| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Odyssey by Homer: heart, or seen him with his eyes; for he seems like one
that has wandered far.'
Then didst thou make answer, swineherd Eumaeus: 'Queen, oh
that the Achaeans would hold their peace! so would he charm
thy very heart, such things doth he say. For I kept him
three nights and three days I held him in the steading, for
to me he came first when he fled from the ship, yet he had
not made an end of the tale of his affliction. Even as when
a man gazes on a singer, whom the gods have taught to sing
words of yearning joy to mortals, and they have a ceaseless
desire to hear him, so long as he will sing; even so he
The Odyssey |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Secret Sharer by Joseph Conrad: I had somehow the impression that he was on the point of letting go the ladder
to swim away beyond my ken--mysterious as he came. But, for the moment,
this being appearing as if he had risen from the bottom of the sea
(it was certainly the nearest land to the ship) wanted only to know the time.
I told him. And he, down there, tentatively:
"I suppose your captain's turned in?"
"I am sure he isn't," I said.
He seemed to struggle with himself, for I heard something
like the low, bitter murmur of doubt. "What's the good?"
His next words came out with a hesitating effort.
"Look here, my man. Could you call him out quietly?"
The Secret Sharer |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Whirligigs by O. Henry: great, prostrate beam. The air was pungent with the
dust of commerce. The great river slipped yellowly
past. Across it Algiers lay, a longitudinous black bulk
against a vibrant electric haze sprinkled with exact stars.
The girl was young and of the piquant order. A certain
bright melancholy pervaded her; she possessed an
untarnished, pale prettiness doomed to please. Her
voice, when she spoke, dwarfed her theme. It was the
voice capable of investing little subjects with a large
interest. She sat at ease, bestowing her skirts with the
little womanly touch, serene as if the begrimed pier were
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