There's no way to know what makes one thing happen and not another. What leads to what. What destroys what. What causes what to flourish or die or take another course.

I think being a woman alone enhanced the impulse in others to be generous. What we're told is that to be a woman alone is to be in a dangerous situation. The message is that people are gong to prey on you and do bad things to you. That may be true in some cases, but what I experienced was the other case.

Nobody will protect you from your suffering. You can't cry it away or eat it away or starve it away or walk it away or punch it away or even therapy it away. It's just there, and you have to survive it. You have to endure it. You have to live through it and love it and move on and be better for it and run as far as you can in the direction of your best and happiest dreams across the bridge that was built by your own desire to heal.

The universe, I'd learned, was never, ever kidding. It would take whatever it wanted and it would never give it back.

It's a long life, sweetheart, and time heals all wounds.

Can I convince the person about whom I'm crazy to be crazy about me? The short answer is no. The long answer is no.

Every time I read Erin Belieu work I'm pierced in that wonderful way poetry can.