Page 89

By Jack Joseph Smith

to engage in pretense devoted to the monolith of modern prayer." He indicated to the monument, but Jauquline's eyes were on white puffed clouds crossing bet- ween the sun and a religious fairyland. A faint laugh signaled something to her former lover. A bit of sublime patience and he might have known, that she would not have been suprised to see ch- erubs and nymphs descending through the clouds to rest their angelic souls of form upon his little garden valley in an aria of sound from their brass horns; but he thought her laughter slight, a re- mark taking him to turn, due no doubt to her spite- ful spirit. And strangely enough his reply to his fantasy was; "do you not know that our montrum is perhaps the most dedicated voice to God in Los Angeles" And now her laughter was spiteful. "Do you think you are the only one who prays in L.A? And in this unholy city, where did you get your upper middle class home to do it from?" "Yogananda says that Karma is the place one acc- epts and acts from without guilt." "Then why do you preach to me when I accept my place in the world, and at the same time try and

Original Scan

AI Interpretation

GPT

Jauquline turns the monk father's polished prayer language back toward class comfort, Los Angeles, and the question of who gets to preach from safety.

The page sharpens the satire from the prior scene. Her cloud-and-fairyland attention already exceeds his monument, and her questions expose how spiritual authority can be staged from property, class, and distance from the city it judges.

Claude

As the monk gestures to 'the monolith of modern prayer,' Jauquline's eyes are 'on white puffed clouds crossing between the sun and a religious fairyland,' and her 'faint laugh' provokes his fantasy of 'cherubs and nymphs descending through the clouds' with 'brass horns' - which he dismisses as 'her spiteful spirit.' His boast that 'our montrum is perhaps the most dedicated voice to God in Los Angeles' draws her real scorn: 'Do you think you are the only one who prays in L.A? And in this unholy city, where did you get your upper middle class home to do it from?' When he cites 'Yogananda' that 'Karma is the place one accepts and acts from without guilt,' she throws it back - why preach when she 'accept[s] my place in the world'?