from the Notebooks of 1975:
She said, I had a wonderful dream. I dreamed you made love to me. It felt so good. She was happy for an hour or two. I was pleased to learn that the spirit has taken up some of the heavy work. That was the morning of the sixth day of a fast. I broke it that night. She cleared away more of the weeds and dried daisies and planted roses and grape-vine cuttings. There is no place for me back there.
He refers to the incident again in the Notebooks of 1977:
It was an unexpected (although long overdue) justification of my heavy and reluctant investment in meditation, fasting, dismal prayer, and holy conversation.
I felt a lot like Atlas when he was tapped on the shoulder by an hydraulic jack.
from a Diary Tape of 1978:
I was a fool to be bitter or make light of it. The marriage had moved to another realm but I was not quick enough to follow it. I couldn’t appreciate her work in the garden. I had come to depend too much on the weeds.