“He didnt reckon that God owed him anything. He reckoned that hed had it all, and wasted it. Burning lakes and howling fiends had just never seemed that convincing, perils hardly fit to frighten nau...”

“There was no public to humiliate him here. They already knew he was a lunatic. They expected it. He could burst into howls of insanity, and they would only smile those gentle smiles at him and wres...”

“He put his fist against his chest. Burn, Maddygirl, he said. Then he turned and left her in the flickering gloom and thunder.”

“He lifted his eyes. They were the color of the deepest heart of hurricane clouds, deeper blue than the sky behind him.”

“Was that what she meant? Why she cried? Because he was an animal afraid to leave its cage, no words to say what he thought, no thoughts but muddled mad stupid thoughts?”

“He put his fist against his chest. “Burn, Maddygirl,” he said. Then he turned and left her in the flickering gloom and thunder.”

“There is not a moment in which God does not present Himself under the cover of some pain to be endured, of some consolation to be enjoyed, or of some duty to be performed. All that takes place with...”

“I flopped on the overstuffed kitchen couch and watched him go. I wondered what would happen to all his films and photographs in the upstairs closet - the documentaries on homelessness and drug addi...”

“Wherever you will go, I will let you down, But this lullaby goes on.”

“The only calibration that counts is how much heart people invest, how much they ignore their fears of being hurt or caught out or humiliated. And the only thing people regret is that they didn't li...”

“I wonder if fears ever really go away, or if they just lose their power over us.”

“Fear is all in the mind”

“Nothing forces us to knowWhat we do not want to knowExcept pain”

“Doesn't it seem that it is always by chance that these things happen, or is it because of the generosity of a shared knowledge of suffering that allows for it?”

“Wisdom is not making life any harder than it has to be.”