BARACK OBAMA
"It was a pleasure to burn. It was a special pleasure to see
things eaten, to see things blackened and changed. With the
brass nozzle in his fists, with this great python spitting its
venomous kerosene upon the world, the blood pounded in his
head, and his hands were the hands of some amazing
conductor playing all the symphonies of blazing and burning to
bring down the tatters and charcoal ruins of history. With his
symbolic helmet numbered 451 on his stolid head, and his
eyes all orange flame with the thought of what came next, he
flicked the igniter and the house jumped up in a gorging fire
that burned the evening sky red and yellow and black. He
strode in a swarm of fireflies. He wanted above all, like the old
joke, to shove a marshmallow on a stick in the furnace, while
the flapping pigeon-winged books died on the porch and lawn
of the house. While the books went up in sparkling whirls and
blew away on a wind turned dark with burning. Montag grinned
the fierce grin of all men singed and driven back by flame."
RAY
BRADBURY
FAHRENHEIT
451
