“From life, from the apple cut by the flaming knife, what grain will be saved? My son, believe me, nothing remains, Only adult toil, the furrow of fate in the palm. Only toil, Nothing more.”

All was taken away from you: white dresses, wings, even existence.

For a country without a past is nothing, a word That, hardly spoken, loses its meaning, A perishable wall destroyed by flame, An echo of animal emotions.

The revolt against one’s environment is usually ‘shame’ of one’s environment.

The purpose of poetry is to remind us how difficult it is to remain just one person, for our house is open, there are no keys in the doors, and invisible guests come in and out at will.

I liked beaches, swimming pools, and clinics for there they were the bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh. I pitied them and myself, but this will not protect me. The word and the thought are over.

I have no wisdom, no skills, and no faith but I received strength, it tears the world apart. I shall break, a heavy wave, against its shores and a young wave will cover my trace.

You who think of us: they lived only in delusion, Know that we the People of the Book, will never die!

Poetry is news brought to the mountains by a unicorn and an echo.

The living owe it to those who no longer can speak to tell their story for them.

At every sunrise I renounce the doubts of night and greet the new day of a most precious delusion.

I am composed of contradictions, which is why poetry is a better form for me than philosophy.

And if there is no lining to the world? If a thrush on a branch is not a sign, But just a thrush on the branch? If night and day Make no sense following each other?

The purpose of poetry is to remind us / how difficult it is to remain just one person.

Yet falling in love is not the same as being able to love.

Consolation Calm down. Both your sins and your good deeds will be lost in oblivion.

When a writer is born into a family, the family is finished.

Most people in the West who say they believe in God actually believe in belief in God.

So there’s nothing more vulgar than the sound of someone saying, God Bless America, someone who doesn’t really believe it, but he thinks it will make him look good to other people. I think it’s the most nauseating spectacle.

I’m an atheist, and that’s it. I believe there’s nothing we can know except that we should be kind to each other and do what we can for people.

I don’t believe in sort of holding back, you know, life isn’t a dress rehearsal!

My style kind of differs – sometimes I want to be a little dressed down, a little tomboy, sometimes I want to be dressed up and very chic and look proper. But I don’t ever believe in overdoing it for day-to-day style.

This is the true horror of religion. It allows perfectly decent and sane people to believe by the billions, what only lunatics could believe on their own.

If you believe in justice, surely you believe in the hereafter, because this world is not just.

I believe passionately that everyone has a particular God-given ability.