I have a very sensitive nose. I identify with dogs. I understand the world through my nose.

This is the sad bed of chosen chastity because you are miles and mountains away.

Sex just as a drive, as a hormonal drive, is not very interesting.

the body is wiser than its inhabitants. the body is the soul. the body is god’s messenger.

I stand in the mist and cry, thinking of myself standing in the mist and crying, and wondering if I will ever be able to use this experience in a book.

As women, we can't look old. We can't be fat. We're supposed to look like the 14-year-old models in Vogue, who are younger and younger and skinnier and skinnier, and they are air-brushed and contoured and Photoshopped.

Anybody who instantly goes from being a poet and a graduate student to being a public figure has to be in a state of shock. First people want to praise you, and then they want to attack you. No one can prepare you for it.