“I followed the trail out of the room, invigorated by the possibility of reinventing my own body. The meaning was mine, as long as I was with those who had the vision and vocabulary to understand my creation.”

“I saw, in gradual vision through my tears,The sweet, sad years, the melancholy years,Those of my own life, who by turns had flungA shadow across me.”

“I had no study in those days, not even a desk or file or bookcase to call mine alone....It might have happened sooner [the writing of work worthy of publication] had I had a room of my own and fewer children, but somehow I doubt it. For as I look back on what I have written, I can see that the very persons who took away my time and space are those who have given me something to say.”

“I would not like it thought that I do not buy my own paperclips, sir. I enjoy owning my own paperclips. It means they are mine.”

“I kissed her salty tears and murmured, murmured I don’t know what. I felt her body straining, straining to meet mine and I felt my own contracting and drawing away and I knew that I had begun the long fall down.”

“I am a man that knows of the possibility of failure. I have suffered defeat. I have created miscalculations. I have even abandoned victory, and fallen in shame. I can claim my arrogance. I can claim my ignorance. I can claim my naiveté. However, the creation of those possibilities were simply due to a lack of understanding of who I was. I have conquered my Id. I have conquered my Ego. I have conquered my Spirituality. I am a man that knows of the possibility of failure, but because I have mastered the principles of nothing, possibility, and uncertainty, failure simply tags along with me, unable to grasp my glory.”