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Commotions of the Flesh
- Southern Illinois University Press
- Chapter
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Commotions of the Flesh after a line from Epicurus To live in the world is to live in the body, that deepest heap of wants. To hell with the mind and its pursuit of its own proper good. I am concerned here with the commotions of the flesh. Living in the fissure between desire and the having,I have failed, failed, failed to control myself. From tooth to tongue, gullet to gut, I have taken in the religion of pork chop and gin, tasted red meat and confection, nectarine and absinthe. And I have been pulled along by the wild vein-song of sex, the hunger that coils in the blood. My children sing out to me from their hammock between my hips; they coax my fingers to touch. Forgive me my weaknesses, for bleeding and sweating and snoring, for giving in to gravity’s tug. Forgive my shivering,these tears, this stomach rumble and bone-racket, this agitation of the willful heart. ...