People still have the same story, the one where they get born and they do stuff and they die, but now the story means something different to what it meant before.

Let's start a new tomorrow, today.

Eyes as black and as shiny as chips of obsidian stared back into his. They were eyes like black holes, letting nothing out, not even information.

His name is Marcus: he is four and a half and possesses that deep gravity and seriousness that only small children and mountain gorillas have ever been able to master.

Black as night, sweet as sin.

Everybody going to be dead one day, just give them time.

People take on the shapes of the songs and the stories that surround them, especially if they don't have their own song.

Stories are webs, interconnected strand to strand, and you follow each story to the center, because the center is the end. Each person is a strand of the story.

That's the trouble with you young people. You think because you ain't been here long, you know everything. In my life I already forgot more than you ever know.

The right song can turn an emperor into a laughingstock, can bring down dynasties.

Human beings do not like being pushed about by gods. They may seem to, on the surface, but somewhere on the inside, underneath it all, they sense it, and they resent it.

When you love nature, it always loves you back with the fragrance of flowers.

Clearly she was expected to say something, but panic at having to speak stole the thoughts from her head.

Only the pure in heart can make a good soup.

We have to prepare our teenagers and our children for a world away from us. That requires explanations. That requires understanding.

As before the collapse, the setting sun brushed the tiles, brought out the warm brown glow on the wallpaper, and hung the shadow of the birch on the wall as if it were a woman's scarf.

Those who try to "break on through to the other side" not only cannot predict what they may find there, but are themselves too often broken in the process.

Nobody gets killed when they're happy. It always starts with an argument, or a debt.

The fundamental goal of Buddhism is the realization of the peace and happiness of humankind.

Deep inside, our integrity sings to us whether we are listening or not. It is a note that only we can hear. Eventually, when life makes us ready to listen, it will help us to find our way home.

Nothing is to be preferred before justice.