Death is our friend, precisely because it brings us into absolute and passionate presence with all that is here, that is natural, that is love.

It's possible I am pushing through solid rockin flintlike layers, as the ore lies, alone;I am such a long way in I see no way through, and no space: everything is close to my face, and everything close to my face is stone.

[A]t bottom, and just in the deepest and most important things, we are unutterably alone, and for one person to be able to advise or even help another, a lot must happen, a lot must go well, a whole constellation of things must come right in order once to succeed.