If I canot know your name, may I light a lamp so I can see your face?' If you sould ever see my face, you will lose me forever.' Why?' Psyche wanted to know. 'Are you ugly? Are you afraid I won't love you if I see your face?' Perhaps I am afraid that if you see my face, it will be THAT that you will love and not me.' I understand, believe me. I know what that feels like.

...part of the mind's job was to cast doubt on what the heart knew to be true, and the heart, because it had no words, often lost the argument

The young accept the extraordinary as normal because they do not compare their lives with those of others when everyone is like them.

But there are times when a tree can no longer withstand the pain inflicted on it, and the wind will take pity on that tree and topple it over in a mighty storm. All the other trees who witnessed the evil look down upon the fallen tree with envy. They pray for the day when a wind will end their suffering. I pray for the day when God will end mine.

Some wounds go so deep that you don't even feel them until months, maybe years, later.

To write and not tell the truth? That would be death for any writer. But more, it would be death to the imagination. And if the imagination dies, what would happen to the souls of children?

Goodness was not a trait you acquired; it was a value you practiced when you were on the verge of doing evil.