[ Later, he will know, he took the cup. This was the hurt of it, the start of the sentence.
She offered. He accepted. And, in all things of trade, men pay. ]
You wish them burned.
[ Or ripped from surface, or torn at root. He knows, instinctively, they speak of demolition and not lubrication — of making the stretch of her back arable and known, not of waiting out the autumnal slip of the thin, glistened plate from her skins.
There is cruelty in this, how she asks — him. Sparing Sizhui and Wei Ying, and perhaps Jiang Cheng, the men of her life to whom she allocates alms of devotion. Lan Wangji's hurt is an abstract notion, distant in the orbit of her awareness. There can be no collision between his discomfort and her guilt, only empty, parallel, gelid coexistence.
Cause without effect. He sips his tea, eyes downed, and his knuckles try the faint qualities of tremble. ]
Bare your back.
[ Let them do this, then, like whores and patrons, like strangers. ]
no subject
She offered. He accepted. And, in all things of trade, men pay. ]
You wish them burned.
[ Or ripped from surface, or torn at root. He knows, instinctively, they speak of demolition and not lubrication — of making the stretch of her back arable and known, not of waiting out the autumnal slip of the thin, glistened plate from her skins.
There is cruelty in this, how she asks — him. Sparing Sizhui and Wei Ying, and perhaps Jiang Cheng, the men of her life to whom she allocates alms of devotion. Lan Wangji's hurt is an abstract notion, distant in the orbit of her awareness. There can be no collision between his discomfort and her guilt, only empty, parallel, gelid coexistence.
Cause without effect. He sips his tea, eyes downed, and his knuckles try the faint qualities of tremble. ]
Bare your back.
[ Let them do this, then, like whores and patrons, like strangers. ]