers the rough metal of the window opening had the feel of miniature mountain peaks and valleys. Jagged, smooth, soft, hard. He leaned close and stroked with his fingertips and the pleasure of the touch sent shivers of love running the length of his spine. Why had he never noticed this before? Bending, he put out his tongue and the sweet-sour-iron-dirt taste was so wonderful, and when he let the sharp front edges of his teeth touch the metal it felt as though he had bitten off a piece of steel half as big as the bridge.

He leaned down and kissed her stomach, her hip bones, while his big hands held her in place. Then his mouth was on her, covering her, licking over her clit. She arched up, crying out as his tongue slid over her folds, making her mindless and crazy. She clutched the pillow, burying her head into the softness as he sucked and licked, nipping over her skin. She clamped her thighs around his head. Whimpered. He was going to drive her right over the edge. His tongue lapped over her clit. "Jack, stop," she said, her voice harsh and panting. "I'm going to... God... No... I want..." He didn't stop. Didn't ease up. He just pushed her harder. His tongue. It was magic. The condom packet slid off her stomach as she planted her feet and rocked into him. Giving up, surrendering to his will and determination. Everything that made Jack, Jack. She coiled tight and then she exploded. She bit her lip, stifling her moans as she rode out wave after wave of delicious sensation. She couldn't think, couldn't put together a sentence, but then he was on her, over her. His palm on her neck, his fingers on her jaw, twisting her face to meet his. His mouth covered hers. He tasted like sex. And lust. His grasp was tight on her jaw, and the way he kissed her, devoured her, sucked her right back under. It was a raw, dirty kiss that consumed her. Her fingers came up to where he held her, and she dug her nails into his wrists. He growled against her lips, biting her, sucking. And the kiss went on and on and on. He finally pulled away, grabbed the condom, and tore open the package. He tossed it onto her body again, ridding himself of his sweats, and then he was naked. And she could only gape at him. Her gaze wide. He had the best cock she'd ever seen in her life. Long and thick. A work of goddamn art. She reached for him, but he grabbed her wrist, shaking his head. "I can't wait, Chlo." He picked up the condom, threw the packet on the floor somewhere and rolled the condom down his hard shaft. She breathed out his name. "Jack." He leaned down, kissing her again, soft and sweet. His erection nudged between her legs. "Just let me inside.

But I enjoy eating these days. More of us do than care to admit it publicly. I revel in it, as one only revels in pursuits one does not need. The runner enjoys running when she need not ee a lion. Sex improves when decoupled—sorry—from animalist procreative desperation (or even from the desperation of not having had sex in a while, as I’ve had cause to note after my recent two decades’ sojourn and attendant dry spell). I bite blueberry pancakes drizzled with maple syrup, extra butter—that expanding u, the berry’s pop against my teeth, butter’s bloom in my mouth. I explore sweetnesses and textures. I’m never hungry, so I don’t race to the next bite. I eat glass, and as it cuts my gums, I savor minerals, metals, impurities; I see the beach from which some poor bastard skimmed the sand. Small rocks taste of the river, of rubbed sh scale, of glaciers long gone. They crunch, crisp, celery-like. I share the sensation with fellow acionados; they share theirs with me, though there’s lag, and sensor granularity remains an issue. So, a roundabout way of saying: I love to eat.

In front of the mound: a mile of naked strangers. In groups of twenty, like smokes, they are directed to the other side by a man with a truncheon and a whip. It will not help to ink in his face. Several men with barrows collect clothes. There are young women still with attractive breasts. There are family groups, many small children crying quietly, tears oozing from their eyes like sweat. In whispers people comfort one another. Soon, they say. Soon. No one wails and no one begs. Arms mingle with other arms like fallen limbs, lie like shawls across bony shoulders. A loose gray calm descends. It will be soon . . . soon. A grandmother coos at the infant she cuddles, her gray hair hiding all but the feet. The baby giggles when it’s chucked. A father speaks earnestly to his son and points at the heavens where surely there is an explanation; it is doubtless their true destination. The color of the sky cannot be colored in. So the son is lied to right up to the last. Father does not cup his boy’s wet cheeks in his hands and say, You shall die, my son, and never be remembered. The little salamander you were frightened of at first, and grew to love and buried in the garden, the long walk to school your legs learned, what shape our daily life, our short love, gave you, the meaning of your noisy harmless games, every small sensation that went to make your eager and persistent gazing will be gone; not simply the butterflies you fancied, or the bodies you yearned to see uncovered—look, there they are: the inner thighs, the nipples, pubes—or what we all might have finally gained from the toys you treasured, the dreams you peopled, but especially your scarcely budded eyes, and that rich and gentle quality of consciousness which I hoped one day would have been uniquely yours like the most subtle of flavors—the skin, the juice, the sweet pulp of a fine fruit—well, son, your possibilities, as unrealized as the erections of your penis—in a moment—soon—will be ground out like a burnt wet butt beneath a callous boot and disappear in the dirt. Only our numbers will be remembered—not that you or I died, but that there were so many of us. And that we were.

Did they have all the ingredients for the seed cake, Miss Sophia? The caraway and rye, and the currants for the top?" "Yes," Sophia replied as the cook-maid disappeared into the larder. "But we could find no red currants, and-" Suddenly her words were smothered into silence as Sir Ross pulled her into his arms. His lips descended to hers in a kiss so tender and carnal that she could not help responding. Stunned, she struggled to retain her hatred of him, to remember the wrongs of the past, but his lips were utterly warm and compelling, and her thoughts scattered crazily. The pink rose dropped from her nerveless fingers. Sophia swayed against him, groping for his hard shoulders in a futile bid for balance. His tongue searched her mouth... delicious... sweetly intimate. Sophia inhaled sharply and tilted her head back in utter surrender, her entire existence distilled to this one burning moment. Through the pounding heartbeat in her ears she dimly heard Eliza's concerned voice echoing from the larder. "No red currants? But what will we top the seed cake with?" Sir Ross released Sophia's mouth, leaving her lips moist and kiss-softened. His face remained close to hers, and Sophia felt as if she were drowning in the silver pools of his eyes. His hand came to the side of her face, his fingers curving over her cheek, his thumb brushing the corner of her mouth. Somehow Sophia managed to answer Eliza. "We f-found golden currants instead-" As soon as the words left her mouth, Sir Ross kissed her again, his tongue exploring, teasing. Her groping fingers touched the back of his neck, where the thick black hair curled against his nape. Sensation rustled through her, spurring her pulse to an intemperate pace. Taking advantage of her surrender, he kissed her more aggressively, hunting for the deepest, sweetest taste of her. As her knees weakened, his arms wrapped securely around her, supporting her body as he continued to ravish her mouth. "Golden currants?" came Eliza's dissatisfied voice. "Well, the flavor won't be quite the same, but they will be better than nothing." Sir Ross released Sophia and steadied her with his hands at her waist. While she stared at him blankly, he gave her a brief smile and left the kitchen just as Eliza reemerged from the larder.

Her legs splayed wide as he dropped her onto the mattress, his big body settling between them, and she cried out as he slid back inside her, his hardness stretching her lusciously. He began to pump in a slow, steady motion that wouldn't alter no matter how she writhed and begged him to go harder, faster, deeper. His mouth went to her breast, sucking at a nipple, tugging sweetly in time to his thrusting. Her body contracted every time he pushed inward, clasping him hungrily, sensation building until a powerful climax began, wringing every inch of her body with raw force. She fell silent, her hips locked in a steep arch against his weight. Still the measured rhythm went on, extracting every last flicker of sensation. He was tireless, unhurried, using himself to satisfy her. At last Phoebe collapsed down on the bed, shivering uncontrollably. West plunged into her... once, twice, thrice... and pulled out to crush the thick wet rod of his sex against her stomach. He buried a savage growl in the bedclothes and clutched the mattress on either side of her so hard she thought he might gouge holes in it. As she felt the hot spill of his release, an unfamiliar croon came from her throat, a sound of primal satisfaction at having pleased her mate.

Turn." It took her a moment to realize what he meant. He wanted her to spin into the bandages, instead of standing still and allowing him to wrap her. She did so, slowly, understanding almost immediately the seductive nature of the situation. Something about the movement, about his dark blue eyes on her as she spun, made her feel like a temptress- his Salome. He did not touch her as she turned, dancing only for him; instead, he allowed her to choose the speed and the strength of the fabric, she spun right into his arms. Holding her gaze, Ralston tucked the end of the linen into the bindings before he took her face in one hand and tilted it up for another kiss. This one was soft and sweet, his lips brushing gently across hers in an excruciatingly slow caress, leaving her heart pounding and her mind reeling. With his other hand, he stroked one flattened breast gently, teasing the protected skin until she wanted to tear off the bindings again. He broke off the kiss and leaned down, setting his lips to the edge of the linen, softly laving the sensitive skin straining above the bindings. "Poor, lovely darlings," he murmured, worshipping her with hands and mouth, raising her temperature and sending another wave of passion pooling deep within her.

That the life of Man is but a dream has been sensed by many a one, and I too am never free of the feeling. When I consider the restrictions that are placed on the active, inquiring energies of Man; when I see that all our efforts have no other result than to satisfy needs which in turn serve no purpose but to prolong our wretched existence, and then see that all our reassurance concerning the particular questions we probe is no more than dreamy resignation, since all we are doing is to paint our prison walls with colourful figures and bright views – all of this, Wilhelm, leaves me silent. I withdraw into myself, and discover a world, albeit a notional world of dark desire rather than one of actuality and vital strength. And everything swims before my senses, and I go my way in the world wearing the smile of the dreamer. All our learned teachers and educators are agreed that children do not know why they want what they want; but no one is willing to believe that adults too, like children, wander about this earth in a daze and, like children, do not know where they come from or where they are going, act as rarely as they do according to genuine motives, and are as thoroughly governed as they are by biscuits and cake and the rod. And yet it seems palpably clear to me. I gladly confess, since I know the reply you would want to make, that they are the happiest who, like children, live for the present moment, drag their dolls around and dress and undress them, and watchfully steal by the drawer where Mama has locked away the cake, and, when at last they get their hands on what they want, devour it with their cheeks crammed full and cry, ‘More!’ – They are happy creatures. And those others, who give pompous titles to their beggarly pursuits and even to their passions, and chalk them up as vast enterprises for the good and well-being of mankind, they too are happy. – It is all very well for those who can be like that! But he who humbly perceives where it is all leading, who sees how prettily the happy man makes an Eden of his garden, and how even the unhappy man goes willingly on his weary way, panting beneath his burden, and that all are equally interested in seeing the light of the sun for one minute more – he indeed will be silent, and will create a world from within for himself, and be happy because he is a man. And then, confined as he may be, he none the less still preserves in his heart the sweet sensation of freedom, and the knowledge he can quit this prison whenever he wishes.

Evan Roberts speaks: “Let us see what God’s Spirit will do for us in a quiet meeting. It did wonderful things at Lougher when no one sung or spoke.” A few moments later all are kneeling in five minutes of silent prayer. The crowded room is still except for quick gasps of sobbing breath from those who are deeply moved. Here and there a half audible voice is mumbling inarticulate prayer. Deeper yet grows time silence and more impressive. Wrinkled faces are upturned, and unseeing eyes look upward. Heads are bowed in folded hands. Shoulders are convulsed with emotion, and lips are moving from which no sound comes. Still the preacher gives no sign. Gradually a single low voice is heard in all parts of the chapel, singing sweetly the hymn, “Have you seen Him?” in Welsh. For an instant there is time stillness of listening with bated breath; then slowly other voices join in singing until the building rings with thrilling melody. It is as if they have burst from prayer into song. And this is a scene of the revival which so respected a paper as the Lancet, evidently without investigating it except through time reports of the sensational papers and its own prejudice, calls “a debauch of emotionalism,” “a hysterical outburst,” marked with “scenes of disorder.

. . . These two are the fountains of knowledge, from whence all the ideas we have, or can naturally have, do spring. 3. The objects of sensation one source of ideas. First, our Senses, conversant about particular sensible objects, do convey into the mind several distinct perceptions of things, according to those various ways wherein those objects do affect them. And thus we come by those ideas we have of yellow, white, heat, cold, soft, hard, bitter, sweet, and all those which we call sensible qualities; which when I say the senses convey into the mind, I mean, they from external objects convey into the mind what produces there those perceptions. This great source of most of the ideas we have, depending wholly upon our senses, and derived by them to the understanding, I call SENSATION. 4. The operations of our minds, the other source of them. Secondly, the other fountain from which experience furnisheth the understanding with ideas is,- the perception of the operations of our own mind within us, as it is employed about the ideas it has got;- which operations, when the soul comes to reflect on and consider, do furnish the understanding with another set of ideas, which could not be had from things without. And such are perception, thinking, doubting, believing, reasoning, knowing, willing, and all the different actings of our own minds;- which we being conscious of, and observing in ourselves, do from these receive into our understandings as distinct ideas as we do from bodies affecting our senses. This source of ideas every man has wholly in himself; and though it be not sense, as having nothing to do with external objects, yet it is very like it, and might properly enough be called internal sense. But as I call the other SENSATION, so I Call this REFLECTION, the ideas it affords being such only as the mind gets by reflecting on its own operations within itself. By reflection then, in the following part of this discourse, I would be understood to mean, that notice which the mind takes of its own operations, and the manner of them, by reason whereof there come to be ideas of these operations in the understanding. These two, I say, viz. external material things, as the objects of SENSATION, and the operations of our own minds within, as the objects of REFLECTION, are to me the only originals from whence all our ideas take their beginnings. The term operations here I use in a large sense, as comprehending not barely the actions of the mind about its ideas, but some sort of passions arising sometimes from them, such as is the satisfaction or uneasiness arising from any thought. 5.All our ideas are of the one or the other of these. . . .

