* * * * *

I recall the highest moment of my being. I saw that moment, and all the
others of my life. I saw them as something that I could not bear to see,
and I cried out that from that hour I would change them. I have not kept
the vow; there was no one to drive me.

But this man they drive; they pinch him and burn him and tear him; they
crush his limbs, they break his bones, they grind his flesh, they make his
brain a living fire of anguish. And he fights them.

Into the deep recesses of his being goes the cry--for all that he has--for
all that he is! For every ounce of his strength, for every throb of his
will, for every vision, every truth that he knows! To bear this, to save
him here! And so he wrestles, so he rises, so he gropes and gasps; and in
the moment of his fiercest straining, with the throb of all his being he
bursts the barrier, he rends the veil; and infinite passion rolls in in
floods upon him, he clutches all existence in his arms; and from his lips
there bursts a mad frenzied shout of rapture--that makes his torturers
stand transfixed, listening, trembling with terror.

And so they drag him back to his dungeon; and there, unable to move, he
lies upon the stones and pants out his ecstasy and his life.

That is The Captive.

* * * * *

April 29th.