Too many of us have to sit foolishly by while something comes out of the dark, strikes, returns to wherever it came from, as if we are too fragile fo… - Thomas Pynchon

Facts are but the Play-things of lawyers, — Tops and Hoops, forever a-spin... Alas, the Historian may indulge no such idle Rotating. History is not Chronology, for that is left to Lawyers, — nor is it Remembrance, for Remembrance belongs to the People. History can as little pretend to the Veracity of the one, as claim the Power of the other, — her Practitioners, to survive, must soon learn the arts of the quidnunc, spy, and Taproom Wit, — that there may ever continue more than one life-line back into a Past we risk, each day, losing our forebears in forever, — not a Chain of single Links, for one broken Link could lose us All, — rather, a great disorderly Tangle of Lines, long and short, weak and strong, vanishing into the Mnemonick Deep, with only their Destination in common.

She watches Marvy's face as he pays Monika, watches him in this primal American act, paying, more deeply himself than when coming, or asleep, or maybe even dying.

The Doper's Dream

Last night I dreamed I was plugged right in
To a bubblin' hookah so high,
When all of a sudden some Arab jinni
Jump up just a-winkin' his eye.
'I'm here to obey all your wishes,' he told me.
As for words I was trying to grope.
'Good buddy,' I cried, 'you could surely oblige me
By turning me on to some dope!'
With a bigfat smile he took ahold of my hand,
And we flew down the sky in a flash,
And the first thing I saw in the land where he took me
Was a whole solid mountain of hash!
All the trees was a-bloomin' with pink 'n' purple pills,
Whur the Romilar River flowed by,
To the magic mushrooms as wild as a rainbow,
So pretty that I wanted to cry.
All the girls come to greet us, so sweet in slow motion,
Mourning glories woven into their hair,
Bringin' great big handfuls of snowy cocaine,
All their dope they were eager to share.
We we dallied for days, just a-ballin' and smokin',
In the flowering Panama Red,
Just piggin' on peyote and nutmeg tea,
And those brownies so kind to your head.
Now I could've passed that good time forever,
And I really was fixing to stay,
But you know that jinni turned out, t'be a narco man,
And he busted me right whur I lay.
And he took me back to a cold, cold world
'N' now m'prison's whurever I be...
And I dream of the days back in Doperland
And I wonder, will I ever go free?