One of the obligations of the writer is to say or sing all that he or she can, to deal with as much of the world as becomes possible to him or her in language.

You have come to the shore. There are no instructions.

Both art and faith are dependent on imagination; both are ventures into the unknown.

I'm not very good at praying, but what I experience when I'm writing a poem is close to prayer.

Nothing we do has the quickness, the sureness, the deep intelligence living at peace would have.

It's when we face for a moment the worst our kind can do, and shudder to know the taint in our own selves, that awe cracks the mind's shell and enters the heart.

Grief is a hole you walk around in the daytime and at night you fall into it.

In certain ways writing is a form of prayer.

Marvelous Truth, confront us at every turn, in every guise.

But for us the road unfurls itself, we don't stop walking, we know there is far to go.

What I heard was my whole self saying and singing what it knew: I can.

God provides for him that trusteth.

The Patriot Act closed dangerous gaps in America's law enforcement and intelligence capabilities, gaps that terrorists exploited when they attacked us.

God rules even where Satan seems to hold sway, because the latter exists only on God's sufferance.

I always wanted to do an action movie, not particularly Bond.

Nonviolence is an imperative in order to bring about ultimate community.

Do not fear. Some things will never change.

We may be excused for not always being bright, but we are not excused for not being gracious, yielding and considerate.

Everything comes to those who hustle while they wait.

Loud dress becomes offensive to people of taste, as evincing an undue desire to reach and impress the untrained sensibilities of the vulgar.

A cynic had defined aid as simply the system by which poor white people in rich countries gave money to rich black people in poor countries to put into Swiss bank accounts.