He is careful of what he reads, for that is what he will write. He is careful of what he learns, for that is what he will know.

Like everyone in his right mind, I feared Santa Claus.

You empty yourself and wait, listening. After a time you hear it: There is nothing there...You feel the world's word as a tension, a hum, a single chorused note everywhere the same. This is it: This hum is the silence.

Who and of what import were the men whose bones bulk the Great Wall, the thirty million Mao starved, or the thirty million children not yet five who die each year now? Why, they are the insignificant others, of course; living or dead, they are just some of the plentiful others...And you? To what end were we billions of oddballs born?

Write about winter in the summer.

I breathed the air of history all unaware, and walked oblivious through its littered layers.

Hone and spread your spirit till you yourself are a sail, whetted, translucent, broadside to the merest puff.