Out of the woman's great brown breast the milk gushed forth for the child, milk as white as snow, and when the child suckled at the one breast it flowed like a fountain from the other, ans she let it flow. There was more than enough for the child, gr...
Yet I am incapable of writing the only kind of novel which interests me: a book powered with an intellectual or moral passion strong enough to create order, to create a new way of looking at life. It is because I am too diffused. I have decided never...
I couldn't believe his arrogance. I turned away hoping to ignore him enough so he'd just leave. "Just give me five minutes," came Flynn's muffled voice through the closed window. I ignored him. He'd caused me way too much trouble. "Mercy, just crack ...
They say a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. I took mine and fell flat on my face. As a young woman, I dreamed of changing the world. In my twenties, I went to africa to try and save the continent, only to learn that Africans nei...
Just because something doesn’t go as planned, doesn’t mean it wasn’t worth your while. Sometimes you have to fall forward, by learning what doesn’t work, to discover what does. Sometimes you have to get knocked down lower than ever before, so...
He looked her over with blatant intent, his gaze containing an edge that had her swallowing hard before she could stop herself. "Do you know what I think?" he said at last. "I live to hear such things." He stepped forward, only a handful of steps, bu...
He pressed bravely ahead with his story, the outlines and preliminary versions of which by now filled two thick notebooks, reorganizing, redrafting, and obsessively re-polishing lines and paragraphs with a jeweler's precision. But it was not good eno...
In fact no one recognizes the happiest moment of their lives as they are living it. It may well be that, in a moment of joy, one might sincerely believe that they are living that golden instant "now," even having lived such a moment before, but whate...
I felt the familiar warm tingling at the center of my chest and had just enough time to gasp as some invisible hand yanked me forward, smacking my forehead against the dashboard with enough force to stun me dumb. Chubs slammed on the brakes, forcing ...
Mama, I know you used to ride the bus. Riding the bus and it’s hot and bumpy and crowded and too noisy and more than anything in the world you want to get off and the only reason in the world you don’t get off is it’s still fifty blocks from wh...
Does affirmative action place minority students in colleges where they're likely to fail while depriving other applicants of the chance to attend the most challenging schools where they are capable of succeeding? Does rent control drive up the cost o...
When Isaiah predicted that spears would become pruning hooks, that's a reference to cultivating. Pruning and trimming and growing and paying close attention to the plants and whether they're getting enough water and if their roots are deep enough. So...
Relativism poses as humble by saying: “We are not smart enough to know what the truth is—or if there is any universal truth.” It sounds humble. But look carefully at what is happening. It’s like a servant saying: I am not smart enough to know...
If [the loss of fertility of the soil and the loss of soil as a renewable resource] does happen, we are familiar enough with the nature of American salesmanship to know that it will be done in the name of the starving millions, in the name of liberty...
That wasn't enough. They weren't enough. Nor, she soon realized, was Will, though by every rational measure he ought to have been. ... He became ardent, spoke of love, hinted at marriage. She stilled his roving hands and deflected his near-proposals....
He was in Guanajuato, Mexico, he was a writer, and tonight was the Day of the Dead ceremony. He was in a little room on the second floor of a hotel, a room with wide windows and a balcony that overlooked the plaza where the children ran and yelled ea...
With me, the present is forever, and forever is always shifting, flowing, melting. This second is life. And when it is gone it is dead. But you can’t start over with each new second. You have to judge by what is dead. It’s like quicksand … hope...
Not enough info makes for a lot of dead cats." "Dead cats?" "You know, 'Curiosity killed the cat.' And I have enough curiosity to start a feline genocide." "Feline genocide?" "Yeah. If you don't explain Apollo, the cat kingdom will crumble. Cats all ...
All sorrows in life stem from the lack of cake. If you had your own cake, you wouldn't bother trying to take away the other person's cake! And, if the cake you had were beautiful enough, you wouldn't bother trying to melt the icing on that other pers...
In order for your wit to be appreciated, the people around you need to be witty, too. In order for your lightness of being to be appreciated, those around you must be vibrating towards the same weightlessness. In order for your beauty to be appreciat...
..But for long years we healers have only sought to patch the rents made by the men of swords. Though we should still have enough to do without them: the world is full enough of hurts and mischances without wars to multiply them.' 'It needs but one f...
