Walk on air against your better judgement.

No bit of the natural world is more valuable or more vulnerable than the tree bit. Nothing is more like ourselves, standing upright, caught between heaven and earth, frail at the extremities, yet strong at the central trunk, and nothing is closer to us at the beginning and at the end, providing the timber boards that frame both the cradle and the coffin.

The appointment [in Harvard] gave me economic safety, writerly support, and intellectual self-respectplus eight months to myself every year.

Whether it be a matter of personal relations within a marriage or political initiatives within a peace process, there is no sure-fire do-it-yourself kit.

Harvard created wonderful conditions for me as a writerbut the writing was done, almost entirely, when I got home.

Allow ourselves to do as Ram Dass said in his delicious phrase "Be Here Now." If you are here now you cannot fall into falsely constructed gender projections.

Harvard meant a lot in my writing life from the beginning, even though I didnt actually do much composition on the spot.