And for just a moment I had reached the point of ecstasy that I always wanted to reach, which was the complete step across chronological time into timeless shadows, and wonderment in the bleakness of the mortal realm, and the sensation of death kicking at my heels to move on, with a phantom dogging its own heels, and myself hurrying to a plank where all the angels dove off and flew into the holy void of uncreated emptiness, the potent and inconceivable radiancies shining in bright Mind Essence, innumerable lotus-lands falling open in the magic mothswarm of heaven. I could hear an indescribable seething roar which wasn't in my ear but everywhere and had nothing to do with sounds. I realized that I had died and been reborn numberless times but just didn't remember especially because the transitions from life to death and back to life are so ghostly easy, a magical action for naught, like falling asleep and waking up again a million times, the utter casualness and deep ignorance of it. I realized it was only because of the stability of the intrinsic Mind that these ripples of birth and death took place, like the action of wind on a sheet of pure, serene, mirror-like water. I felt sweet, swinging bliss, like a big shot of heroin in the mainline vein; like a gulp of wine late in the afternoon and it makes you shudder; my feet tingled.

And for just a moment I had reached the point of ecstasy that I always wanted to reach, which was the complete step across chronological time into timeless shadows, and wonderment in the bleakness of the mortal realm, and the sensation of death kicking at my heels to move on, with a phantom dogging its own heels, and myself hurrying to a plank where all the angels dove off and flew into the holy void of uncreated emptiness, the potent and inconceivable radiancies shining in bright Mind Essence, innumerable lotus-lands falling open in the magic mothswarm of heaven. I could hear an indescribable seething roar which wasn’t in my ear but everywhere and had nothing to do with sounds. I realized that I had died and been reborn numberless times but just didn’t remember especially because the transitions from life to death and back to life are so ghostly easy, a magical action for naught, like falling asleep and waking up again a million times, the utter casualness and deep ignorance of it. I realized it was only because of the stability of the intrinsic Mind that these ripples of birth and death took place, like the action of wind on a sheet of pure, serene, mirror-like water. I felt sweet, swinging bliss, like a big shot of heroin in the mainline vein; like a gulp of wine late in the afternoon and it makes you shudder; my feet tingled. I thought I was going to die the very next moment.

And for just a moment I had reached the point of ecstasy that I always wanted to reach, which was the complete step across chronological time into timeless shadows, and wonderment in the bleakness of the mortal realm, and the sensation of death kicking at my heels to move on, with a phantom dogging its own heels, and myself hurrying to a plank where all the angels dove off and flew into the holy void of uncreated emptiness, the potent and inconceivable radiancies shining in bright Mind Essence, innumerable lotus-lands falling open in the magic mothswarm of heaven. I could hear an indescribable seething roar which wasn’t in my ear but everywhere and had nothing to do with sounds. I realized that I had died and been reborn numberless times but just didn’t remember especially because the transitions from life to death and back to life are so ghostly easy, a magical action for naught, like falling asleep and waking up again a million times, the utter casualness and deep ignorance of it. I realized it was only because of the stability of the intrinsic Mind that these ripples of birth and death took place, like the action of wind on a sheet of pure, serene, mirror-like water. I felt sweet, swinging bliss, like a big shot of heroin in the mainline vein; like a gulp of wine late in the afternoon and it makes you shudder; my feet tingled. I thought I was going to die the very next moment. But I didn’t die, and walked four miles and picked up ten long butts and took them back to Marylou’s hotel room and poured their tobacco in my old pipe and lit up. I was too young to know what had happened.

These beauteous forms, Through a long absence, have not been to me As is a landscape to a blind man's eye: But oft, in lonely rooms, and 'mid the din Of towns and cities, I have owed to them, In hours of weariness, sensations sweet, Felt in the blood, and felt along the heart; And passing even into my purer mind With tranquil restoration:—feelings too Of unremembered pleasure: such, perhaps, As have no slight or trivial influence On that best portion of a good man's life, His little, nameless, unremembered, acts Of kindness and of love. Nor less, I trust, To them I may have owed another gift, Of aspect more sublime; that blessed mood, In which the burthen of the mystery, In which the heavy and the weary weight Of all this unintelligible world, Is lightened:—that serene and blessed mood, In which the affections gently lead us on,— Until, the breath of this corporeal frame And even the motion of our human blood Almost suspended, we are laid asleep In body, and become a living soul: While with an eye made quiet by the power Of harmony, and the deep power of joy, We see into the life of things. If this Be but a vain belief, yet, oh! how oft— In darkness and amid the many shapes Of joyless daylight; when the fretful stir Unprofitable, and the fever of the world, Have hung upon the beatings of my heart— How oft, in spirit, have I turned to thee, O sylvan Wye! thou wanderer thro' the woods, How often has my spirit turned to thee! And now, with gleams of half-extinguished thought, With many recognitions dim and faint, And somewhat of a sad perplexity, The picture of the mind revives again: While here I stand, not only with the sense Of present pleasure, but with pleasing thoughts That in this moment there is life and food For future years. And so I dare to hope, Though changed, no doubt, from what I was when first I came among these hills; when like a roe I bounded o'er the mountains, by the sides Of the deep rivers, and the lonely streams, Wherever nature led: more like a man Flying from something that he dreads, than one Who sought the thing he loved. For nature then (The coarser pleasures of my boyish days And their glad animal movements all gone by) To me was all in all.—I cannot paint What then I was. The sounding cataract Haunted me like a passion: the tall rock, The mountain, and the deep and gloomy wood, Their colours and their forms, were then to me An appetite; a feeling and a love, That had no need of a remoter charm, By thought supplied, not any interest Unborrowed from the eye.—That time is past, And all its aching joys are now no more, And all its dizzy raptures. Not for this Faint I, nor mourn nor murmur; other gifts Have followed; for such loss, I would believe, Abundant recompense. For I have learned To look on nature, not as in the hour Of thoughtless youth; but hearing oftentimes The still sad music of humanity, Nor harsh nor grating, though of ample power To chasten and subdue. And I have felt A presence that disturbs me with the joy Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime Of something far more deeply interfused, Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns, And the round ocean and the living air, And the blue sky, and in the mind of man: A motion and a spirit, that impels All thinking things, all objects of all thought, And rolls through all things. Therefore am I still A lover of the meadows and the woods And mountains; and of all that we behold From this green earth; of all the mighty world Of eye, and ear,—both what they half create, And what perceive; well pleased to recognise In nature and the language of the sense The anchor of my purest thoughts, the nurse, The guide, the guardian of my heart, and soul Of all my moral being.

Her hands slipped down to his chest, the firm surface covered with a light fleece of coarse golden hair. With his body still joined to hers, St. Vincent held still beneath her inquisitive fingers. She touched his lean sides, exploring the hard vaulting of his ribs and the satiny plane of his back. His blue eyes widened, and then he dropped his head to the pillow beside hers, growling as his body worked inside hers with a deep thrust, as he was helplessly shaken with new tremors of rapture. His mouth fastened on hers with a primal greed. She opened her legs wider, pulled at his back to urge more of his weight on her, trying in spite of the pain to tug him deeper, harder. Braced on his elbows to keep from crushing her, he rested his head on her chest, his breath hot and light as it fanned over her nipple. The bristle of his cheek stung her skin a little, the sensation causing the tips of her breasts to contract. His sex was still buried inside her, though it had softened. He was silent but awake, his eyelashes a silky tickle against her skin. Evie remained quiet as well, her arms encircling his head, her fingers playing in his beautiful hair. She felt the weight of his head shift, the wet heat of his mouth seeking her nipple. His lips fastened over it, and his tongue slowly traced the outer edge of the gathered aureole, around and around until he felt her stirring restlessly beneath him. Keeping the tender bud inside his mouth, he licked steadily, sweetly, while desire ignited her breasts and her stomach and loins, and the soreness dissolved in a fresh wave of need. Intently he moved to the other breast, nibbling, stroking, seeming to feed on her pleasure. He levered upward enough to allow his hand to slide between them, and his cunning fingers slid into the wet nest of hair, finding the tingling feminine crest and teasing skillfully. She felt herself sliding into another climax, her body clamping voluptuously on the hot flesh that was insinuated deep inside her.

His mouth brushed over hers with kisses of soft fire. And as he possessed her, she gradually came to understand the pattern he was working within her… eight shallow thrusts, two deep… seven shallow, three deep… progressing until he finally gave her ten heavy, penetrating plunges. Lottie cried out with wrenching pleasure, her hips lifting against his sleek weight as she was filled with volatile sensation. When the burning delight had begun to fade, Nick altered their positions subtly, moving farther over her, nudging her knees wider, adjusting the angle of his sex. He thrust deeply, sealing their bodies together, and circled his hips in a slow, steady rhythm. “I can’t,” Lottie said breathlessly, realizing what he wanted, knowing that it was impossible. “Let me,” Nick whispered, tireless and wickedly adept as he continued the gentle circling, using his body to pleasure her. She was astonished by how quickly the heat rose again, her senses welcoming the patient stimulation, her sex turning slick and swollen as he moved inside her, over her, against her. “Oh… oh…” The sounds were torn from her throat as she reached another crest, her limbs jerking, her cheek pressed hard against his shoulder. And then he began the entire cycle again. Nine shallow, one deep… Lottie lost count of how many times he brought her to ecstasy, or how much time passed while he made love to her. He whispered in her ear… endearments… intimate praise… telling her how hard she made him… how sweet she felt around him… how much he wanted to satisfy her. He gave her more pleasure than it seemed possible to bear, until finally she begged him to stop, her body trembling with exhaustion. Nick complied with reluctance, pushing deep inside one last time, releasing his pent-up desire with a shuddering groan. Compulsively he kissed her again, as he withdrew from her sated body. Lottie barely had the strength to lift her hand, but she caught at his arm and murmured thickly, “Will you stay?” “Yes,” she heard him say. “Yes.” -Lottie & Nick

Before she knew what was happening, she was leaning towards him. Ryam stiffened as she pressed her lips to his. His mouth was warm and inviting. She only tasted him for a second before his hands jerked to her shoulders to hold her away. Undaunted, she grasped at the neck of his tunic while she kissed him, brushing over his lips again, searching, pleading. Slowly, his grip loosened. He yielded with a groan, sliding his tongue past her lips to feed on her desire. She wrapped her arms around him, barely able to circle the broadness of his shoulders. A soft, aching sound rose from her throat as his fingers dug into the nape of her neck, tilting her to him, fitting their mouths together even more intimately. She clung to him, guided by nothing but the desperate beating of her heart and a sharp, sweet yearning deep within her. His hands moved restlessly to grasp her hips, but then he tore himself away from her so abruptly she made a startled sound. He gritted his teeth and turned away, his hands clenched into fists. His pulse skipped along his neck as he gulped in breath after ragged breath. ‘You can’t kiss me like that,’ he growled. ‘You can’t look at me like that.’ Ailey was staring at him. Her fingers lifted to press against lips swollen with want and sensation. Naked desire. He could see it in her eyes, smell it on her skin. She was flushed with it, overflowing. God, the silken taste of her. She didn’t know how to hide her feelings and they clawed at him until the ache between his legs reached an acute peak. ‘What do you want from me?’ he demanded. One moment she made him swear not to touch her and the next she was kissing him into madness. If she made a single move towards him, made a single sweet sound he’d take hold of her, lower her to the ground and make her his right now with the fierce throb of combat and their wild escape still in his veins. Some part of her must have known it. That was why she stayed petrified, her only movement the rise and fall of her breasts as she struggled to breathe. ‘Tell me what it is you want from me and it’s yours,’ he promised dangerously.

In groups of twenty, like smokes, they are directed to the other side by a man with a truncheon and a whip. It will not help to ink in his face. Several men with barrows collect clothes. There are young women still with attractive breasts. There are family groups, many small children crying quietly, tears oozing from their eyes like sweat. In whispers people comfort one another. Soon, they say. Soon. No one wails and no one begs. Arms mingle with other arms like fallen limbs, lie like shawls across bony shoulders. A loose gray calm descends. It will be soon… soon. A grandmother coos at the infant she cuddles, her gray hair hiding all but the feet. The baby giggles when it’s chucked. A father speaks earnestly to his son and points at the heavens where surely there is an explanation; it is doubtless their true destination. The color of the sky cannot be colored in. So the son is lied to right up to the last. Father does not cup his boy’s wet cheeks in his hands and say, You shall die, my son, and never be remembered. The little salamander you were frightened of at first, and grew to love and buried in the garden, the long walk to school your legs learned, what shape our daily life, our short love, gave you, the meaning of your noisy harmless games, every small sensation that went to make your eager and persistent gazing will be gone; not simply the butterflies you fancied, or the bodies you yearned to see uncovered - look, there they are: the inner thighs, the nipples, pubes - or what we all might have finally gained from the toys you treasured, the dreams you peopled, but especially your scarcely budded eyes, and that rich and gentle quality of consciousness which I hoped one day would have been uniquely yours like the most subtle of flavors - the skin, the juice, the sweet pulp of a fine fruit - well, son, your possibilities, as unrealised as the erections of your penis - in a moment - soon - will be ground out like a burnt wet butt beneath a callous boot and disappear in the dirt. Only our numbers will be remembered - not that you or I died, but that there were so many of us.

Sweat popped out on his brow. Little by little he advanced. Higher. Deeper. Her flesh yielding beneath his gentle but inevitable penetration. She moaned. "It's not enough. Dammit, it's not enough!" His laugh was triumphant. "Patience, love. Patience." She buried her head against his shoulder. He buried his finger inside her cleft, as far as he could. His thumb slowly circled her velvety pearl, pressed, then circled anew, faster and faster, gaining a tempo he knew would drive her wild. Her hands came up, clenching and unclenching against his chest. He felt the tension strung throughout her body and knew precisely what caused it. Knew precisely how to ease it. "Don't fight it." The words were a low, silken whisper, yet his tone was almost gritty with self-control. "Just let it happen, darling. Just let it happen." She couldn't stop it. He knew that pure sensation burned inside her. She writhed around his finger, her hips seeking, stark and wanton. He knew precisely when the spasms of release seized hold. She cried aloud. Her body contracted around him, again and again. She collapsed against him, spent and satiated, his finger still deep inside her. Aidan, however, was more aroused than he had ever been in his life. Every part of his body, every muscle, every nerve, was taut and on edge, almost to the breaking point. A crimson haze of desire scorched his insides, for though Fionna had gained release, he had not. He could barely think. Powerful arms lifted her, catching her so that she faced him, her bare legs bracketed around his. a long arm swept around her back. "You pleased me, love. And I am glad that I pleased you so much. But the next time we are together like this, it will be a different part of me that will be inside you. The next time it will be this." Reaching between them, he fumbled with his trousers, freeing his rigid erection, curling her fingers around his thick, swollen flesh and sealing it there with the pressure of his own. "And there will be nothing between us, sweet. No barriers of clothing. No barriers of words. Do you understand what I am saying?" Fionna gaped at him, stunned at what he'd said. Stunned at what he was doing. She could feel that rigidly masculine part of him... good heavens, her palm was filled with that rigidly masculine part of him.

