He realized this early on, and realized too that what people think are their lives are merely its conditions. The truth is closer than thought and lies buried in what we already know.

I think people would be happier if they admitted things more often. In a sense we are all prisoners of some memory, or fear, or disappointment - we are all defined by something we can’t change.

In the end I didn't know who I was crying for, but it was something my body wanted to do, as though trying to digest grief.

Anyone who is desperate or alone will agree there is comfort in routine.

Love is also a violence, and cannot be undone.

We cross from memory into imagination with only a vague awareness of change.

Sometimes I wake up and lie still enough to hear a petal drop from the vase of flowers. Sometimes I lie awake and wish there was someone to hear my falling.

I tried to convey to the boy how people’s lives are often altered by curved lines read slowly from paper, sand, or stone.

When he smiles, they mostly look away. But Martin likes to think they carry his smile for a few blocks – that even the smallest gesture is something grand.

We all have different lives, Martin believes – but in the end probably feel the same things, and regret the fear we thought might somehow sustain us.

I was afraid of the sea when I was a girl. Someone said it went on forever and that frightened me. I wondered why my parents had chosen to live at the beginning and the end of the world.

Mars is the only place in the solar system where it's possible for life to become multi-planetarian.

The world sums you up by the clothes that you wear, and treats you accordingly.

Major social movements eventually fade into the landscape not because they have diminished but because they have become a permanent part of our perceptions and experience.

I’m just kinda tired. Like a monkey in the rain.

The human race afraid of nothing, rushes on through every crime.

I want word of mouth to be our biggest voice.

Only those with great ambitions know what great fears drive them forward.

Let me be dressed as I will, yet flies worms and flowers exceed me still.

When desiring ceases, the other world opens. The other world is hidden in this world. But because your eyes are full of desire, full of the ego, you cannot see it.

Surrogate motherhood has been the subject of much philosophical and political dispute over the years.