The writer's first affinity is not to a loyalty, a tradition, a morality, a religion, but to life itself, and to its representation in language.

Towns change; they grow or diminish, but hometowns remain as we left them.

Literature can teach us how to live before we live, and how to die before we die. I believe that writing is practice for death, and for every (other) transformation human beings encounter.

Love is the outlaw's duty.

If death is this brilliant slide, this high, fine music felt as pure vibration, this plunging float in wind and silence, it's not so bad.

The writing life is a secret life, wither we admit it or not.

Smoke veils the air like souls in drifting suspension, declining the war's insistence everyone move on.

Then he's inside you, and your body remembers, each time, every man, even if you try to forget.

Talk between women friends is always therapy.

I write line by line, by the sound and the weight and the music of the words.

I wish I had more time to write.

I love my family so much that it brings tears to my eyes.

Ten responsible and rational young citizens are sufficient to clean up the mess of a thousand old superstitious citizens.

I really consider myself more of a rhythm guitarist than a soloist.

She was surprised at how tiny it seemed now. She supposed the school was just as big as it had ever been only her eyes had grown used to looking at bigger things.

In the final analysis, we count for something only because of the essential that we embody. If we do not embody that, life is wasted.

When two people are at one in their inmost hearts, they shatter even the strength of iron or bronze.

My hunch is that if we allow ourselves to give who we really are to the children in our care, we will in some way inspire cartwheels in their hearts.

It's unnatural and unhealthy for a nation to be engaged in global crusades for some principle or idea while neglecting the needs of its own people.

Not everybody is qualified to go to Stanford, but everybody should have access to the best qualify for which they are eligible.

In the present moment, we are all innocent. Wake up!