I've done as many as 20 or 30 drafts of a story. Never less than 10 or 12 drafts.

there isn't enough of anything as long as we live. But at intervals a sweetness appears and, given a chance prevails.

Life and death matters, yes. And the question of how to behave in this world, how to go in the face of everything. Time is short and the water is rising.

That's all we have, finally, the words, and they had better be the right ones.

Write about what you know, and what do you know better than your own secrets?

And what did you want? To call myself beloved, to feel myself beloved on the earth.

I could hear my heart beating. I could hear everyone's heart. I could hear the human noise we sat there making, not one of us moving, not even when the room went dark.

It ought to make us feel ashamed when we talk like we know what we're talking about when we talk about love.

The places where water comes together with other water. Those places stand out in my mind like holy places.

Dreams, you know, are what you wake up from.

But I can hardly sit still. I keep fidgeting, crossing one leg and then the other. I feel like I could throw off sparks, or break a window--maybe rearrange all the furniture.

Fashion, n. A despot whom the wise ridicule and obey.

Thank God, He does not measure grace out in teaspoons.

The devil wipes his breech with poor folks' pride.

Declare independence, don't let them do that to you!

From adversity we can learn the value of patience.

The benevolence of wrapping the partridge in a vine leaf brings out its quality, just as the barrel of Diogenes brought forth the qualities of the great thinker.

My top priority for 2012 will be to make a renewed push for women's economic empowerment and political participation.

The opposite of every great idea is another great idea.

The day was warm and clear. Kids were playing soccer in the parking lots and women were sunning their babies and having their tea all over the lawns. The scene was entirely too cheery for journalism.

I can’t undo the past. But in the future, I will gladly lay my life down for you, brother. (Styxx)