She did not answer. Or, rather, she answered by sliding long fingers across Kassad’s chest, ripping away the leather thongs which bound the rough vest. Her hands found his shirt. It was soaked with blood and ripped halfway down the front. The woman ripped it open the rest of the way. She moved against him now, her fingers and lips on his chest, hips already beginning to move. Her right hand found the cords to his trouser front, ripped them free. Kassad helped her pull off the rest of his clothes, removed hers with three fluid movements. She wore nothing under her shirt and coarse-cloth trousers. Kassad’s hand slid between her thighs, behind her, cupped her moving buttocks, pulled her closer, and slid to the moist roughness in front. She opened to him, her mouth closing on his. Somehow, with all of their motion and disrobing, their skin never lost contact. Kassad felt his own excitement rubbing against the cusp of her belly. She rolled above him then, her thighs astride his hips, her gaze still locked with his. Kassad had never been so excited. He gasped as her right hand went behind her, found him, guided him into her. When he opened his eyes again she was moving slowly, her head back, eyes closed. Kassad’s hands moved up her sides to cup her perfect breasts. Nipples hardened against his palms. They made love then. Kassad, at twenty-three standard years, had been in love once and had enjoyed sex many times. He thought he knew the way and the why of it. There was nothing in his experience to that moment which he could not have described with a phrase and a laugh to his squadmates in the hold of a troop transport With the calm, sure cynicism of a twenty-three-year-old veteran he was sure that he would never experience anything that could not be so described, so dismissed. He was wrong. He could never adequately share the sense of the next few minutes with anyone else. He would never try. They made love in a sudden shaft of late October light with a carpet of leaves and clothes beneath them and a film of blood and sweat oiling the sweet friction between them. Her green eyes stared down at Kassad, widening slightly when he began moving quickly, closing at the same second he closed his. They moved together then in the sudden tide of sensation as old and inevitable as the movement of worlds: pulses racing, flesh quickening with its own moist purposes, a further, final rising together, the world receding to nothing at all—and then, still joined by touch and heartbeat and the fading thrill of passion, allowing consciousness to slide back to separate flesh while the world flowed in through forgotten senses. They lay next to each other.

Those minutes were the beginning of his abandoning himself to a very strange kind of devotion, such a reeling, intoxicated sensation that the proud and portentous word ‘love’ is not quite right for it. It was that faithful, dog-like devotion without desire that those in mid-life seldom feel, and is known only to the very young and the very old. A love devoid of any deliberation, not thinking but only dreaming. He entirely forgot the unjust yet ineradicable disdain that even the clever and considerate show to those who wear a waiter’s tailcoat, he did not look for opportunities and chance meetings, but nurtured this strange affection in his blood until its secret fervour was beyond all mockery and criticism. His love was not a matter of secret winks and lurking glances, the sudden boldness of audacious gestures, the senseless ardour of salivating lips and trembling hands; it was quiet toil, the performance of those small services that are all the more sacred and sublime in their humility because they are intended to go unnoticed. After the evening meal he smoothed out the crumpled folds of the tablecloth where she had been sitting with tender, caressing fingers, as one would stroke a beloved woman’s soft hands at rest; he adjusted everything close to her with devout symmetry, as if he were preparing it for a special occasion. He carefully carried the glasses that her lips had touched up to his own small, musty attic bedroom, and watched them sparkle like precious jewellery by night when the moonlight streamed in. He was always to be found in some corner, secretly attentive to her as she strolled and walked about. He drank in what she said as you might relish a sweet, fragrantly intoxicating wine on the tongue, and responded to every one of her words and orders as eagerly as children run to catch a ball flying through the air. So his intoxicated soul brought an ever-changing , rich glow into his dull, ordinary life. The wise folly of clothing the whole experience in the cold, destructive words of reality was an idea that never entered his mind: the poor waiter François was in love with an exotic Baroness who would be for ever unattainable. For he did not think of her as reality, but as something very distant, very high above him, sufficient in its mere reflection of life. He loved the imperious pride of her orders, the commanding arch of her black eyebrows that almost touched one another, the wilful lines around her small mouth, the confident grace of her bearing. Subservience seemed to him quite natural, and he felt the humiliating intimacy of menial labour as good fortune, because it enabled him to step so often into the magic circle that surrounded her.

He gripped the sides of her body carefully, keeping her in place as he parted her with his tongue and stroked the sides of the soft furrow. Entranced by the vulnerable shaper of her, he lapped at the edges of softly unfurled lips and tickled them lightly. The delicate flesh was unbelievably hot, almost steaming. He blew a stream of cooling air over it, and relished the sound of her moan. Gently he licked up through the center, a long glide through silk and salty female dampness. She squirmed, her thighs spreading as he explored her with flicks and soft jabs. The slower he went, the more agitated she became. He paused to rest the flat of his tongue on the little pearl of her clitoris to feel its frantic throbbing, and she jerked and struggled to a half-sitting position. Pausing, Keir lifted his head. "What is it, muirninn?" Red-faced, gasping, she tried to pull him over her. "Make love to me." "'Tis what I'm doing," he said, and dove back down. "No- Keir- I meant now, right now-" She quivered as he chuckled into the dark patch of curls. "What are you laughing at?" she asked. "At you, my wee impatient bully." She looked torn between indignation and begging. "But I'm ready," she said plaintively. Keir tried to enter her with two fingers, but the tight, tender muscle resisted. "You're no' ready," he mocked gently. "Weesht now, and lie back. 'Tis one time you won't be having your way." He nuzzled between her thighs and sank his tongue deep into the heat and honey of her. She jerked at the feel of it, but he made a soothing sound and took more of the intimate flavor he needed, had to have, would never stop wanting. Moving back up to the little bud where all sensation centered, he sucked at it lightly until she was gasping and shaking all over. He tried to work two fingers inside her again, and this time they were accepted, her depths clenching and relaxing repeatedly. As he stroked her with his tongue, he found a rhythm that sent a hard quiver through her. He kept the pace steady and unhurried, making her work for it, making her writhe and arch and beg, and it was even better than he'd imagined, having her so wild beneath him, hearing her sweet little wanton noises. There was a suspended moment as it all caught up to her... she arched as taut as a drawn bow... caught her breath... and began to shudder endlessly. A deep and primal satisfaction filled him at the sounds of her pleasure, and the sweet pulsing around his fingers. He drew out the feeling, patiently licking every twitch and tremor until at last she subsided and went limp beneath him. Even then, he couldn't stop. It felt too good. He kept lapping gently, loving the salty, silky wetness of her. Her weak voice floated down to him... "Oh, God... I don't think... Keir, I can't..." He nibbled and teased, breathing hotly against the tender core. "Put your legs over my shoulders," he whispered. In a moment, she obeyed. He could feel the trembling in her thighs. A satisfied smile flicked across his mouth, and he pressed her hips upward to a new angle. Soon he'd have her begging again, he thought, and lowered his head with a soft growl of enjoyment.

He concluded the speech with an irritated motion of his hands. Unfortunately, Evie had been conditioned by too many encounters with Uncle Peregrine to discern between angry gestures and the beginnings of a physical attack. She flinched instinctively, her own arms flying up to shield her head. When the expected pain of a blow did not come, she let out a breath and tentatively lowered her arms to find Sebastian staring at her with blank astonishment. Then his face went dark. "Evie," he said, his voice containing a bladelike ferocity that frightened her. "Did you think I was about to... Christ. Someone hit you. Someone hit you in the past---who the hell was it?" He reached for her suddenly---too suddenly---and she stumbled backward, coming up hard against the wall. Sebastian went very still. "Goddamn," he whispered. Appearing to struggle with some powerful emotion, he stared at her intently. After a long moment, he spoke softly. "I would never strike a woman. I would never harm you. You know that, don't you?" Transfixed by the light, glittering eyes that held hers with such intensity, Evie couldn't move or make a sound. She started as he approached her slowly. "It's all right," he murmured. "Let me come to you. It's all right. Easy." One of his arms slid around her, while he used his free hand to smooth her hair, and then she was breathing, sighing, as relief flowed through her. Sebastian brought her closer against him, his mouth brushing her temple. "Who was it?" he asked. "M-my uncle," she managed to say. The motion of his hand on her back paused as he heard her stammer. "Maybrick?" he asked patiently. "No, th-the other one." "Stubbins." "Yes." Evie closed her eyes in pleasure as his other arm slid around her. Clasped against Sebastian's hard chest, with her cheek tucked against his shoulder, she inhaled the scent of clean male skin, and the subtle touch of sandalwood cologne. "How often?" she heard him ask. "More than once?" "I... i-it's not important now." "How often, Evie?" Realizing that he was going to persist until she answered, Evie muttered, "Not t-terribly often, but... sometimes when I displeased him, or Aunt Fl-Florence, he would lose his temper. The l-last time I tr-tried to run away, he blackened my eye and spl-split my lip." "Did he?" Sebastian was silent for a long moment, and then he spoke with chilling softness. "I'm going to tear him limb from limb." "I don't want that," Evie said earnestly. "I-I just want to be safe from him. From all of them." Sebastian drew his head back to look down into her flushed face. "You are safe," he said in a low voice. He lifted one of his hands to her face, caressing the plane of her cheekbone, letting his fingertip follow the trail of pale golden freckles across the bridge of her nose. As her lashes fluttered downward, he stroked the slender arcs of her brows, and cradled the side of her face with his palm. "Evie," he murmured. "I swear on my life, you will never feel pain from my hands. I may prove a devil of a husband in every other regard... but I wouldn't hurt you that way. You must believe that." The delicate nerves of her skin drank in sensations thirstily... his touch, the erotic waft of his breath against her lips. Evie was afraid to open her eyes, or to do anything that might interrupt the moment. "Yes," she managed to whisper. "Yes... I---" There was the sweet shock of a probing kiss against her lips... another... She opened to him with a slight gasp. His mouth was hot silk and tender fire, invading her with gently questing pressure. His fingertips traced over her face, tenderly adjusting the angle between them.

My little undomesticated pornstar pushed me so hard between her legs, my oxygen levels plummeted. She clenched around my fingers through her panties as an orgasm rolled through her in waves. The gush of warmth soaked the cotton. I kissed her through the fabric, again and again, knowing tomorrow everything would return to its proper position—my boundaries, my limits, my hang-ups, my demons. “Can I return the favor?” Dallas sat half up. “But not through your briefs. Men’s briefs always smell like old cheese that’s been sitting in a crockpot for days. I know because whenever my housekeeper went on vacation, we all took turns doing the laundry. And, well, I really shouldn’t say, but Dadd—” Not wanting the moment to be ruined with a conversation about her father’s underwear, I pulled forward, shutting her smart mouth with a kiss that tasted like her sweet pussy. At first, she pinched her lips and made a face, unsure what she thought about her own taste. But when I dragged the tip of my hard cock along her slit through our clothes, she went wild and kissed me back, shoving her tongue so deep down my throat I thought she would fish out my dinner. “Yes.” She wiggled against me. “Please, sir, may I have some more?” She’d quoted Oliver Twist while getting fucked. Truly, the woman was one of a kind. Knowing it was idiotic, and dangerous, and deranged, I pushed my tip through her slit. She was tight—tighter, still, through the tattered, stretched cotton of her ruined panties—but wet and sleek, ready for what was coming. The sensation, how warm and taut she felt, completely undid me. I thrust harder and deeper, entering her through our underwear, fucking her slowly with only flimsy fabric between us. I tore my mouth from hers, eyes glued to my cock each time it sank into her. I could barely fit inside, she was so tight. This was, by far, the best fuck I’d ever had. She panted. “Is this what people call dry-humping?” No. Nothing about this was dry. I was basically fucking her through our underwear. Only, explaining to her that this was full-blown sex with a side order of my issues was not in my plans for tonight. Or ever. “Sure.” Each push brought me closer to a climax. From slow, controlled, teasing thrusts designed to drive her mad with desire, I quickly derailed to jerky, manic, need-to-be-inside-this-woman plunges. Of a man so hungry for human connection, for affection, for carnal needs to be met and satisfied. My head grew dizzy. I’d taken into consideration the possibility that Dallas couldn’t come through penetration. It merely placed her in the same majority as most females on Planet Earth. But she shook, clawed, and reached for me, looking ready to climax. Her tits bounced and jiggled each time I slammed into her. Her mouth opened in awe, probably because this orgasm felt different from the first two. Deeper and more violent. She clutched the lapels of my shirt, shoving her face in mine. “Lose the underwear.” She met my thrust, groaning when my crown peeked past the slot in my boxer briefs. “I want you to come inside me. I want to feel you.” I was about two seconds from fulfilling her demand. Luckily, my logic grabbed the steering wheel, which my cock had seized sometime this evening, and derailed the situation from full-blown calamity. I managed to wait until she came, just barely, before pulling out, flipping her onto her stomach, and jerking off. I aimed for her bare ass but somehow came on her hair. No matter. She had plenty of time to wash it. Her agenda wasn’t exactly full. Dallas fell back onto the pillows, a lopsided grin on her face. (Chapter 31)

