“I held my fingers out to the new day. I that virgin light -- bold strands of pink and orange breaking over the rim of the horizon -- I saw hope, and I wrapped my fingers around that light and brought it to my heart.”

“To live is to hold your child, your own flesh, your very blood, in your arms. To see her smile and wrap five tiny fingers around just one of yours. To live is to hold your wife close to you as you lie in bed and listen to her breathe -- to fall asleep, one against the other, fitted as if you were made for each other, and then awaked in the dawn when she turns to you and whispers your name. To live is to walk your land, knowing every tree and footpath and foxhole, and come home to the smell of a pot of stew, boiling over the fire. Home, wife, children. That is what it is to live.”

“And in that I never saw more truth...than to truly live, was to have something worth dying for.”

“Tomorrow morning we'll rise again, more tired and hungry than we are today, but God willing still alive and whole.”

“Because I think I saw you, yesterday morning when I woke up. I think my eyes worked again, just for a moment, and you were the light I saw.”

“I reach over and stroke her hair. When I do, a few of the strands fall off in my fingers. I pull my hand back and slowly wrap them around my finger as I walk to my room and pick my purple hair clip up off the floor. I open the clip and place the strands of hair inside and snap it shut. I place the clip under my bedroom pillow and I go back to my mother’s room. I slide into the bed beside her and wrap my arms around her. She finds my hand and we interlock fingers as we talk without saying a single word.”

“You go first.Go through the door before me.Enter the limousine while I wait by your side.Enter the shops while I stand behind, guarding your back.Sit at the table before me.Please, sample the tastiest morsels while I sit quietly. My desire is that you go first, in every occasion of earthly life.Only once will I go before you,And that will be at my last moment.For when death claims us, you must go last.Because I can't live one second without you.”