"

People read books to escape the uncertainties of life.

"

People love to read about sins and errors, but not their own.

"

People ask without wanting to know.

"

The very least you can do in your life is to figure out what you hope for. And the most you can do is live inside that hope. Not admire it from a dist...more

"

What I want is so simple I almost can't say it: elementary kindness.

"

The flowers were beaten down, their bent-over heads bejeweled with diamond droplets like earring on sad, rich widows

"

The tunnel of winter had settled over our lives, ushered in by that great official Hoodwink, the end of daylight saving time. Personally I would vote ...more

"

Mistakes wreck your life. But they make what you have. It's kind of all one. You know what Hester told me when we were working the sheep one time? She...more

"

In my own worst seasons I've come back from the colorless world of despair by forcing myself to look hard, for a long time, at a single glorious thing...more

"

I do understand that they fall when I'm least able to pay attention because poems fall not from a tree, really, but from the richly pollinated boughs ...more

"

It's the same struggle for each of us, and the same path out: the utterly simple, infinitely wise ultimately defiant act of loving one thing and then ...more

"

Misunderstanding is my cornerstone. It's everyone's, come to think of it. Illusions mistaken for truth are the pavement under our feet.

"

Listen: being dead is not worse than being alive. It is different though. You could say the view is larger.

"

Don’t try to make life a mathematics problem with yourself in the center and everything coming out equal. When you’re good, bad things can still happe...more

"

To live is to change, to acquire the words of a story, and that is the only celebration we mortals really know.