The Truth Came Slowly Like A Story

It Was Hard To Reassure Grown-ups When You Weren't Certain Yourself What You Were Feeling And Thinking—when Thoughts Dissolved Before You Could Name Them.

When You Read To A Child, When You Put A Book In A Child's Hands, You Are Bringing That Child News Of The Infinitely Varied Nature Of Life. You Are An Awakener.

Labels Not Only Free Us From The Obligation To Think Creatively; They Numb Our Sensibilities, Our Power To Feel. During The Vietnam War, The Phrase Body Count Entered Our Vocabulary. It Is An Ambiguous Phrase, Inorganic, Even Faintly Sporty. It Distanced Us From The Painful Reality Of Corpses, Of Dead, Mutilated People.

My Life Was Incoherent To Me. I Felt It Quivering, Spitting Out Broken Teeth.

And What Movies We Saw! All The Actors And Actresses Whose Photographs I Collected, With Their Look Of Eternity! Their Radiance, Their Eyes, Their Faces, Their Voices, The Suavity Of Their Movements! Their Clothes! Even In Prison Movies, The Stars Shone In Their Prison Clothes As If Tailors Had Accompanied Them In Their Downfall.