Every novel is-at the beginning-the same opening of a door onto a completely unknown space.

You think I'm not a goddess? Try me. This is a torch song. Touch me and you'll burn.

Now I can see how that can happen. You can fall in love with anybody--a fool, a criminal, a nothing. There are no good rules.

The problem is huge. We've just added seventy-five million people to the already large proportion of people in the world who are malnourished all the time, whose bodies are being starved.

Water does not resist. Water flows. When you plunge your hand into it, all you feel is a caress.

What is it the I'll want from you? Not love: that would be too much to ask. Not forgiveness, which isn't yours to bestow. Only a listener, perhaps; only someone who will see me. Don't prettify me though, whatever else you do: I have no wish to be a decorated skull. But I leave myself in your hands. What choice do I have? By the time you read this last page, that- if anywhere- is the only place I will be.

Screw poetry, it’s you I want, your taste, rain on you, mouth on your skin.