"One wonders what Lincoln thought when reports floated back to Springfield of the harrowing Donner Party debacle," Holst wrote. "We can imagine him reading the newspaper's lurid accounts of deep snow, exhaustion, exposure and starvation, and shaking his head to think that the man with whom he'd gone to war and gone to trial would one day come to such hardship," she added.

We’re watching Texas roll over the Devil Rays and Greg tells me that my writing is less about love and beauty these days, and frequently borders on misogyny. 

Last time I read your blog, he tells me, I hoped you didn’t really feel this way.  Even your last book, he says, was horrifyingly brutal. 

It makes me wonder if you’ve ever really loved a woman.

I imagine love, I tell him, is never without cuts and bruises, and there is no such thing as love without consequence. 

In my stories, when I love a woman I want to know her entirely, to be completely inside her.  

I want to hold her desperately from behind, as she bends her neck invitingly, inhaling deeply as I reach for her zipper.

After fingering her atlas I unzip her spine and her head falls forward in agreement. 

Crawling inside just above her tailbone, I stuff my feet one at a time into her thighs, calves, feet, and then toes, careful so as not to break a nail. 

I slip my groin into hers and pull her belly to mine, holding her ass firmly with my free hand before pressing it against my own. 

When I pull her arms over mine I realize how much smoother they are than my own and when I touch them with her fingers they remind me of dried candle wax and falling asleep in buttercups. 

There is a tattoo between her forefinger and thumb that says *L*O*V*E*. 

Using her hands I tuck her neck up against mine and feel the remarkable weight of her chest drawing me forward.

Her shoulders stretch tightly over the bone.

Finally, I take a deep breath and slide her head over mine, hearing her sigh for the first time, our eyes staring inside out. 

When our mouths touch we eat my lips right off her face and our tongues wrestle indiscriminately from roof to floor.

I want to know what she’s thinking when we look at our self in the mirror, examining what’s changed and what remains.

But I know for certain that we love each other by the way we lean into the mirror and gently kiss the glass, and mouth just the right words, before closing our bedroom door.