“DEPARTUREThe horizon slopes away The days are longer Trip A heart hops in a cage A bird sings It is going to die Another door is going to open At the end of the corridor Where a star Begins to shine A dark-haired woman The lantern of the departing train("Departure")”

“My Solitude is my Treasure, the best thing I have. I hesitate to go out. If you opened the little gate, I would not hop away—but oh how I sing in my gold cage.”

“But, in her life, nothing was going to happen. Such was the will of God! The future was a dark corridor, and at the far end the door was bolted.”

“Islam was like a mental cage. At first, when you open the door, the caged bird stays inside: it is frightened. It has internalized its imprisonment. It takes time for bird to escape, even after someone has opened the doors to its cage.”

“Some birds are not meant to be caged, that's all. Their feathers are too bright, their songs too sweet and wild. So you let them go, or when you open the cage to feed them they somehow fly out past you. And the part of you that knows it was wrong to imprison them in the first place rejoices, but still, the place where you live is that much more drab and empty for their departure.”

“FLIGHT OF FOLLY. WOMAN TRAPPED IN CAGE OF OPEN DOORS.”