These beauteous forms, Through a long absence, have not been to me As is a landscape to a blind man's eye: But oft, in lonely rooms, and 'mid the din Of towns and cities, I have owed to them In hours of weariness, sensations sweet, Felt in the blood, and felt along the heart; And passing even into my purer mind, With tranquil restoration:—feelings too Of unremembered pleasure: such, perhaps, As have no slight or trivial influence On that best portion of a good man's life, His little, nameless, unremembered, acts Of kindness and of love. Nor less, I trust, To them I may have owed another gift, Of aspect more sublime; that blessed mood, In which the burthen of the mystery, In which the heavy and the weary weight Of all this unintelligible world, Is lightened:—that serene and blessed mood, In which the affections gently lead us on,— Until, the breath of this corporeal frame And even the motion of our human blood Almost suspended, we are laid asleep In body, and become a living soul: While with an eye made quiet by the power Of harmony, and the deep power of joy, We see into the life of things. If this Be but a vain belief, yet, oh! how oft— In darkness and amid the many shapes Of joyless daylight; when the fretful stir Unprofitable, and the fever of the world, Have hung upon the beatings of my heart— How oft, in spirit, have I turned to thee, O sylvan Wye! thou wanderer thro' the woods, How often has my spirit turned to thee! And now, with gleams of half-extinguished thought, With many recognitions dim and faint, And somewhat of a sad perplexity, The picture of the mind revives again: While here I stand, not only with the sense Of present pleasure, but with pleasing thoughts That in this moment there is life and food For future years. And so I dare to hope, Though changed, no doubt, from what I was when first I came among these hills; when like a roe I bounded o'er the mountains, by the sides Of the deep rivers, and the lonely streams, Wherever nature led: more like a man Flying from something that he dreads, than one Who sought the thing he loved. For nature then (The coarser pleasures of my boyish days, And their glad animal movements all gone by) To me was all in all.—I cannot paint What then I was. The sounding cataract Haunted me like a passion: the tall rock, The mountain, and the deep and gloomy wood, Their colours and their forms, were then to me An appetite; a feeling and a love, That had no need of a remoter charm, By thought supplied, nor any interest Unborrowed from the eye.—That time is past, And all its aching joys are now no more, And all its dizzy raptures. Not for this Faint I, nor mourn nor murmur, other gifts Have followed; for such loss, I would believe, Abundant recompence. For I have learned To look on nature, not as in the hour Of thoughtless youth; but hearing oftentimes The still, sad music of humanity, Nor harsh nor grating, though of ample power To chasten and subdue. And I have felt A presence that disturbs me with the joy Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime Of something far more deeply interfused, Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns, And the round ocean and the living air, And the blue sky, and in the mind of man; A motion and a spirit, that impels All thinking things, all objects of all thought, And rolls through all things. Therefore am I still A lover of the meadows and the woods, And mountains; and of all that we behold From this green earth; of all the mighty world Of eye, and ear,—both what they half create, And what perceive; well pleased to recognise In nature and the language of the sense, The anchor of my purest thoughts, the nurse, The guide, the guardian of my heart, and soul Of all my moral being.

I had a dream where I was in a place that served steak and mashed potatoes and the soup! The pasta soup was heavenly even better than my mother’s homemade recipe. Every spoonful of the soup reminded me of the sun. The mashed potatoes were so smooth that they could slide down my gullet. The steak was medium-rare, my favorite, and every bite reminded me of the steak my mom made but it was one hundred and one times better.  And there was also iced tea and every sip of it felt refreshing like a cold, winter morning with the sun shining merrily and my mom and I throwing snowballs at each other. I  ate and drank until I could eat no more. I felt as if my stomach was about to combust. But then in came the tiramisu. It was better than anything I had ever tasted. The rich smell of coffee wafted up from it. It reminded me of the coffee shop my mom went to when I was little. Despite the fact that my stomach was about to explode I managed to fit in three more slices of tiramisu before I could eat no more. But then came the Ice cream. It was my favorite flavor, mango. The ice cream was silky and sweet. It was like I was on a sunny June morning, a ray of sunlight shining in my face. The sensation intensified as mango juice dribbled down my chin like sunlight itself. I managed six scoops before I was sure my belly would explode. Every moment of eating the ice cream was sunsational. Finally came the float. It was vanilla ice cream on top of some Fanta even though my mom insisted root beer was one hundred times better. It tasted amazing. It was like the early spring making our ice crack in the pond on which my mother and I go ice skating every winter. It was happy but also sad at the same time as if my old life called back for me.

I had been to Jamaica and the Bahamas, and to Europe a few times, but this was my first time being this far from home. I felt Nairobi's foreigness - or really, my own foreigness in relation to it - immediately, even in the first strains of morning. It's a sensation I've come to love as I've traveled more, the way a new place signals itself instantly and without pretense. The air has different weight from what you're used to; it carries smells you can't quite identify, a faint whiff of wood smoke or diesel fuel, maybe, or the sweetness of something blooming in the trees. The same sun comes up, but looking slightly different from what you know.

Many people flock to places and persons who promise intensive experiences of togetherness, cathartic emotions of exhilaration and sweetness, and liberating sensations of rapture and ecstasy. In our desperate need for fulfillment and our restless search for the experience of divine intimacy, we are all too prone to construct our own spiritual events.

FAVORITE SUGAR COOKIES MAKES 10–30 COOKIES, DEPENDING ON SIZE The following is my favorite sugar cookie recipe. If the dough is processed IMMEDIATELY, the baked cookies taste sensational, just like vanilla shortbread. This recipe is perfect for the impatient baker. The sugar cookies also can be instantly turned into a cookie on a stick, pretty iced cookies you can hang as decoration, or colorful fondant cookies. This is a very multi-talented sugar cookie — imagination's the limit! 1 cup (230 g) butter (room temperature) 1 1/4 cup 2 tablespoon (165 g) powdered sugar 1 egg ½ teaspoon vanilla extract 141 3 3.4 cup 1 tablespoon (475 g) flour 2 teaspoons baking powder ½ teaspoon salt Flour for the work station 1. Preheat the oven to 400 °F (200 °C) on the baking setting and cover a baking sheet with parchment paper. Mix butter and powdered sugar until it is creamy. Whisk the egg together with the vanilla extract in a separate bowl and thoroughly add it into the butter and sugar mixture. 2. Mix the flour, baking powder, and salt together. Gradually add this to the butter and sugar mixture and knead with your hands into a firm dough. If the dough sticks to your fingers, you can still add a little flour. Let the dough rest for 2 minutes in the bowl. 3. Roll out the dough on the floured work station so that it is about ¼ in thick. Form dough into the desired shapes with cookie cutters and place on the baking sheet. *Do you want to turn your sugar cookies into cookie pops? Then from here follow the instructions on page 19. 4. Bake the cookies in the oven for 7–8 minutes. Caution! The cookies should not brown. Let the finished cookies cool down on a wire rack completely intact. You can decorate them the next day. Thus you avoid the fat of the cookie getting into the glaze, absorbing the fondant and becoming discolored.

Here are the indications I look for in Sweet Leaf. The stems should be somewhat flexible and soft, as Gilmore remarks. One should be able to feel the volatile oils on the stalk, leaves, and flowers. The taste should be sweet, pungent, peppery, hot, and (most important) “buttery.” There need to be enough volatile oils to cause this “buttery” sensation in the mouth.

Though absent long, These forms of beauty have not been to me, As is a landscape to a blind man’s eye: But oft, in lonely rooms, and mid the din Of towns and cities, I have owed to them, In hours of weariness, sensations sweet, Felt in the blood, and felt along the heart, And passing even into my purer mind With tranquil restoration: — feelings too Of unremembered pleasure; such, perhaps, As may have had no trivial influence On that best portion of a good man’s life; His little, nameless, unremembered acts Of kindness and of love.

Pleasure is a matter of encountering. It is a possibility of feeling that finds completion in an encounter with a body, element or substance. That is all there is to pleasure: agreeable sensations, sweet, unprecedented, deliciously unexpected, wild... It is always some sensation, and always triggered by an encounter, by something that confirms, from outside, the possibilities inscribed in our bodies. Pleasure is the encounter with the good object: the one that causes a possibility of feeling to blossom.

Is that why it smells so . . . special?” Keefe asked. The air was somehow both disgustingly sour and cloyingly sweet, like curdled milk stirred with extra-sugary frosting. And it felt thicker, like Sophie could chew her breath—which was not a pleasant sensation.

Some fifteen years earlier, in the mid-’90s, I’d somehow found myself at a dinner on the Upper East Side where a magnum of 1959 Château Margaux was opened for coupling with a main course of leg of lamb and where, once I’d tasted from the glass poured for me, I finally understood the logic behind spending thousands of dollars on a bottle of something to drink. I was no connoisseur. I couldn’t tell a berry note from a chocolate nose or discern the hint of spring flowers the dining guest beside me picked up, she said, developing as it sat in the glass. What I experienced was, perhaps, all the more remarkable for my having so virgin a palate. On my tongue, the wine disappeared almost magically into pure sensation, an absorbing congeries of rich and dusky hints—insinuations of bitterness tempered by the faintest echoes of something once sweet, now round and gathering—a developing flavor that revealed some ideal to which my every previous encounter with red wine appeared to have been pointing all along. And even more remarkable than this almost disincarnate sensation was the disincarnation itself, the effortless sublimation of liquid into pure savor, conveying me to the threshold of some essential idea of wine itself, a frictionless passage into the immaterial that felt, quite frankly, like something metaphysical

Top 10 ideas from No More Meltdowns: 1. Each day for several months, have your child imagine the sensations of anger and rehearse the calming strategy, such as: holding a squeeze ball, counting to 10, taking deep breaths, taking a walk and swinging on the swing set. He will be able to do the calming strategy without too much conscious effort (42) 2. Create a schedule of routines that involves visual reminders of their schedule to provide comfort in understanding what to expect next (40) 3. Praise their effort when they are working on a project or attempting a new activity. Those concentrating on their ability get frustrated more easily. In contrast, those attending their level of effort respond to frustration with more motivation and positive feelings. Praise their continued efforts rather than simply praise their current ability (28) 4. Avoid meltdowns by anticipating and preparing for triggering events. Use the Prevention Plan Form (20, 147) 5. Self-calming strategies: Getting a hug, swinging on the swing set, taking a walk, taking deep breaths, counting to 10, holding a favorite toy (a pup) and a squeeze ball. (42) When using humor, ask “Is it okay if I try to make you laugh to get your mind off of this?”(39) 6. Creating rules and consequences is an important starting point. Without rules and consequences, our lives would be chaotic (5) 7. Gradually expose your child to new foods by asking him first to just look at the foods. Next, ask him to smell them, taste them and eventually eat a small piece. Begin with sweet items (even candy) to allow your child to be open to trying new things. Exercise just prior to trying a new food can increase appetite (77, 78, 80) 8. A child’s passion can be the most effective distraction. Suggestions: Getting hugs, stuffed animals, favorite toys, books and looking out the window (38) 9. Give your child a sticker for each night he sleeps in his own bed. Most importantly, praise him so that he can take pride in his independence (143) 10. Set a time to do homework soon after school, before he gets too tired, and right after as snack, so he’s not hungry. Break down the homework into small steps and ask him to do one tiny part of it. Once started, he will likely be willing to do other parts as well (70) When children feel accepted and appreciated by us, they are more likely to listen to us (9)

Beauty and stone In the huge town square, A statue carved from stone witnessed every passer by, And wondered how it could similar movements acquire, So that it too could walk if not fly, Its eyes constantly looked at the strange faces, Its posture was always the same, It stood at just one place and it could never visit other places, For it had sacrificed everything in the static beauty’s name, That is still, motionless, feelingless and always the same, It even perceives different things with single perception of mind, Cursed to play over and over again the same game, Because for the statue-like beauty everything is predefined, The posture, the view, the stance, and I guess even its every thought, At least that is how I feel when I look at the statue placed in the main town square, It seems to seek what it since eternity has sought, Because it may bear a fixed expression, but that has nothing to do with its desire, Because it expresses what its sculptor felt, And in this crowded town square it looks the same every night, everyday and every time, Of its own sweet will it has never with anything dealt, It has witnessed many lovers’ kisses, and it has been witness to many a crime, But it is its irony to be a statue and nothing else, Beautiful to look at and admire, But it has a missing pulse, That of real, warm, sensitive and sensate beauty in its prime, So, I sometimes look at it and just pretend it noticed me, As I leave the spot, I see it unmoved and feelingless, To it nothing matters, who you are or who you wish to be, Because it is just beauty carved from stone, completely lifeless, And then my love I think of you, and I miss you, So I leave the statue and its stone carved beauty behind, Because the statue is beautiful, but it cannot be you, Therefore, instead in my memories and in my heart beats you I discover and always manage to find!

Beautiful ways Memories with deep feelings, Are like always retracting emotions, They drop like sticky cob web hanging from the ceilings, And retrieve many moments filled with deep sensations, Sometimes they lead to poignancy, And sometimes they bring flashes of her sweet memories, And then the heart struggles to find its buoyancy, Because the mind willingly all these moments carries, Poor heart’s every perversion, Fails to convince the mind to consider the heart’s requests, the heart that keeps it alive, Alas the mind is a slave to her memories and her beautiful sensation, And without bearing her feelings in no other thinking avenues it wishes to dive, So the heart beats with a sense of precariousness, While the mind seeks her sensations, her feelings and enters a state of meditation, Where it only ponders on her feelings and her loveliness, And the poor heart becomes the victim of its own creation, Of loving, of feeling, of emoting, of beating just for her, And as the mind becomes unresponsive, I neither think of my anguished heart, my inactive mind, but just about her, and only about her, And wait and hope that the reality becomes a little bit sensitive and a bit more submissive, But destiny that turns the wheels of time and everything, Has its own plans to execute and fulfil, To it love, lovers, feelings do not mean anything, Because it obeys someone else’s heart’s will, For destiny is true to her emotions and her love affair, And I too then proclaim I am devoted to my memories and their every sensation, And loving her is by all means sensible and fair, For if destiny can do what it pleases, my heart and mind too shall seek their destiny in their most loving destination, So let destiny play its game and cast the heart and mind in time’s bottomless well, But let it know, that we all- my heart, my mind and I, shall fill it too with her sensation, And then time may bid to every other life’s pursuit its final farewell, And then mine shall be the destiny and I shall live with her in the world that will be her beauty’s creation, So, let my heart love her enough, Let my mind think of her always, For time and destiny maybe tough, But love and facts always find their new and beautiful ways!

