Every time someone forgets, someone else disappears,' my brother wrote.

Still anyone who trusts a serpent deserves its bite. The wise see a creature for what it is, not what it says it may be.

Others said May was best, that sweet green time when lilacs bloomed and gardens along Main Street were filled with sugary pink peonies and Dutch tulips.

This was what it meant to be human, to know that time moved and all things changed.

Never look at other people's bad fortune,' my mother said. 'If you do, it will come back to find you instead of its rightful owner.

The voice that arises out of the silence is something no one can imagine until it is heard. It roars when it speaks, it lies to you and convinces you, it steals from you and leaves you without a single word of comfort.

I just finished Colson Whitehead's "The Underground Railroad," which I think is a work of genius.