The most futile thing a man can do is to ponder the alternatives, to stew and fret over the life that might have been lived if circumstances had not … - William Styron

Perhaps, he thought, if I only think of this second, this moment, the train won't come at all. Think of the water, think of now.

I would have done it all again. I would have destroyed them all. Yet I would have spared one. I would have spared her that showed me Him whose presence I had not fathomed or maybe never even known. Great God, how early it is! Until now I had almost forgotten His name. “Come!” the voice booms, but commanding me now: Come, My son! I turn in surrender.
Surely I come quickly. Amen.
Even so, come, Lord Jesus. Oh how bright and fair the morning star …

Though it is a painful fact that most Negroes are hopelessly docile, many of them are filled with fury, and the unctuous coating of flattery which surrounds and encases that fury is but a form of self-preservation.