In the mail are two notes from women in his recent past. One says, “I want
to see you.” The other says, “I want to kill you.”   (From “On a Page from Rilke,” Above Ground: An Anthology of Living Fiction, 2009)

There are, it seems, people even in this country, even in this century, who honestly, unironically believe that there is an intelligent, self-conscious force above and beyond humanity and that this force — generally thought of as male, and generally called God — has a will that it exercises over us and everything in the universe. (2000.09.01)