My mother's last word to me clanks inside me like an iron bell that someone beats at dinnertime: love, love, love, love, love.

...the other half of rising—the very half that makes rising necessary—is having been nailed to the cross.

"The Dream of a Common Language" by Adrienne Rich. I carried it the entire hike. On my first night, when I felt like I was in too deep, I read the first poem out loud to myself over and over.

I didn't feel sad or happy. I didn't feel proud or ashamed. I only felt that in spite of all the things I'd done wrong, in getting myself here, I'd done right.

Music. I could not go without that. My mind would not let me be without music. I hiked the trail in 1995 - before there were iPods or music on our cell phones or even cell phones. So I was truly out there with just my thoughts. After a few days there was a continuous loop of songs playing silently in my mind.

I really came to literature through poetry.

Be about ten times more magnanimous than you believe yourself capable of. Your life will be a hundred times better for it.