Hell

It isn't just other people. As a friend has hellpfully (ahem) informed me, it's also a place you can visit. In Michigan.

Fear of hell and eternal damnation is pretty much the only thing that moves me toward religion; otherwise I barely even think of god, much less believe in him. Maybe this is what Charles Simic was getting at when he wrote:

God's refuted but the devil's not.
("The Scarecrow," The Book of Gods and Devils)

Oh look, the entire poem is quoted here by someone who uses phrases like "portentously self-indulgent" to characterize Simic's work and cites this poem as an example of the poet's faux profundity. So that once again I've chosen the wrong poem to like. Fuck the universe. And don't send me to hell.

Chartres, south facade