I'm Not First And Foremost

Journalism Taught Me How To Write A Sentence That Would Make Someone Want To Read The Next One. You Are Trained To Get Rid Of Anything Nonessential. You Go In, You Start Writing Your Article, Assuming A Person's Going To Stop Reading The Minute You Give Them A Reason. So The Trick Is: Don't Give Them One.

Maybe This Is Not A Come-down-from-the-ledge Story. But I Tell It With The Thought That The Woman On The Ledge Will Ask Herself A Question, The Question That Occurred To That Man In Bogota. He Wondered How We Know That What Happens To Us Isn't Good?

Wear Your Heart On The Page, And People Will Read To Find Out How You Solved Being Alive.

I Had A Mother I Could Only Seem To Please With Verbal Accomplishments Of Some Sort Or Another. She Read Constantly, So I Read Constantly. If I Used Words That Might Have Seemed Surprising At A Young Age, She Would Recognize That And It Would Please Her.

I Moved Through The Days Like A Severed Head That Finishes A Sentence.