“At this very moment, the thumb of Ricardo's hovering shadow jabbed her in her left eye, revealing for all the world the shallowness of her water table. Rice could have been planted at that instant on the terraces of her flesh and sprouted in strength and beauty in the floods that overwhelmed her from that moment on through all the afternoon. ”

“Listening to the sound of the water, her sound, her lovely body glistening through the room a moment from now. There are only moments. Live in this one. The happiness of these days.”

“Dana had four beautiful eyes. She wore glasses. But her eyes were so beautiful that the glasses only made her prettier. With two eyes she was pretty. With four eyes she was beautiful. With six eyes she would have been even more beautiful. And if she had a hundred eyes, all over her face and her arms and her feet, why, she would have been the most beautiful creature in the world.”

“Her eyes watered until the moment became nothing more than floating colors in front of her watery eyes.”

“At that moment, I wished I were the wind, free to dance across her flesh, seep through her clothing, and explore the forbidden depths of her body beneath.”

“Elias could not have prepared himself for the moment that he walked into that cottage and laid his eyes on her. Her emerald green eyes--the way they gazed upon him like there were no surroundings or time or sounds to distract her, like he was all that existed.”