Part of you died each year when the leaves fell from the trees and their branches were bare against the wind and the cold, wintry light.

Clearly I miss Him, having been brought up in religion. But now a man must be responsible to himself.

I kissed her hard and held her tight and tried to open her lips; they were closed tight.

For what are we born if not to aid one another?

Write drunk; edit sober.

You know that fiction, prose rather, is possibly the roughest trade of all in writing. You do not have the reference, the old important reference. You have the sheet of blank paper, the pencil, and the obligation to invent truer than things can be true. You have to take what is not palpable and make it completely palpable and also have it seem normal and so that it can become a part of experience of the person who reads it.

Defense is the stronger form with the negative object, and attack the weaker form with the positive object.