YOUNG CHILDREN MAY BE grueling, young children may be vexing, and young children may bust and redraw the contours of their parents’ professional and marital lives. But they bring joy too. Everyone knows this (hence: “bundles of joy”). But it’s worth considering some of the reasons why. It’s not just because they’re soft and sweet and smell like perfection. They also create wormholes in time, transporting their mothers and fathers back to feelings and sensations they haven’t had since they themselves were young. The dirty secret about adulthood is the sameness of it, its tireless adherence to routines and customs and norms. Small children may intensify this sense of repetition and rigidity by virtue of the new routines they establish. But they liberate their parents from their ruts too. All of us crave liberation from those ruts. More to the point, all of us crave liberation from our adult selves, at least from time to time. I’m not just talking about the selves with public roles to play and daily obligations to meet. (We can find relief from those people simply by going on vacation, or for that matter, by pouring ourselves a stiff drink.) I’m talking about the selves who live too much in their heads rather than their bodies; who are burdened with too much knowledge about how the world works rather than excited by how it could work or should; who are afraid of being judged and not being loved. Most adults do not live in a world of forgiveness and unconditional love. Unless, that is, they have small children. The most shameful part of adult life is how blinkered it makes us, how brittle and ungenerous in our judgments. It often takes a much bigger project to make adults look outward, to make them “boundless and unwearied in giving,” as the novelist and philosopher C. S. Lewis writes in The Four Loves. Young children can go a long way toward yanking grown-ups out of their silly preoccupations and cramped little mazes of self-interest—not just relieving their parents of their egos, but helping them aspire to something better.

I grab her dangling hand, bringing the back of it to my mouth. As always, the need to cleanse the mark of anyone else off of her, necessary. I drag my tongue along her hand, tasting her sweet skin against my tastebuds. She shivers again at the sensation, and I see her thighs close tighter beneath her dress, knowing the wetness pooling there. That sweet, thick honey her body makes just for me.

But I don’t know how to plot and deceive people...” I protested as best I could, but Ferdinand just knelt down to make eye contact with me. “There is a first time for everything. I shall teach you how,” he said, breaking into a smile so poisonously sweet that I could feel the venom flowing into me. It was a sensation that made me tense up and grit my teeth.” Excerpt From Ascendance of a Bookworm: Part 3 Adopted Daughter of an Archduke Volume 2

She broke off as her helpful directions were extinguished by the sweet, hot shock of his mouth on hers. It was not the kiss a friend would give. It was heat and demand, fused in a raw sensuality that demolished her balance. Her gloved hands slid up to grip his broad shoulders. The kiss went on and on, exploring deliciously, wringing sensation from her mouth. One of his hands wandered over here back, stroking her spine into a pleasured arch. Her breasts felt full and tender, and she longed for him to touch them... kiss them... oh, God, she'd lost her mind. She felt how hard he was all around her, every muscle taut. His breath rode roughshod on every powerful rise and fall of his chest. Reaching down, he gripped her hips to pull them high against an unmistakably rigid, swollen shape. She thought of how it would feel to lie spread beneath him, with all that hardness inside her, and a faint moan slipped from her throat. MacRae licked at the sound as if he could taste it, and broke the kiss to rest his forehead against hers. Their panting breaths mingled. It was hard to speak with him still clasping her hips against his. Every part of her was throbbing.

I have never understood “gardeners” who refuse to garden because it is unseemly for a lady or gentleman to dirty their hands. Perhaps they don’t know the thrill of plunging a trowel into spring-softened soil to toss up the sweet, earthy scent of leaves and twigs and all manner of matter. By refusing to stain their aprons, they miss the sensation of damp, fresh dirt crumbling between their fingers or breathing the fresh air deeply. They don’t know the satisfaction of knocking the dust off one’s clothes when retreating into the house for a well-earned cup of tea.

Our fourth chakra is our heart chakra that gives pure love, compassion, good parent quality, self-confidence and detachment. Our spirit is most importantly in our heart, and the spirit is nothing but love. Its ruling planet is Venus, which represents the signs of Taurus and Libra as love, beauty, art and rule. A Venus which works well creates harmony and beauty wherever it is. It makes you feel nice to people. Strong Venus in a birth chart adds significant beauty to a male. The uniqueness stretches out from a person's inner nature and focuses on a person's behavior and attitude. Benevolence and sweetness encourage us to create positive emotions in people and help us transform them. When our heart opens, we become more connected with our subconscious. The spirit of pure love that is ignited in our heart naturally extends to our surroundings and also sparks similar emotions among the people around us. •       The Vishuddhi is called the fifth Chakra. This chakra located in our throat area helps us to feel that we are part and parcel of the whole. When this chakra is open we feel that we are a part of the whole. When this chakra is open, we experience the sensation of being one with the universe, with nature and with other humans. Saturn is the ruling planet for that center of energy. Saturn also rules the Capricorn and Aquarius signs. In our birth chart difficult aspects of Saturn make us feel lonely in life. Saturn is something of a disciplined teacher. Saturn's position in our birth chart offers us life field checks and lets us develop our shortcomings. It reveals the human character parts which need to be completed. It sometimes limits, creates hurdles and makes initiatives useless. Saturn is doing this so we are learning the lesson it is trying to teach. Once we learn our limitations and discover them, Saturn gives us stability, robustness and detachment. The fifth chakra also governs the ability within us to discern between right and wrong. During moments that Saturn is questioning us, with the aid of this chakra, we will use our power of judgment to realize what is right and wrong. This center of energy also gives us a state of witness. This allows us to enjoy life while playing our role and as a drama experience all the tragedy and difficulties. In this game the earth, the whole universe and planets play a role and put it on stage. Saturn creates a pessimistic personality when functioning badly, who cannot see the good things in life and feels sorry for himself.

what is fancy in depression! One feels that this inexhaustible fancy is weary at last and worn out with continual exercise, because one is growing into manhood, outgrowing one’s old ideals: they are being shattered into fragments, into dust; if there is no other life one must build one up from the fragments. And meanwhile the soul longs and craves for something else! And in vain the dreamer rakes over his old dreams, as though seeking a spark among the embers, to fan them into flame, to warm his chilled heart by the rekindled fire, and to rouse up in it again all that was so sweet, that touched his heart, that set his blood boiling, drew tears from his eyes, and so luxuriously deceived him! Do you know, Nastenka, the point I have reached? Do you know that I am forced now to celebrate the anniversary of my own sensations

Mr. Keir MacRae Lady Merritt Sterling The names had been typed... but why?... what for?... Bits and pieces of memory whirled in his head... thoughts wheeling just beyond reach. As he struggled blindly to catch hold of something, make sense of the tumult, he heard Merritt's voice... stay for one night just one... and there was the smell of rain and the cool darkness of night, and the warmth of a bed... the tender plump curves of a woman's breasts, and the hot clasp of her body pulling at him, squeezing in voluptuous pulsation, and the sweet, wracking culmination as she cried out his name. And there was the sight of her in candlelight, flames dancing in guttering pools of wax, catching glimmers from her eyes, hair, skin... and the glorious freedom of yielding everything, telling her everything, while inexhaustible delight welled around them. And the despair of leaving, the physical pain of putting distance between them, the sensation of being pulled below the surface of the sea, looking up from airless depths to an unreachable sky. Lady Merritt's fingertips pressing a typewriter key. Tap. Tap. Tiny metal rods flicked at a spool of inked ribbon, and letters emerged. Keir was panting now, clutching the slip of paper, while his brain sorted and spun, and pin tumblers aligned, a key turned, and something unlocked. "Merry," he said aloud, his voice unsteady. "My God... Merry.

MacRae drew closer and took her head in his hands. His thumbs caressed the edge of her jaw, the light rasp of calluses causing gooseflesh to rise everywhere. Holy Moses, he was really going to do it. She was about to be kissed by a stranger. Too late to make light of anything now. What have I done? She stared up at him with wide eyes, the dissonant notes of nerves and tension joining in a long, sweet chord of desire. The crescents of his lashes, dark with gold tips, lowered slightly as he looked down at her. There was no place to hide from that piercing gaze. She felt so terribly exposed, every bit as naked as he'd been a few minutes ago. His head bent, and his mouth found hers with a pressure as soft as snowfall. She'd thought he might be rough or impatient, maybe a bit clumsy... she'd expected anything but the gently teasing caress that coaxed her lips apart before she was even aware of it. He tasted her with the tip of his tongue, a sensation that went down to her knees and weakened them. She felt herself list like a ship unable to right itself, but he gathered her firmly against him, his supportive arms closing around her. The tender focus on her mouth deepened until it had gone on longer than any kiss in her life, and still she wanted more. He kissed her as if it were not the first time but the last, as if the world were about to end, and every second was worth a lifetime. He feasted on her with the craving of years. Blindly she caught at his mouth with hers, while her fingers tangled in his hair. The textures of him- plush velvet, rough bristle, wet silk- stimulated her beyond bearing. She'd never known desire like this, a swoon that kept deepening into more and more exquisite feeling.

The resonant space of nondual therapy allows client and practitioner to remain distinct yet ultimately inseparable through their shared being. This is intimacy and compassion at the deepest level, transcending subject/object division while not denying individuality, sensations, feelings or boundaries. As Rumi expressed, 'We are the mirror as well as the face in it. We are tasting the taste this minute of eternity. We are pain and what cures pain, both. We are the sweet cold water and the jar that pours.

When I was a child, I associated my parents with individual flavors. It was the same way you might filter someone through a prism of color--- thinking of some people in blues, other people in reds--- but instead of color, the sensation I latched on to was flavor. My mother's flavors were always those of the desserts she made--- suave caramels and milk chocolates and the delicate, utterly feminine accents of crystallized violets or buttery almonds. But my father's flavors--- my father's flavors were something else altogether. They were subtle and elusive and melted on the tongue only to vanish before you could place them. Dark, adult flavors, and slightly bitter: veal carpaccio. silvery artichokes. And, most of all, mushrooms: chanterelles, chicken of the woods, and--- my father's favorite mushroom of all--- trumpets of death.

Oh, Tom!” she exclaimed in a voice of deep sympathy. She leaned toward me, studying my face. “Poor man, what’s happened to you?” Empty as a hollow log when the mice are eaten. “My wolf died.” It shocked me that I spoke the truth so bluntly. Jinna was silent, staring at me. I knew she could not understand. I did not expect her to understand. But then, as her helples silence lengthened, I felt very much as if she might understand, for she offered me no useless words. Abruptly, she dropped her knitting in her lap and leaned across to put her hand on my forearm. “Will you be all right?” she asked me. It was not an empty question; she genuinely listened for my reply. “In time,” I told her, and for the first time, I admitted that was true. As disloyal as the thought felt, I knew that as time passed, I would be myself again. And in that moment, I felt for the first time the sensation that Black Rolf had tried to describe to me. The wolfish part of my soul stirred, and, Yes, you will be yourself again, and that is as it should be, I heard near as clearly as if Nighteyes had truly shared the thought with me. Like remembering, but more so, Rolf had told me. I sat very still, savoring the sensation. Then it passed, and a shiver ran over me. “Drink your tea, you’re taking a chill,” Jinna advised me, and leaned down to toss another piece of wood on the fire. I did as she suggested. As I set the cup down, I glanced up at the charm over the mantle. The changeable light from the flames gilded and then hid the beads. Hospitality. The tea was warm and sweet and soothing, the cat purred on my lap, and a woman looked at me fondly. Something in me eased another notch. Petting the cat makes you feel better, Fennel asserted smugly.

When in my hunting lodge I drank the warm foaming milk which an unkempt wench had drained into a wooden pail from the udder of a beautiful gentle~yed cow, the sen­sation was no different from that which I experienced when, seated on a bench built into the window of my study, my mind absorbed the sweet and foaming nourishment from a book.

Experience requires change. We respond to differences, not absolutes, and this means that something can become pleasurable not because of any stand-alone properties it has, but rather in contrast to the experience of the past. As one neuroscientist put it, “Because the brain grades on a curve, endlessly comparing the present with what came just before, the secret to happiness may be unhappiness . . . the transient chill that lets us feel warmth, the sensation of hunger that makes satiety so welcome, the period of near despair that catapults us into the astonishing experience of triumph.

And for just a moment I had reached the point of ecstasy that I always wanted to reach, which was the complete step across chronological time into timeless shadows, and wonderment in the bleakness of the mortal realm, and the sensation of death kicking at my heels to move on, with a phantom dogging its own heels, and myself hurrying to a plank where all the angels dove off and flew into the holy void of uncreated emptiness, the potent and inconceivable radiancies shining in bright Mind Essence, innumerable lotus-lands falling open in the magic mothswarm of heaven. I could hear an indescribable seething roar which wasn’t in my ear but everywhere and had nothing to do with sounds. I realized that I had died and been reborn numberless times but just didn’t remember especially because the transitions from life to death and back to life are so ghostly easy, a magical action for naught, like falling asleep and waking up again a million times, the utter casualness and deep ignorance of it. I realized it was only because of the stability of the intrinsic Mind that these ripples of birth and death took place, like the action of wind on a sheet of pure, serene, mirror-like water. I felt sweet, swinging bliss, like a big shot of heroin in the mainline vein; like a gulp of wine late in the afternoon and it makes you shudder; my feet tingled. I thought I was going to die the very next moment. But I didn’t die, and walked four miles and picked up ten long butts and took them back to Marylou’s hotel room and poured their tobacco in my old pipe and lit up. I was too young to know what had happened.

As they were heading back through the centre of the park again, Sentaro felt a tugging sensation at his back. He turned around and saw the stone cairn at the charnel house. Four thousand souls. Four thousand people who never went home. He felt their eyes boring down on him from above.

