“In a time of destruction, create something.”

“…I have changed/I am a dandelion puffball blur. My hair,/scribbles of white lines. My face. Lines/crisscross and zigzag my face./My eyes. I am looking into eyes/whose color has turned lighter, hazy brown./Wind and time are blowing me out." –Maxine Hong Kingston”

“To write out the precepts again, we contend with them, and keep them; we build our humanity, and keep our humanity alive... Thay has named the precepts 'wonderful'... Wonderful because they can protect us, and show us how to live a joyous life, an interesting, adventurous, deep, large life, and how to be with one another, and with animals, plants, and all the Earth and universe. Wonderful because when we practice the precepts, we existentially become humane, we embody loving kindness... Standing in the midst of burning ruins, I was glad that I knew the precepts. Though I kept their tenets imperfectly, even in aspiration I created some invisible good that could not be destroyed... The Five Wonderful Precepts give clear and simple directions to finding that life. In devastation, I have blueprints for making home anew (90-92).--For a Future to Be Possible: Commentaries on the Five Wonderful Precepts”

“How unlike a dead fish a live fish is.”

“...it's the duty of artists to volunteer to do particle counting. Don't leave creation up to the accountants.”

“This is the most important thing about me--I'm a card-carrying reader. All I really want to do is sit and read or lie down and read or eat and read or shit and read. I'm a trained reader. I want a job where I get paid for reading books. And I don't have to make reports on what I read or to apply what I read.”

“Hunger also changes the world—when eating can't be a habit, than neither can seeing.”