I learned that poets aren’t God, but if there is a God...or anything approaching a God...he’s a poet. And a failed one at that. - Dan Simmons

Twenty kilometers. At an average speed of 120 klicks per hour, we should cover the distance in ten minutes. Ten freezing, adrenaline-pumping, gorge-rising, terror-beating-against-the-ribs, react-in-a-microsecond-or-die seconds.

Words are the only bullets in truth’s bandolier. And poets are the snipers.

The universe is indifferent to our fates. This was the crushing burden that the character took with him as he struggled through the surf toward survival or extinction. The universe just does not give a shit.