“My fingers will not type the words "her money became a burden to her" but I do think that her wealth was like a lazy servant — better than nothing but a source of unremitting annoyance because it never filled her most urgent needs.”

“He felt as if his heart had dried up. I needed her he thought. I needed someone like her to fill the void inside me. But I wasn’t able to fill the void inside her. Until the bitter end, the emptiness inside her was hers alone.”

“There is nothing for her beyond those gates," Gavriel said. "Do you think to bring her along like a talisman to remind you of your humanity? Or do you think sharing your damnation will lighten the burden of it?”

“But my body was like a harp and her words and gestures were like fingers running upon the wires.”

“Her lips on his could tell him better than all her stumbling words.”

“The receptionist looked us over, then went back to typing something incredibly urgent—like her résumé́ for another job.”

“I had never spoken to her, except for a few casual words, and yet her name was like a summons to all my foolish blood.”

“The irony of her story is merely that her love became, in the end, her motive rather than her goal, the doorway rather than the house.”

“She was like a drowning person, flailing, reaching for anything that might save her. Her life was an urgent, desperate struggle to justify her life.”

“And may my bronze name / touch always her thousand fingers / grow brighter with her weeping / until I am fixed like a galaxy / and memorized / in her secret and fragile skies.”