A young child, or one of the lower animals, is given on Monday a round piece of sugar, eats it and finds it sweet. On Tuesday it sees a square piece of sugar, and proceeds to eat it. . . . Tuesday's sensation and Monday's image are not only separate facts, which, because alike, are therefore not the same; but they differ perceptibly both in quality and environment. What is to lead the mind to take one for the other. Sudden at this crisis, and in pity at distress, there leaves the heaven with rapid wing a goddess Primitive Credulity. Breathing in the ear of the bewildered infant she whispers, The thing which has happened once will happen once more. Sugar was sweet, and sugar will be sweet. And Primitive Credulity is accepted forthwith as the mistress of our life. She leads our steps on the path of experience, until her fallacies, which cannot always be pleasant, at length becomes suspect. We wake up indignant at the kindly fraud by which the goddess so long has deceived us. So she shakes her wings, and flying to the stars, where there are no philosophers, leaves us here to the guidance of — I cannot think what.

Perhaps the weather had some bearing on Jane’s curious sensations. The frost had ended and it was one of those days of almost piercingly sweet mildness which sometimes occur in the very beginning of winter.

I’m serious, you demon,” I spat, my dagger digging into his jaw. He seemed not to care at all. “Don’t come a step closer.” He didn’t, but he did, however, reach out his hand and lift a strand of my long hair. “So soft and pretty,” he murmured, “like silver silk.” I grabbed his wrist with my free hand and pressed the blade to the skin of his throat. His arrogant smile spread wide, the strands of my hair sliding through his fingers. I shivered at the sensation, not understanding why it both disturbed and thrilled me. “Don’t test me,” I warned, injecting as much venom as I could into my voice. “I’ll stab you right through the heart.” His scarlet gaze devoured me with fiery heat, but the timbre of his voice remained steady and cool. “My sweet, of that I am positively

But the moment Frederick buried his face between my legs it was clear there was nothing in the world he would rather be doing than this. He tasted and licked, breathing me in as he took his sweet, deliberate time. My fingertips found purchase on his shoulders, and I clung to them for dear life as he teased me, the wool of the sweater he still wore deliciously smooth against my bare legs. My head fell back against the pillow again and I writhed on the mattress, bucking up towards his mouth in search of greater friction, needing more. But he wouldn't be rushed. His hands gripped my hips harder as my body sought to move against him, keeping me pinned helplessly to the mattress in the exact spot he wanted me. I whined in delicious agony as he traced the shape of my clit with the achingly soft flat of his tongue, dancing around the direct contact my body was screaming for. I could feel how wet I was growing, could hear the sharp keening sounds I was making as if from a distance. But he would not be rushed by my desperation as he kissed, and lapped, and tasted. "Frederick." I tangled my fingers in his soft hair and tugged, moaning. I was going to pieces. I was out of my head with need. "Please." At my naked plea something must have broken inside him. He groaned, long and loud, the reverberations from it sending sparks of sensation rocketing down my spine--- And then, at last, his tongue was right there, licking me senseless as his lips closed around my clit. He sucked gently, then with greater pressure, and the room, the bed beneath us, fell away. The world collapsed down to a pinprick, nothing existing anymore outside of Frederick and the exquisite, cresting pleasure. "Oh, god," I moaned, bucking against his mouth. I was outside of myself, outside of reason. "Please---" My orgasm came upon me like a tidal wave--- devastating, and all-consuming, my toes curling with the spine-melting pleasure of it. Distantly, I could feel Frederick shifting on the bed, kissing his way up my body, whispering praise to my bare legs, my stomach, my breasts.

I release her neck, sliding my palm down her beautifully arched spine before gripping her ass with a firm grasp, bending down to lick the length of her sweet, soft clit and pussy. I glide a heavy, flat tongue along her clit, over her aching hole, all the way up to her ass. She wiggles in my grasp, clearly feeling discomfort at the newfound sensation. Smacking the side of her thigh, she tenses as I tease, then plunge my tongue into her forbidden entrance. “Fuck,” she cries out, attempting to get out of my grasp, but I grip her hips, forcing her back onto my tongue. Briony rarely curses, so when I hear her innocent lips mutter the word fuck with my tongue in her ass, it’s a recipe for disaster. I lean back up, my pulse spiking in anticipation as a bead of cum drips from the tip of my cock, needing to dirty her with a pleasure we’ve both yet to discover. I slap the white porcelain skin of her ass with a rough hand, loving the bounce her flesh gives me, thirsty for the reddened marks, ultimately causing her to moan against the blanket between her white-knuckled hold.

For spring and summer, Dina baked delicate and light pastries fragranced with rosewater, meskouta orange bundt cake, and delicate raspberry macarons. When strawberries were in season in early June, she made airy fraisier cake. For autumn and winter, Dina worked with heavier ingredients: thick, dark chocolate, cinnamon, cardamom, gingerbread, and pumpkin. As the days grew colder and the light dimmed earlier and earlier, people started to crave that feeling of warmth and comfort. And Dina would give that to them, even if only for a short while. One special bake for this season was a ginger and persimmon cake, yellowed with saffron strands, which Dina had bought on her last trip to Morocco, and fresh vanilla pods, their sweet scent so potent that it wafted across the café. This was in addition to all the regular pastries and cakes she had on offer, which were all recipes her mother had taught her to bake. The cake made with dark honey from the Atlas mountains was an all-time customer favorite. Dina had imbibed it with a very specific spell, a childhood memory of a time that she must have fallen asleep on a car ride home, and although she was a little too big to be carried, she remembered her father lifting her into his arms, her mother closing the car door softly so as not to wake her, then carrying her upstairs and tucking her into bed. When she'd been fashioning the spell for the first time, it had occurred to Dina that one day your parents put you down and they never picked you up again, and so she'd made the honey cake to recreate that feeling of childhood comfort. That sensation of someone taking the utmost care of you, holding you close, was a feeling that many in the rushing city of London didn't experience often. Sometimes she wondered if she was really in the business of café ownership, or if she was more of a fairy godmother in disguise. Undeniably, the magical pastries were great at keeping customers coming back for more, so that was a bonus on the businesswoman side of things.

Before I know it, Calvin is hugging me. His embrace is strong, warm, and so very comforting. He’s holding on as firmly as I am, clinging to me like I’m his life preserver in a stormy sea. I feel his stubble on my cheek, the sensation igniting a rush of heat that pools low in my stomach, making it hard to think. I don’t want to let go.

It is no longer possible for us to carry out the ceremony, as once we did, wrapped in the shining belt of the galaxy; but to achieve the effect as nearly as possible, Urth’s attractive field was excluded from the basilica. It was a novel sensation for me, and though I was unafraid, I was reminded again of that night I spent among the mountains when I felt myself on the point of falling off the world—something I will undergo in sober earnest tomorrow. At times the ceiling seemed a floor, or (what was to me far more disturbing) a wall became the ceiling, so that one looked upward through its open windows to see a mountainside of grass that lifted itself forever into the sky. Startling as it was, this vision was no less true than that we commonly see. Each of us became a sun; the circling, ivory skulls were our planets. I said we had dispensed with music, yet that was not entirely true, for as they swung about us there came a faint, sweet humming and whistling, caused by the flow of air through their eye sockets and teeth; those in nearly circular orbits maintained an almost steady note, varying only slightly as they rotated on their axes; the songs of those in elliptical orbits waxed and waned, rising as they approached me, sinking to a moan as they receded. How foolish we are to see in those hollow eyes and marble calottes only death. How many friends are among them! The brown book, which I carried so far, the only one of the possessions I took from the Matachin Tower that still remains with me, was sewn and printed and composed by men and women with those bony faces; and we, engulfed by their voices, now on behalf of those who are the past, offered ourselves and the present to the fulgurant light of the New Sun.

Everything in Kira froze at the feel of those sharp fangs puncturing her skin, but she wasn’t prepared for what happened next. Instead of pain, a cascade of pure sensation flowed over her. Sweet, luscious warmth seemed to spread slowly from her neck, down her shoulders, and lower, until it felt like her body was submerged in heated chocolate. All her worries drained away in such a rush that she felt dizzy, only realizing how heavy the stress had been when it was no longer there to weigh her down. Something thick and silky threaded through her fingers. After a hazy moment, Kira realized she’d raised her arms and was now gripping Mencheres’s hair. He made a deep, guttural sound that vibrated against her neck as he swallowed. My blood. Mencheres is swallowing my blood. The thought should have frightened her, or at the very least, made her uneasy, but Kira found herself pressing closer to him instead. Shards of pleasure spiked in her as his fangs slid deeper in response. The heat spreading through her began to swirl and concentrate in one spot, making her gasp at the sudden intense need in her loins. Her hands tangled tighter in his hair while a dark, inexplicable urge had Kira rubbing her neck against his mouth. Pleasure stabbed into her with enough impact to make her gasp as his fangs slid into her again. She heard herself moaning. Felt another dizzying sweep of heat. How could a bite be responsible for so much bliss? Mencheres lifted his head all too soon, leaving cool air on her throat instead of the hard, sensual pressure of his mouth. The firm caress of his hands on her back and head vanished, too, resulting in disappointing emptiness instead of the feel of him gripping her. She didn’t even think before she yanked his head back down to her neck. “Don’t stop,” she gasped.

I promise to love and cherish you, to honor and sustain you, in sickness and in health, in poverty and in wealth, in the bad that may darken our days, in the good that may light our way. Tirzah, beloved, I promise to be true to you in all things until I die. And even beyond that, God willing.” She stood staring at him, shaken to the core. “And what have I to promise you?” His eyes lit with gentle humor. “To obey?” He lowered his mouth to hers. When he kissed her, Angel was lost in a wilderness of new sensations. It had never felt like this, warm and wonderful, exciting and right. None of the old rules applied. She forgot everything she had ever learned from other masters. She was dry ground soaking in a spring rain, a flower bud opening to the sun. Michael knew and gently coaxed her with tender words flowing over her like the sweet balm of Gilead healing her wounds. And she flew, Michael with her, into the heavens.

I HOPE THIS WON’T SOUND too pathetic, but I’ve been waiting every day for you to call.” Each syllable uttered in that voice was a gemlike particle that rolled through the receiver, into the ear canal, and straight to the brain. His spine went numb and a sweet sensation seeped through his body, as if he were absorbing some exquisite wine or cognac.

I don’t want this! It isn’t supposed to be like this! I’m supposed to lose my virginity in some awesome, superspectacular, sensational way. Not like this! But everything inside me is going gooey like rich, warm, velvety chocolate fondue that’s so thick and sweet and scrumptious that I want to swim in it, let it cover my head, take me down deep into a place where I don’t have to think anymore and I don’t have to fight anymore and I can just be without always having to struggle to stay on top and protect myself and win all the time. I want to get naked here in the street. I want to do it every which way, standing up and lying down, doggy style and reverse cowgirl.

I was humming a popular melody, enjoying my solitude, when I felt a pair of hands massaging my groin. With the mask shadowing my eyes I could not see this mysterious person. This tantalizing feeling was extremely soothing and stimulating. Relaxing into the tub I allowed the massaging hands to continue. These seductive hands soon found their way to my scrotum and engorged penis. Before I could discard my mask, the tempter’s sweet lips were on mine, prying my lips open, forcing them to surrender to his lusting mouth. I just wanted to enjoy these sensual sensations, and flow to the rhythmic motions of this mysterious interloper.

To her surprise, Linc was waiting around the first curve on the road, listening to the radio. She could see his hand tapping a beat on the back of the other seat. Kenzie slowed her car to a stop when their windows lined up. He rolled his down. “Hey. How’d it go?” “No big deal. I handed the papers to his temp assistant. What the hell are you doing here?” Linc studied her face. “I wanted to see if the beacon I put on your car was working.” She should have known. “Is that necessary?” “The readout is on this.” He tapped the face of his watch. “I can’t see. And I don’t believe you.” Kenzie put her car into park, got out, and walked around. He turned his wrist to show her. “Check it out. Your dot merged into my dot.” “Isn’t that sweet.” He grinned. “It’s not a problem to remove the beacon if you don’t like it.” “No. It’s all right. You’re the only person who knows where I am most of the time now.” That didn’t seem to have occurred to him. “Really?” She nodded. “So where are you off to?” Kenzie shot him a mocking look. “You don’t have to ask, do you?” Linc laughed. “The beacon can’t read your mind.” She rolled her eyes. “Thank God for that. If you want to know, I was heading to the drugstore to print out some of the photos for Mrs. Corelli. Where are you going?” “Just running errands,” he said. “Need anything from the electronics store?” “I don’t think so.” “Okay. I’m just picking up a couple of components.” Kenzie gave a little yelp. “Yikes--that reminds me. Yesterday my boss asked me to pick something up for him out in the boondocks. I forgot until you said that. So if my dot falls off your watch, you’ll know why.” He smiled at her warmly as he bent his arm and rested it on the bottom of the window frame. The bicep under the flannel rounded up very nicely as he lifted a hand and chucked her gently under the chin. “Funny.” The friendly touch was unexpectedly intimate. In fact, it triggered a dangerous sensation of giving in. She smiled at him, feeling weak. His brown eyes were dark and warm. She felt herself blush under his steady gaze. Linc was the real deal. Maybe she didn’t have to be so tough all the time. It was okay to be protected. More than okay. Back when she’d had Tex at her side, she’d actually liked the feeling. Like all military working dogs, he’d been trained to maintain an invisible six-foot circle around her, and woe to anyone who crossed into it without her permission. Including guys she was dating. “Kenzie?” She snapped out of it. “Sorry. You knocked on my stupid spot.” “I’ll have to remember that.” She shook her head in mock dismay. “Please don’t. Let’s touch base around four or five o’clock.” He nodded and turned the key in the ignition. “Works for me.” His gaze stayed on her a moment longer. “Call me if you need anything.” “I will. Thanks.” She glanced back at the gray monolith a little distance behind them and her mouth tightened. But when her green gaze met Linc’s brown eyes, she managed a quick smile. He raised his left hand in a quick good-bye wave and eased his car ahead of hers, rolling up the window again. She watched him go, then got back into hers and drove on, turning off on the road to the firing range.

