If even rock was interesting, if even this ugliness was worth whole shelves at the library, required sophisticated tools to study, and inspired grown men to crack mountains and saw crystals--then what wasn't?

The sensation of writing a book is the sensation of spinning, blinded by love and daring.

Nature seems to exult in abounding radicality, extremism, anarchy. If we were to judge nature by its common sense or likelihood, we wouldn't believe the world existed. In nature, improbabilities are the one stock in trade. The whole creation is one lunatic fringe. ... No claims of any and all revelations could be so far-fetched as a single giraffe.

I work mornings only. I go out to lunch. Afternoons I play with the baby, walk with my husband, or shovel mail.

There were no formerly heroic times, and there was no formerly pure generation. There is no one here but us chickens, and so it has always been.

The dear, stupid body is as easily satisfied as a spaniel.

Divinity is not playful. The universe was not made in jest but in solemn incomprehensibl e earnest. By a power that is unfathomably secret, and holy, and fleet. There is nothing to be done about it, but ignore it, or see.