Commonplace Book

Try to praise the mutilated world. Remember June’s long days, and wild strawberries, drops of rosé wine. The nettles that methodically overgrow the abandoned homesteads of exiles.

—Adam Zagajewski, “Try to Praise the Mutilated World,” tr. by Clare Cavanagh, Without End, 2002

She determined to think no more of Castruccio; but every day, every moment of every day, was as a broken mirror, a multiplied reflection of his form alone.

—Mary Shelley, Valperga, 1823

The idea of [playing the guitar with my teeth] came to me in a town in Tennessee. Down there you have to play with your teeth