Early July 2012 In one of Andy’s responses, my ex-lover wrote, Young, That sounds great! I look forward to co-writing the fourth book of A Harem Boy Saga with you. This will provide us time to map out the outline of our joint project during the course of our correspondence. As much as I’d love to work with you on this project, I want to be sure that Walter is okay with us going into this venture together. I have no desire to upset your loving relationship and certainly have no wish to be an unwelcome intruder into your lives. Let me know if he agrees. When I was in hospital recovering from my nervous breakdown, I met Jack, a 24-year-old nursing student. He cared for me during my recovery. We dated for several months before his transfer to a hospice in a different city. I did not have the courage to tell Toby that Jack and I were dating. I was afraid Toby would threaten suicide again, until the fateful evening when he discovered Jack and me making out in my flat. My caregiver and I had proceeded to my lodgings after a scrumptious dinner one evening. After several glasses of wine while watching television, Jack leaned his head against my shoulder. His dreamy, doe-like eyes looked adoringly at me, reminding me of your beautiful Asian eyes staring at me during our intimate moments together. Our kisses soon led to lingering sensual foreplay. Before long, our clothes were scattered all over. Jack went on his knees, eagerly caressing my growing hardness and wrapping his luscious lips around me under my briefs. Easing down my underwear, he went to work. His sweetness stirred my longing for you. Closing my eyes to savor his warm fallation, I reclined against the comfortable sofa and enjoyed the pleasurable sensation showered upon my erection. He engulfed my pulsating manhood, suckling away as if to satisfy his hunger. It was similar to the way you used to relish my hardness for hours on end. Like you, he pleasured me with deep, devotional worship; I was overwhelmed by his sexual imperativeness, wanting his warmth to wash over my entirety. His expert titillation did wonders for my soul, causing me to spasm involuntarily. He devoured my length as if deprived of nourishment while I nurtured my feed into Jack’s bobbing head, pressing him against my quivering palpitations.

This green place in which I stood with James turned slowly around us like a music box. All my memories returning, and all his. I could see and feel each of his days and he mine. Childhood songs, books read, hearts broken, arguments forgiven.The sweetness of these imperfections far outshining the regrets. Our lives overlapped as naturally as two blades of grass brushing together. My pain forgotten, my clothes dry and clean, I pulled James close to me. As he lifted my chin, I felt no sensation of falling as when I had been Light touching one who is Quick. It wasn't the mere heat of a stolen moment in borrowed flesh. We touched now soul to soul, both of us Light. And when we kissed, the garden rocked, floating upstream.

Although Arin was eager to see Kestrel, he would have to wait. He caught threads of music from far away. As he came across the grass, the piano’s melody strengthened. It opened within him a happiness that gathered and gleamed…glossy, but the way water is, with weight. A lovely fatigue claimed him. He lay down on the grass and listened. He thought about how Kestrel had slept on the palace lawn and dreamed of him. When she had told him this, he’d wished that it had been real. He tried to imagine the dream, then found himself dreaming. Everything made sense in his dream yet he felt the tenuousness of this perfect reason. The arch of Kestrel’s bare foot. An old tale about the god of death and the seamstress. Arin would lose, upon waking, his understanding of why touching Kestrel would arouse the memory of a story he’d not thought about in a long time. He dreamed: one stocking balled in his fist, and the stray question of how it had been made, who had sewn this? He saw his hands--though they did not look like his hands--measuring and cutting fabric, sewing invisible stitches. A dark-haired boy tumbled from a room, a god-mark upon his brow. When a guest entered and said, Weave me the cloth of yourself, Arin thought that he was the forbidding guest and the child and the sewing girl all at once. She said, I’m going to miss you when I wake up. Don’t wake up, he answered. But he did. Kestrel, beside him on the grass, said, “Did I wake you? I didn’t mean to.” It took him a velvety moment to understand that this was real. The air was quiet. An insect beat its clear wings. She brushed hair from his brow. Now he was very awake. “You were sleeping so sweetly,” she said. “Dreaming.” He touched her tender mouth. “About what?” “Come closer, and I’ll tell you.” But he forgot. He kissed her, and became lost in the exquisite sensation of his skin becoming too tight for his body. He murmured other things instead. A secret, a want, a promise. A story, in its own way. She curled her fingers into the green earth.

Kestrel, beside him on the grass, said, “Did I wake you? I didn’t mean to.” It took him a velvety moment to understand that this was real. The air was quiet. An insect beat its clear wings. She brushed hair from his brow. Now he was very awake. “You were sleeping so sweetly,” she said. “Dreaming.” He touched her tender mouth. “About what?” “Come closer, and I’ll tell you.” But he forgot. He kissed her, and became lost in the exquisite sensation of his skin becoming too tight for his body. He murmured other things instead. A secret, a want, a promise. A story, in its own way. She curled her fingers into the green earth.

While she was making a pretense of choosing another poem, something warm settle on the back of her neck. Vim’s hand. He’d said nothing. His body hadn’t shifted. He still held the child in the crook of his arm, but he was touching Sophie too. His thumb was making slow circles on her nape, sending a melting warmth down her spine and up into her brain. “Read more slowly, Sophie. I think Kit’s dropping off.” She nodded carefully so as not to dislodge the wondrous gift of his hand on her person. When she read again, she could barely focus on the words, so drunk was she with the sensation of Vim Charpentier’s touch on the bare skin of her neck. She’d wished for things from him before he left, things no decent woman admitted to wanting, things she could never have asked for in words. And this slow, sweet touch was part and parcel of what she’d wished for. ***

He should stop, but the intoxicating sensation of Eliza’s hot breath on Thomas’s face dominated him and he could think of nothing else. Nothing but kissing her. The world around him stopped and he moved both hands to cup her smooth cheeks as he continued to taste her lips. She pressed into his kiss, moving her own delicate hands to his face. Sampling the sweetness her mouth was the biggest mistake he’d ever made. Just one would never be enough. Reluctant,

I put the water on scalding, and climbed inside. Then and only then did I finally, finally let it out. There was the pain at first, just the raw, brutal sensation of love lost, of a future I had been planning on disintegrating, leaving me to have to rebuild a new one. After that, oh yeah, that was when the bitter set in. Five years. Five freaking years and he dumped me because Mommy and Daddy didn't approve? What a pathetic, weak-willed, co-dependent excuse for a man. Any real man would have flipped them off, told them to take their money and shove it, and went home to the woman they loved and made plans. And it was an awful, ugly thing to realize that I had been all-consumingly in love with a man who loved money more than he loved me. On that thought and knowing to my soul that I was not going to be the type of woman who broke herself into pieces over a man who didn't deserve it, I wiped the tears away, I got redressed, I ate half my body weight in sweets... and I decided to move on with my life.

He turned his head to look at her, trying to think of ways to plead his case. Some way to dazzle and beguile her and make her glad that it was him she was here with. Something witty and persuasive, but she turned at precisely the same moment he did, with invitation in her eyes, and all he could come up with was, “Damn, I really want to kiss you.” Her hesitation was a mere fraction of a second. “Me too,” she whispered. It was all he needed to hear, and in an instant she was in his arms. He kissed her, hard, with no prelude, no artful negotiations or seductive machinations. Just hungry kisses that sent his mind spinning and his body following. She kissed him back with equal enthusiasm, with one hand on his chest and the other wrapped tightly around the back of his neck, pulling him closer. Her mouth was sweet, as sweet as he’d imagined, with lips so soft he could have fallen over the edge of that lighthouse and thought the sensation was just from her touch.

Lowering his hand to her belly, he pressed his palm against her spasm-stricken muscles and kneaded away the tightness. She felt like a sensitive harp string, thrummed by expert fingers. Horrified by her body’s reaction, she tried to twist free, but he threw a damp, buckskin-clad leg over both of hers and pinned her to the fur. Her back stung each time she moved, the pain so sharp it made beads of sweat pop out on her brow. Her thighs felt as if they were on fire. “M-mm-m, you are still hot,” he mumbled. His hand lingered on her belly. “Not too bad where the sun did not touch, though. The fever is better.” No man had ever dared touch her like this. She tossed her head from side to side, strained to get her arms and legs free, then shuddered in defeat. “Do not fight.” His voice was so close, it seemed to come from within her own mind. “You cannot win, eh? Rest.” His sleepy whispers invaded her whole being, slow, hypnotic, persuasive. He rubbed her in a circular motion, pausing in sleep, then coming awake to rub some more. “Lie still. Trust this Comanche. It is for the burn, no? To heal your skin.” As he slid his palm slowly downward, she realized she was slick with some kind of oil. Her heart drummed a sensual alto, off-key to the soprano shrills of fear emitted by her nerve endings. No, please, no. He molded his hand to the slight mound between her thighs, searching out its external softness, his fingertips undulating in a subtle manipulation that shot bolts of sensation to the core of her. Nuzzling her hair again, he sighed, his warm breath raising goose bumps on her neck. “Ah, Blue Eyes, your mother did not lie. You are sweet.” He gave the conjuncture of her thighs a farewell caress, then traced the curve of her hip with a hand that skimmed the painfully burned flesh there so lightly that she scarcely felt it. The pressure of his palm increased when it gained purchase on her ribs where the sun had not reached. His hand tightened its grip, squeezed, and released so rhythmically that it seemed to keep time with the strange, blood-pounding beat inside her. It was as if he had begun the rhythm within her, as if he somehow knew the thrusts, the lulls, better than she.

Do not fight.” His voice was so close, it seemed to come from within her own mind. “You cannot win, eh? Rest.” His sleepy whispers invaded her whole being, slow, hypnotic, persuasive. He rubbed her in a circular motion, pausing in sleep, then coming awake to rub some more. “Lie still. Trust this Comanche. It is for the burn, no? To heal your skin.” As he slid his palm slowly downward, she realized she was slick with some kind of oil. Her heart drummed a sensual alto, off-key to the soprano shrills of fear emitted by her nerve endings. No, please, no. He molded his hand to the slight mound between her thighs, searching out its external softness, his fingertips undulating in a subtle manipulation that shot bolts of sensation to the core of her. Nuzzling her hair again, he sighed, his warm breath raising goose bumps on her neck. “Ah, Blue Eyes, your mother did not lie. You are sweet.” He gave the conjuncture of her thighs a farewell caress, then traced the curve of her hip with a hand that skimmed the painfully burned flesh there so lightly that she scarcely felt it. The pressure of his palm increased when it gained purchase on her ribs where the sun had not reached. His hand tightened its grip, squeezed, and released so rhythmically that it seemed to keep time with the strange, blood-pounding beat inside her. It was as if he had begun the rhythm within her, as if he somehow knew the thrusts, the lulls, better than she. Held captive now by more than bonds and strength of arm, she turned her face to study his, fascinated by the sleepy innocence that clouded his half-closed eyes. The merciless killer was gone, replaced by a drowsy, mischievous boy who stroked her as if she were a newly acquired pet. A slow smile curved his mouth, a dreamy smile that told her he was more asleep than awake. He moved closer to whisper something unintelligible against her cheek. Her lips tingled, then parted. She found herself wondering how it might have felt if he had kissed her, then cringed at the wayward thought. Comanches didn’t kiss, they just took. And her time was running out. With the tip of his tongue, he outlined her ear. “Topsannah, tani-har-ro.” The words came out so slurred, she doubted he even knew he was saying them. “Prairie flower,” he muttered, “in springtime.

We continued our drive, not making any permanent decisions that day about where we’d live. We’d been engaged less than twenty-four hours, after all; there was no huge rush. When we finally returned to his house, we curled up on his couch and watched a movie. Gone With the Wind, of all things. He was a fan. And as I lay there that afternoon and watched the South crumble around Scarlett O’Hara’s knees for what had to have been the 304th time in my life, I touched the arms that held me so sweetly and securely…and I sighed contentedly, wondering how on earth I’d ever found this person. When he walked me to my car late that afternoon, minutes after Scarlett had declared that tomorrow is another day, Marlboro Man rested his hands lightly on my waist. He caressed my rib cage up and down, touching his forehead to mine and closing his eyes--as if he were recording the moment in his memory. And it tickled like crazy, his fingertips on my ribs, but I didn’t care; I was engaged to this man, I told myself, and there’ll likely be much rib caressing in the future. I needed to toughen up, to be able to withstand such displays of romance without my knees buckling beneath me and without my forgetting my mother’s maiden name and who my first grade teacher had been. Otherwise I had lots of years of trouble--and decreased productivity--ahead. So I stood there and took it, closing my eyes as well and trying with all my might to will away the ticklish sensations. They had no place here. Begone, Satan! Ree, hold strong. My mind won, and we stood there and continued to thumb our nose at the reality that we were two separate bodies…and the western sun behind us changed from yellow to orange to pink to a brilliant, impossible red--the same color as the ever-burning fire between us. On the drive home, my whole torso felt warm. Like when you’ve awakened from the most glorious dream you’ve ever had, and you’re still half-in, half-out, and you still feel the dream and it’s still real. I forced myself to think, to look around me, to take it all in. One day, I told myself as I drove down that rural country road, I’m going to be driving down a road like this to run to the grocery store in town…or pick up the mail on the highway…or take my kids to cell lessons.

His nose touched hers, and the warmth of his breath brushed her lips. “Christine,” he said, his voice filling her with longing, “may I kiss you?” A warning sounded from the far corners of her mind and told her she ought to say no, that she should retreat while she still retained her dignity. But he stroked his thumb from her chin back to her jaw again, and the caress lit a flame inside her like the strike of a match to a wick soaked in oil. She gave him her answer by moving into him and closing the distance between them. Although she’d never even embraced a man much less kissed one, she lifted herself to him and trusted he’d do the rest. She was rewarded by the sweet touch of his lips against hers. The sensation was soft and exquisite and brief. She found herself disappointed when he began to pull away. “Guy,” she whispered and pursued his lips with hers. He stilled as if he hadn’t expected her response. For an instant she regretted her boldness, wondered if she’d somehow broken a rule, and felt the heat of embarrassment creep into her cheeks. “I’m sorry—” she mumbled, pulling away. Before she could move more than a fraction, his hand slipped to the small of her back and his mouth returned to hers, cutting off her apology with another soft, feathery kiss. She didn’t know why he was being so careful with her, kissing her as though she might break. So she cupped his cheeks with her hands and pressed her lips harder. His hand against her back tensed and his fingers splayed, drawing her against his chest. He matched the pressure of her lips, tentatively at first. But when she melded against him, his kiss deepened and she could feel the power and strength of him. She relished it, craved it. And she didn’t want it to end.

