And so I await the Devil’s coming.
[January 18.]
AND meanwhile—as I wait—my mind occupies itself with its own good odd philosophy, so that even the Nothingness becomes almost endurable.
The Devil has given me some good things—for I find that the Devil owns and rules the earth and all that therein is. He has given me, among other things—my admirable young woman’s-body, which I enjoy thoroughly and of which I am passionately fond.
A spasm of pleasure seizes me when I think in some acute moment of the buoyant health and vitality of this fine young body that is feminine in every fiber.
You may gaze at and admire the [picture] in the front of this book. It is the picture of a genius—a genius with a good strong young woman’s-body,—and inside the pictured body is a liver, a MacLane liver, of admirable perfectness.
Other young women and older women and men of all ages have good bodies also, I doubt not—though the masculine body is merely flesh, it seems, flesh and bones and nothing else. But few recognize the value of their bodies; few have grasped the possibilities, the artistic graceful perfection, the poetry of human flesh in its health. Few have even sense enough indeed to keep their flesh in health, or to know what health is until they have ruined some vital organ, and so banished it forever.
I have not ruined any of my vital organs, and I appreciate what health is. I have grasped the art, the poetry of my fine feminine body.
This at the age of nineteen is a triumph for me.