Alison McGhee

“Feel how tight my arms are around you?" he said. "This is how tight I'll be holding you. No matter where you go or where I go, remember how tight I'm holding you.”

“There comes a point at which you stop giving things up. That is what i won't give up. None of it will i give up, for my beautiful sister Ivy who lies in bed. Ivy who used to be alive. Ivy who used to be. Ivy who used. Ivy who. Ivy-who-is-not-me.Not me. Not me. Not me.”

“You are most powerful when you are most silent. People never expect silence. They expect words, motion, defense, offense, back and forth. They expect to leap into the fray. They are ready, fists up, words hanging leaping from their mouths. Silence? No.”

“And she tried to breathe.”

“All it takes is a single moment.”

“Water seeks its own level. Look at them. The Tigris, the Euphrates, the Mississippi, the Amazon, the Yangtze. The world's great rivers. And every one of them finds its way to the ocean.”

“They were stupid, stupid people.”

“Wouldn't want to miss a war, would I?”

“I'll live in another world, then.”

“But there's more to this world than meets the eye, isn't there?”

“What, exactly, would you give up?”

“What is the matter with these people, these people who won't stop fighting, won't stop hurting each other...?”

“The world should have stopped, but it didn't. The world kept on going. How can the world just keep on going? An earthquake in India kills a thousand people, and the world keeps on going. A famine in China kills a million people, and the world keeps on going. The twin towers of the World Trade Center buckle and fall, and the world, the world keeps on going.”

“Your heart literally hurts when it's breaking. You can feel it, every beat another ache, and nothing you can do will stop it, either from beating or breaking.”

“Don't hurt someone who cares about you like that. You're not the only person in the world who's ever been hurt. Don't be cruel. Don't go breaking someone else's heart in the hope that you'll feel better. Becaues you won't.”