They both gasped as the head of his shaft pushed against the smoldering wet heat of her. Hunting for the right angle, he bent his knees and drove up to the hilt in a sure, strong thrust. Helen let out a cry, and he hesitated, terrified that he had hurt her. But he felt her body working on his with deep quivers that drew a ragged sound of lust from him. Letting her weight settle more fully onto his shaft, he reached down with his thumb and forefinger to spread her sex open. She whimpered as he pressed against her and rocked upward, lifting her slightly with each thrust. All he could hear were the rasps of their breathing, and the ceaseless rustling of clothes, and the occasional intimate wet sound as he lunged steadily into her. Deep inside she closed in on him sweetly, demanding more, and he gripped her hips and made her ride him relentlessly, using his body to pleasure her. They struggled together amid the rising sensation, pulling closer, closer, until there was no more friction, only the clamping, writhing, throbbing connection that held them fast to each other. Helen moaned, her arms tightening around his neck, and then she fell silent and began to shudder helplessly. The feel of her ecstasy delivered him, the release so complete that it was like losing consciousness, like dying and being reborn.

I think you are sweet and lovely and enchanting and... very innocent." She raised her chin and glared at him through her tears. "I'm not the saint thou thinkest I am." He smiled. She doubted even he realized how natural that condescending, patronizing smile was to him. How it made her want to shake her fist in his face. Instead, she reached up on tiptoe and touched her lips to his, wanting more from him, but somehow knowing it would only come this way. "Not a saint, eh?" He smiled against her mouth, and she pulled back, cheeks aflame. She hadn't gotten very far away before he caught her and gathered her up close into his arms, his lips claiming hers, the force of his will in the kiss. She was swept away as before, but this time she felt the thoughts of right or wrong slipping, drowned in their heat. All her reasoning why she could not fall in love with him faded as she lost herself, floating on the sensation of his mouth against hers. Minutes passed... exploring minutes... discovering minutes. Time stood still, and yet it seemed so short when he pulled suddenly away and gasped out, "My God!" These words were no curse. They were more a prayer. Suddenly Drake laughed, and Serena's spirit soared that she had caused him such joy as that sound carried. She had banished the ghosts in his eyes, if only for a little while. He smiled, and it was one Serena had not yet seen- pure and real- not meant to mean anything different than what it was. "What magic you weave. You always pull me out of the darkness.

Staring into her smiling, rosy-cheeked face, Zachary experienced a painfully sweet sensation, an ache that had less to do with the body than the spirit. She was the most adorable woman he had ever known. Not for the first time, he felt acute envy for George Taylor for having been loved by her. For having the right to touch and kiss her whenever he had wanted. For having had her turn to him for all of her needs. For being loved by her still. From everything Zachary had been told, George Taylor had been the perfect man. Handsome, well-heeled, honorable, respectable, gentlemanly and compassionate. It seemed that he had deserved a woman like Holly, every bit as much as Zachary did not deserve her. Zachary knew that he was none of the things George had been. Everything he could offer her, including his own heart, was tainted.

Although lacking the brocade and elements of ancient sacred ritual, a novel can be a kind of mirror room, too. It, too, is a liminal space, silent, bound by certain rituals and full of magic. The writer enters and seats herself in front of her reflection in the mirror. She collects herself and focuses her attention, and then she picks up a mask. She gazes at it and positions it on her face, and at that moment she is transformed into the protagonist of her story, looking out through its eyes at her reflection in the mirror, made strange by the face of another. It’s a complex sensation, impossible to describe exactly, but, oh, such lingering sweetness! Then, because the world of novels is an endless hall of mirrors, that moment of transformation of writer into character is echoed by the reader when he or she opens the book and enters the mirror room, dons the mask, and becomes the character, too. This is why we read novels, after all, to see our reflections transformed, to enter another’s subjectivity, to wear another’s face, to live inside another’s skin.

Loretta stared up at him, trying to assure herself that he was only bluffing. She had run away; now he meant to teach her a lesson. Once he felt vindicated, he would be the same sweet, gentle Hunter he had always been. She kept right on telling herself that until he crouched beside her and jerked up her overblouse to rudely expose her breasts. Her breath snagged as his fingers plucked the tip of one nipple into throbbing hardness. The moonlight played upon his face, revealing the taut anger in his expression. “Ah, yes, this is the way of it, eh? A heathen and his woman?” His face twisted in a sneer as he rolled her sensitive flesh between his finger and thumb, sending shocks of sensation shooting into her belly. “Hunter, the one who rapes and tortures? That is me.” Abandoning her breast, he rocked back on his heels and jerked up her skirt. “This is very good, Blue Eyes. The animal in me likes having you tied.” With that, he stretched out beside her. Even in her turmoil, Loretta heard an echo in every word he spoke. Looking into his eyes, she knew how deeply her leaving had hurt him.

Ah, yes, this is the way of it, eh? A heathen and his woman?” His face twisted in a sneer as he rolled her sensitive flesh between his finger and thumb, sending shocks of sensation shooting into her belly. “Hunter, the one who rapes and tortures? That is me.” Abandoning her breast, he rocked back on his heels and jerked up her skirt. “This is very good, Blue Eyes. The animal in me likes having you tied.” With that, he stretched out beside her. Even in her turmoil, Loretta heard an echo in every word he spoke. Looking into his eyes, she knew how deeply her leaving had hurt him. Propping himself up on an elbow, he planted a hand on her abdomen and lowered his head to brush his lips across her temple. Her belly convulsed as his fingers began a subtle manipulation, charging her senses, making her skin tingle, in a relentless path toward her breasts. “I will be cruel, yes? And make you weep rivers of tears while I play my games. It will be good, very good.” His mouth touched hers, teasingly light. His hand cupped her breast. Silhouetted against the moon-silvered sky, he was a black outline, his broad shoulders a threatening wall, his long hair drifting in a silken curtain around her. Nightmare or dream? He continued to whisper--saying terrible things, cruel things, taunting her with what was yet to come, living up to all her worst expectations. But his touch was that of a lover, as sweet and magical, as patient and gentle, as the last time they had been together. She knew he had tied her only to prove a point, that no matter what the circumstances, no matter how angry he might become, he would never harm her. “Oh, Hunter, I’m sorry,” she said on the crest of a sob. “I didn’t mean to hurt you like this. I didn’t mean to hurt you.” “You rip my heart out and it should not hurt?” His teeth closed on her earlobe, nipping lightly, sending shivers over her skin. “You spit upon all that I am, and it should not hurt? You abandon me, you dishonor me, and it should not hurt?

You look . . . so divine,” I said in a tight voice. “I see candy in your eyes and the crown jewels of England too.” “No—that’s what I am seeing in your eyes, Cathy. You’re so very beautiful in that white nightgown. I love you in white nightgowns with blue satin ribbons. I love the way your hair spreads like a fan, and you turn your cheek so it rests on a satin pillow.” He moved closer, so his head was on my hair too. Even closer he inclined his head until our foreheads met. His warm breath was on my face. I moved so my head tilted backward and my neck arched. I didn’t feel quite real when his warm lips kissed the hollow of my throat and stayed there. My breath caught. For long, long moments I waited for him to move away. I wanted to pull back myself, but somehow I couldn’t. A sweet peace stole over me, quivering my flesh with a tingling sensation. “Don’t kiss me again,” I whispered, clinging harder to him and pressing his head to my throat. “I love you,” he choked. “There will never be anyone for me but you. When I’m an old, old man, I’ll look back to this night with you under the Christmas tree, and remember how sweet it was of you to let me hold you like this.

Jack kissed her long and deep, with a driving need that radiated all the way to his bones. Pausing, he took an extra moment to breathe in the honeyed fragrance of her skin, to taste the sweet flavor of her tongue as it slid like hot, damp silk against his own. He shuddered from the pleasure, relishing the sensations as though they were manna from heaven.

Vane held the reins of his desire in a grip of iron and refused to let his demons loose. Deep, primal instincts urged him on; experience held him back. She'd never yielded her mouth to any man, never shared her lips willingly. He knew that absolutely, sensed the truth in her untutored response, read it in her lack of guile. But she was rising to him, her passion, her desire, answering his call, sweet as the dew on a crisp spring morning, virginal as snow on an inaccessible peak. He could reach her- she would be his. But there was no need for any hurry. She was untouched, unused to the demands of a man's hands, a man's lips, much less a man's body; if he pressed too fast, she'd turn skittish and balk. And he'd have to work harder to bring her to his bed. Angling his head over hers, he kept every caress slow, every plundering stroke deliberate. Passion lay heavy, languid, almost somnolent between them; as he claimed every sweet inch of the softness she offered him, he laced the heady sensation into every caress, and let it sink into her senses. It would lie there, dormant, until next time he touched her, until he called it forth. He would let it rise by degrees, feed it, nurture it until it became the inescapable compulsion that would, in the end, bring her to him. He would savor her slowly, savor her slow surrender- all the more sweet because the end was never in doubt.

She should, of course, feel scandalized, or at the very least, shocked. Yet whenever she allowed herself to recall all that had happened, sweet pleasure washed through her, leaving her skin tingling and her breasts deliciously warm. Her "shock" was exciting, thrilling, an enticing reaction, not one of revulsion. She should feel guilty, yet whatever guilt she possessed was swamped beneath a compulsion to know, to experience, and an intense recollection of how much she'd enjoyed that particular experience. Lips firming, she set a stitch. Curiosity- it was her curse, her bane, the cross she had to bear. She knew it. Unfortunately, knowing didn't quell the impulse. This time, curiosity was prompting her to waltz with a wolf- a dangerous enterprise. For the last two days, she'd watched him, waiting for the pounce she'd convinced herself would come, but he'd behaved like a lamb- a ridiculously strong, impossibly arrogant, not to say masterful lamb, but with a guileless newborn innocence, as if a halo had settled over his burnished locks.

When your sweet new baby falls asleep in your arms, you look down at your child and the sensation of fierce protectiveness rises to the surface as subtle as a tsunami.

In the heat of our passionate sensuality, my thobe was lifted above my thighs. With a single yank, my briefs slid off my hips, exposing my throbbing erection. A stimulating mouth engulfed its pulsating length, while Andy’s tongue continued to explore every crevice of my yearning mouth. Chilling thrills rushed over my skin as a pair of mature hands caressed my indulgent body. The probing hands cupped my buttocks, lifting my groin towards the warmth of a yearning mouth. Enjoying the sweet sensations traversing my being, I closed my eyes, savoring every moment of this loving sexuality. I tilted my pelvis, granting my Master oral access to my throbbing hardness. His pulsating organ ground against my inner thighs, sending shivers of electric currents through my spine. Kneeling between my legs, the Arab savored every inch of my perkiness as I wiggled my toes, involuntarily on his dangling scrotum, in reciprocation.

After several long hours preparing the eighteen rune tablets needed for the two portals, Talis cast the first spell and together with Mara, Nikulo, Charna, and Goleth, they entered the swirling portal. They found themselves back on Chandrix on that desolate, rocky hill, the air smelling sweet of smoke and cinnamon, the sky thick with fog. But for some reason this time the world was colder and darker, and Talis had the eerie sensation that they were being watched. He bent down and dusted off the gold-capped stone marker he’d found when they’d first entered Chandrix. Indeed they were close to home. “Just

She let him kiss her, let all the sensations he brought with his kiss course through her freshly relaxed body. His mouth was warm, strong, and he tasted sweet and spicy, partly from the ginger-laced cupcakes they'd been baking and testing, and partly because she knew that's just how he tasted. Under his continued exploration, she relaxed further, opened her mouth to him, took him in... and sighed as he filled her so perfectly. She groaned softly, or maybe it was him, as he took the kiss deeper, and it slowly turned more ardent. She realized she'd dug her nails into his shirt, pressing her knuckles into him as she clutched the linen in her fists in her urgent need to get closer to him. "Wow," she gasped against the skin of his jaw as he left her mouth to kiss the corners of her lips, then her cheek, her temple, and dropped his head down to nuzzle at the tender side of her neck. It was the sweetest seduction and a primal rush, all at the same time. She rose up on her toes, wanting more heat, more contact, more... Baxter. "How can this not be the right thing, Leilani," he whispered gruffly against the sensitive skin below her ear.

Imagine… There’s a roast goose in Hong Kong—Mongkok, near the outskirts of the city, the place looks like any other. But you sink your teeth into the quickly hacked pieces and you know you’re experiencing something special. Layers of what can only be described as enlightenment, one extraordinary sensation after another as the popils of the tongue encounter first the crispy, caramelized skin, then air, then fat—the juicy, sweet yet savory, ever so slightly gamey meat, the fat just barely managing to retain its corporeal form before quickly dematerializing into liquid. These are the kinds of tastes and textures that come with year after year of the same man making the same dish. That man—the one there, behind the counter with the cleaver—hacking roast pork, and roast duck, and roast goose as he’s done since he was a child and as his father did before him. He’s got it right now for sure—and, sitting there at one of the white Formica tables, Cantonese pop songs oozing and occasionally distorting from an undersized speaker, you know it, too. In fact, you’re pretty goddamn sure this is the best roast goose on the whole planet. Nobody is eating goose better than you at this precise moment. Maybe in the whole history of the world there has never been a better goose. Ordinarily, you don’t know if you’d go that far describing a dish—but now, with that ethereal goose fat dribbling down your chin, the sound of perfectly crackling skin playing inside your head to an audience of one, hyperbole seems entirely appropriate.

The life of sensation is the life of greed, it requires more and more. The life of spirit requires less and less; time is ample and its passage sweet.

So close, so close at hand, so damn beautiful. Galadir breathed deeply of the sweet smell of her hair and stroked her cheek. Her skin was warm. No, it was boiling and slowly he withdrew his hand, trying to hide the burning sensation he felt. She stared at him with a look that let him out of breath. «I don't like women who want to lead, as you are.»