“When you look ito the still, deep water,you can feel it looking back,trying to come up with the proper punishment.Fucking water, who made you the boss?”

“It was like letting go and falling back into water and seeing yourself grinning up through the water, your face like a mask, and seeing the bubbles coming up as if you were trying to speak from under the water. And how do you know what it's like to try to speak from under water when you're drowned?”

“I have a deep-down belief that there are folks in the world who are good through and through, and others who came in mean and will go out mean. It's like coffee. Once it's roasted, it all looks brown. Until you pour hot water on it and see what comes out. Folks get into hot water, you see what comes out.”

“If you try to breathe water, you will not turn into a fish, you will drown; but water is still good to drink.”

“There are many days when all the awful things that happen make you sick at heart, when the path before you is so steep you can’t bear to look. Not even love can rescue a person from that. Still, enveloped in the twilight coming from the west, there she was, watering the plants with her slender, graceful hands, in the midst of a light so sweet it seemed to form a rainbow in the transparent water she poured.”

“I leaned back against him and rested my cheek on his shoulder. I could feel the river water dripping off of him."Thank you" I whispered. When I looked up, I saw he was crying.”