“The advantage of being married a long time was that one could argue without the necessity of the other's actual, physical presence.”

“It's not that [writers] are pompous jerks. We are insecure. We feel like we're fading away in this vast sea of scriveners.”

“There is a time and a place for everything. The key is being in the right place at the right time.”

“Jesus is compelling in the way the discovery of the stars or the experience of a one-of-a-kind romance is compelling. His presence draws you in to the deep.”

“That moment she was mine, mine, fair,Perfectly pure and good: I foundA thing to do, and all her hairIn one long yellow string I woundThree times her little throat around,And strangled her. No pain felt she;I am quite sure she felt no pain.As a shut bud that holds a bee,I warily oped her lids: againLaughed the blue eyes without a stain.And I untightened the next tressAbout her neck; her cheek once moreBlushed bright beneath my burning kiss . . .”

“I shut my eyes and turned them on my heart, As a man calls for wine before he fights, I asked one draught of earlier, happier sights, Ere fitly I could hope to play my part. Think first, fight afterwards, the soldier’s art: One taste of the old time sets all to rights.”

“One taste of the old time sets all to rights.”