After more than a millennium of refinement, the angelic voices of Benedictine monks still reek of the axe, of cannibalism, of the plague, and of the merciless sword administered from horseback. The arhythmic chant, as far from the body as human voice could ever reach, as far from the pulse and the trampling feet as we could ever travel, still soothes but the incorrigible sinner, the reptile. Repentance incarnated. Resurrexi, chant the monks. Carnal desire tucked away behind the thick walls of the monastery. Libera me, Domine, de morte æterna, chant the monks. Murder sublimated. Requiem æternam for and by the haunted. Human voice has never reached beyond a full circle, but its circumference has never been greater than here, where the angelic and the demonic converge defiantly after an infinite detour. Amen, chant the monks.

Addendum (April 4, 1998)

Each time I chance upon this piece, I am at first convinced that it was written after another one-night escapade of mine in Ljubljana soon after Elise and I got back together, but then I always discover from the date that I must be wrong, for we had left Ljubljana nearly a year earlier. This has just happened to me again. The event itself must have taken place late in 1978 or early in 1979. Anyhow, Gregorian chants are inextricably linked in my mind with Polona—that is, my remorse upon betraying my then wife, to whom I have returned after a long separation, my closest friend and Polona’s boyfriend, Mišo, and ultimately myself, for the woman was hardly worth the trouble. In retrospect, I must have listened to Gregorian chants for several days after screwing Polona, and I must have decided to record this recollection of mine upon hearing Gregorian chants in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where I was living when this piece was written. It may be that I had heard the chanting by chance, but it is much more likely that I deliberately chose the very same record, the title of which is preserved in the title of this piece, to bring back the memory of that crazy night and its tender cure. Remorse is among the sweetest of sentiments.