A child weaned on poison considers harm a comfort.

I've always been partial to the image of liquor as lubrication, a layer of protection from all the sharp thoughts in your head.

There are no really new stories anymore.

Most beautiful, good things were done by women people scorn.

For those who need a name, there's a gift basket of medical terms. All I know is cutting made me feel safe. It was proof. Thoughts and words, captured where I could see them and track them. The truth, stinging, on my skin, in a freakish shorthand. Tell me you're going to the doctor, and I'll want to cut worrisome on my arm. Say you've fallen in love and I buzz the outlines of tragic over my breast. I hadn't necessarily wanted to be cured.

There's a difference between really loving someone and loving the idea of her.

What an indulgence it would be, to just blow off my head, all my mean spirits disappearing with a gun blast, like blowing a seedy dandelion apart.