I don't have a copy of my books, and the degree to which I never read them is profound. I never look.

The failures of other genres to provide an emotional connection with some of their characters and narratives gives memoir a toehold.

In my godless household, poems were the closest we came to sacred speech -- the only prayers said.

The words and sentences you take into your body from books are no less sacred and healing than communion. Surely at least one such person lives in your zip code.

When I got sober, I thought giving up was saying goodbye to all the fun and all the sparkle, and it turned out to be just the opposite. That's when the sparkle started for me.

When people suffer, their relationships usually suffer as well. Period. And we all suffer because, as the Buddha says, that's the nature of being human and wanting stuff we don't always get.

I believe in God, but even if you don't, you can believe in a self, the person who is innately who you are. Once you fully become that person, then everything you do will be blessed.