For time and eternity there have been fathers like Nathan who simply can see no way to have a daughter but to own her like a plot of land. To work her, plow her under, rain down a dreadful poison upon her. Miraculously, it causes these girls to grow. They elongate on the pale slender stalks of their longing, like sunflowers with heavy heads. You can shield them with your body and soul, trying to absorb that awful rain, but they'll still move toward him. Without cease they'll bend to his light.

Thanks for this day, for all birds safe in their nests, for whatever this is, for life.

There is no perfect time to write. There is only now.

What you lose in blindness is the space around you, the place where you are, and without that you might not exist. You could be nowhere at all.

I'm widest awake as a writer doing something new, engaged in a process I'm not sure I can finish, generating at the edge of my powers. Some people bungee jump; I write.

Memories do not always soften with time; some grow edges like knives.

Nonfiction requires enormous discipline. You construct the terms of your story, and then you stick to them.