I love Sylvia Plath and Anne Sexton. I also love more cerebral poets like H.D. and Emily Dickinson. My parents subscribed to a monthly poetry periodical, and as a teenager I was introduced to Denise Levertov, who was an influence.

If Death is your father, you don't ever have to worry about what part of his body the disease will strike next. If Death is your lover, you don't have to be afraid that he will ever leave you.

I dreamed of being a part of the stories—even terrifying one, even horror stories—because at least the girls in stories were alive before they died.

Stories are like genies...They can carry us into and though our sorrows. Sometimes they burn, sometimes they dance, sometimes they weep, sometimes they sing. Like genies, everyone has one. Like genies, sometimes we forget that we do. Our stories can set us free...When we set them free.

Everything was chocolate ice cream and kisses and wind.

Beauty loved him more than anything, her Beast boy, but, secretly, sometimes, she wished he would have remained a Beast.

Once upon a time . . . What time are we upon and where do I belong?