perforce,

“You’re fucked up, mister. But you’re cool.” “I believe that’s what they call the human condition,” said Shadow. “Thanks for the company.”

Chicago happened slowly, like a migraine.

He wondered whether home was a thing that happened to a place after a while, or if it was something that you found in the end, if you simply walked and waited and willed it long enough.

“You try to sell shit?” “Yes,” says Salim, thrilled and horrified that he has spoken the truth about his brother-in-law’s samples. “And they will not buy it?” “No.” “Strange. You look at the stores here, that is all they sell.”

“You were here all the time,” said Shadow to Alison McGovern’s corpse. “Every single person who drove over that bridge saw you. Everyone who drove through the town saw you. The ice fishermen walked past you every day. And nobody knew.” And then he realized how foolish that was.

“Gods die. And when they truly die they are unmourned and unremembered. Ideas are more difficult to kill than people, but they can be killed, in the end.”

We do not always remember the things that do no credit to us. We justify them, cover them in bright lies or with the thick dust of forgetfulness.

Poetry ain’t what you’d call truth. There ain’t room enough in the verses.