Books, like so many good things, require time.
Time to settle; time to soak. Time to be turned around and examined from every angle. Time to simply be remembered with a fond, wistful smile.
A particularly good book might occupy my thoughts for weeks. Years.
Decades.
Perhaps a lifetime.
“I took another track and went down towards the coast. Now and then, warm breezes laden with perfume reached me from nearby gardens. The earth had a rich smell, the sea was rippling with laughter, the sky was blue and gleaming like steel.
Winter shrivels up the mind and body of man, but then there comes the warmth which swells the breast. As I walked I suddenly heard loud trumpetings in the air. I raised my eyes and saw a marvellous spectacle which had always moved me deeply since childhood: cranes deploying across the sky in battle order, returning from wintering in a warmer country.
(…)
The unfailing rhythm of the seasons, the ever-turning wheel of life, the four facets of the earth which are lit in turn by the sun, the passing of life – all these filled me once more with a feeling of oppression. Once more there sounded within me, together with the cranes’ cry, the terrible warning that there is only one life for all men, that there is no other, and that all that can be enjoyed must be enjoyed here. In eternity no other chance will be given to us”
(Nikos Kazantzakis, Zorba the Greek, p.183)