“You dont look like anyone special at all, I tell him. And I curse him. And I start a club to hate him. And I make a magic spell to get rid of him.”

“The thing I've learned is that thinking is not writing.”

“Toy is talking and this is why I love her. She can go on about herself ceaselessly and like the scratching of a branch against the window at night, the steady insistence of it is comforting. She ha...”

“In the tell-me-again times, () when my mom and I lived in a little apartment in a little building downtown, I slept in her bed. It was a raft on the ocean, a cloud, a forest, a spaceship, a cocoon ...”

“And the stories we tell ourselves are not the only stories.”

“I want to go back to the tell-me-again times when I slept in her bed and we were everything together. When I was everything to her. Everything she needed.”

“But youre out of another world old kid You ought to live on top of the Woolworth Building in an apartment made of cutglass and cherry blossoms.”

“[Poem: Slates of Grey]Sullen faces like slates of greyWhat Id seen on a walk today.Bodies rushing bodies boltingTime for life a disregarding.Money to make and to grow oldWhat about the hands to hol...”

“I would describe the distinction between city and landscape like this: cities tend to excite and agitate me; they make me feel big or small, self-confident, proud, curious, excited, tense, annoyed....”

“it's something rebellious about picking up and leaving buying a one way ticket and not knowing when you want to return.”

“You have a lot to explore beyond this cottage if you want to know everything about the world. Explore until your heart is full, Belle. And then explore some more.”

“I can speak to my soul only when the two of us are off exploring deserts or cities or mountains or roads.”

“That you exist this way, Zoe, you're the ultimate proof that we can be so much more than just the sum of our parts and knee-jerk impulses. Something about you just could not be controlled, just had...”