“It’s been raining outside and I feel like a sad poet, hating my imagination pissing on the roof.”

“It’s so difficult to describe depression to someone who’s never been there, because it’s not sadness. I know sadness. Sadness is to cry and to feel. But it’s that cold absence of feeling— that really hollowed-out feeling.”

“I’ve been an outsider all my life. It’s been kind of hard, but I like that way of living.”

“It’s a strange feeling, I thought, like my bones are walking along with me on the outside of my body.”

“A poet is someone who stands outside in the rain hoping to be struck by lightening.”

“In the afternoon dark clouds suddenly color the sky a mysterious shade and it starts raining hard, pounding the roof and windows of the cabin. I strip naked and run outside, washing my face with soap and scrubbing myself all over. It feels wonderful. In my joy I shut my eyes and shout out meaningless words as the large raindrops strike me on the cheeks, the eyelids, chest, side, penis, legs, and butt - the stinging pain like a religious initiation or something. Along with the pain there's a feeling of closeness, like for once in my life the world's treating me fairly. I feel elated, as if all of a sudden I've been set free. I face the sky, hands held wide apart, open my mouth wide, and gulp down the falling rain.”