[On writing her first poem at age eight:] An ode to my dead mother and father, who were both alive and pretty pissed off.

You end up as you deserve. In old age you must put up with the face, the friends, the health, and the children you have earned.

For many men the denial of dependency on their mother is repeated in their subsequent relationships, sometimes by an absence of any sexual interest in women, sometimes by a pattern of loving and leaving them.

Passionate investment leaves us vulnerable to loss. And sometimes, no matter how clever we are, we must lose.

we love as soon as we learn to distinguish a separate 'you' and 'me.' Love is our attempt to assuage the terror and isolation of that separateness.

A normal adolescent is so restless and twitchy and awkward that he can mange to injure his knee--not playing soccer, not playing football--but by falling off his chair in the middle of French class.

Our early lessons in love and our developmental history shape the expectations we bring into marriage.