Eating plain toast will detonate her. "I'll have some honey." When the bread is done I scrape on a microscopic layer of it and pour a cup of coffee, black. She pretends not to listen or watch as I crunch through my breakfast. I pretend that I don't notice her pretending.

There is nothing wrong with me. These are really sick people, sick that you can see.

I am learning how to be angry and sad and lonely and joyful and excited and afraid and happy.

Censorship is the child of fear and the father of ignorance.

I am the space between my thighs, daylight shining through.

Melancholy held me hostage, and the bees built a hive of sadness in my soul.

Censoring books that deal with difficult, adolescent issues does not protect anybody. Quite the opposite. It leaves kids in the darkness and makes them vulnerable. Censorship is the child of fear and the father of ignorance. Our children cannot afford to have the truth of the world withheld from them