I Think I Would Have Died If

She Got A Reputation For An Easy Smile And A Sharp Tongue, And Using One To Balance The Other, She Seemed Friendly But Distant

Beauty Is A Hard Thing. Beauty Is A Mean Story. Beauty Is Slender Girls Who Die Young, Fine-featured Delicate Creatures About Whom Men Write Poems. Beauty, My First Girlfriend Said To Me, Is That Inner Quality Often Associated With Great Amounts Of Leisure Time. And I Loved Her For That.

I Did Not Begin With Craft, I Began With Strong Feelings And Worked Toward Craft.

If I Could Have Found What I Needed At Thirteen, I Would Not Have Lost So Much Of My Life Chasing Vindication Or Death. Give Some Child, Some Thirteen-year Old, The Hope Of The Remade Life. Tell The Truth. Write The Story That You Were Always Afraid To Tell. I Swear To You There Is Magic In It.

I Think I Would Have Died If There Hadn't Been The Women's Movement. It Gave Me A Vision That I Could Do Something Different, And It Gave Me An Understanding That I Wasn't A Monster, Or Sport, Or A Betrayer Of My Family.