Explanation is not half as strong as experience but experience is not half as strong as experience and understanding

Because the enormous narcissism of their parents deprived Will and Tom of suitable role models, both brothers learned to identify with absence. Consequently, even if something beneficial fortuitously entered their lives they immediately treated it as temporary. By the time they were teenagers they were already accustomed to a discontinuous lifestyle marked by constant threats of abandonment and the lack of any emotional stability. Unfortunately, "accustomed to" here is really synonymous with "damaged by.

Back on shore everyone was pretty messed up, but the owner/captain was by far the worst off. He ended up drunk for a week, though the only thing he ever said was "So?" The boat's gone. "So?" Your mate's dead. "So?" Hey at least you're alive. "So?" An awful word but it does harden you. It hardened me.

I still get nightmares. In fact, I get them so often I should be used to them by now. I'm not. No one ever really gets used to nightmares.

Have no fear, you will find your way. It's in your bones. It's in your soul.

Very soon he will vanish completely in the wings of his own wordless stanza. [ ] but his stanza is not completely empty [ * ]

Here then at long last is my darkness. No cry of light, no glimmer, not even the faintest shard of hope to break free across the hold.