“I touch my scar to remind myself that I am not a coward. I am a Quinn.”

“I wanna leave here myself. But when I leave, whether it's on a bus or train or in a pine box, somebody gon' know I was here.”

“Fear was a thing I understood all too well. It was a malignancy that had spread throughout my body until my mother, in her godly wisdom, had diagnosed and cauterized it.”

“She denied and feared God in the same breath. She allowed our actions to shame her, and yet was void of shame. I truly believed there was something unnatural about her - a madness only her children could see. My yearning was not to understand it, but to escape it.”

“Satan is not going to leave. The only way to get him out is to invite God in, and God is not welcome in my mother's house.”

“What good are laws that cannot be read or understood, or a tongue that spews only hatred or ignorance? What good is the written word to an illiterate man?”

“I move like I'm gravity, like it's not a decision. Standing on my toes, on the edge of the high dive, the water looks as clear and blue as the sky. In my head there's the possibility that this moment isn't here yet, that maybe I'm not born. I could be an idea. Or I could be realized, and life is standing still. For this moment, the world has stopped. I have a perfect balance. The wind moves around me. My heart is as light and bright as the sun. I am as light as a sparrow bone, and for one moment I am everything that can't be caught and held. Then I'm passing through the air, turning, arms drawn in, toes pointed. My chin rests on my chest. I believe I have a chance at anything: one full revolution. I spread my wings. I arch my back. I remember why swans are graceful, why someone would name this for something beautiful. I think I'm touching the clouds. For a long time they keep me from breaking the blue. I don't hear the shattering surface. I belong behind this sky, all-silent and calm, and part of the world where butterflies live after they give up their feet and dream of flight. I can stay, if I pretend the fire in my chest doesn't burn, if I pretend the world is upside down, if I pretend water is the air I breathe.”