“Is this a mild winter or a harsh winter?”

“If you don't have the grace and wit to die early, you are forced to vanish, to hide as if in shame and apology.”

“La preghiera è una strategia pratica, la conquista di un vantaggio temporale nei mercati capitali del Peccato e della Remissione.”

“In these night recitations we create a space between things as we felt them at the time and as we speak them now. This is the space reserved for irony, sympathy and fond amusement, the means by which we rescue ourselves from the past.”

“Her death would leave me scattered, talking to chairs and pillows. Don't let us die, I want to cry out to that fifth-century sky ablaze with mystery and spiral light. Let us both live forever, in sickness and health, feebleminded, doddering, toothless, liver-spotted, dim-sighted, hallucinating. Who decides these things? What is out there? Who are you?”

“A person rises on a word and falls on a syllable.”

“It's like World War III. Everything is white. They'll take our bright colors away and use them in the war effort.”