“Sometimes all I want is to be a few inches taller so the world does not look like a dense collection of torsos.”

It’s strange how a word, a phrase, a sentence, can feel like a blow to the head.

I feel the monster of grief again, writhing in the empty space where my heart and stomach used to be.

If I let a little of the emotion out, all of it will come out, and it will never end.

Sorry, am I being rude?” she asks. “I’m used to saying whatever is on my mind.

Dauntless: being brave in the midst of fear.

All I can do is stand still- I feel like if I just stand still, I can stop it from being true, I can pretend that everything is all right.

Killing you is not the worst thing they can do to you,” I say. “Controlling you is.

But when a book comes out, it’s just hundreds of opinions and you have to learn to separate out the ones you want to listen to or figure out many you want to listen to.

My mother knit scarves for the neighborhood kids. My father helped Caleb with his homework. There was a fire in the fireplace and peace in my heart, as I was doing exactly what I was supposed to be doing, and everything was quiet.

We believe in shouting for those who can only whisper, in defending those who cannot defend themselves.

There are so many ways to be brave in this world.

I feel like myself, strong and weak at once – allowed, at least for a little while, to be both.

I think they’re going to force us to eat lots of cake and then take an unreasonably long nap.

Not writing is as important as writing – go out into the world and remember how interesting it, and the people in it, are.

To find that place between what I want and what I think is wise.

I watch her blond head until it disappears around the bend, and I feel bare, like there’s nothing left to protect me against pain. Her absence stings worst of all.

In love, unlike most other passions, the recollection of what you have had and lost is always better than what you can hope for in the future.

If I have a collection of songs for an EP or mixtape, I create the narrative afterwards; but usually with an album, I have a concept and the name first.

We are carrying collectively a lot of trauma, especially those of us in the African-American community. And if we’re not careful, it’ll overtake us, and we’ll self-destruct.

I had a guitar when I was 6 or 7, a plastic guitar with the Beatles’ faces on it. It would be a collector’s item now. It would fetch a hefty sum, I imagine.

At Age 11, I used to listen to Madonna’s Immaculate Collection every day

When I’m lying in bed I think about the next collection. That makes me sound insane, doesn’t it? That I’m getting into bed with David Beckham and thinking about clothes.

She was only a collection of flaws and she was beautiful.

You are not your bank account, or your ambitiousness. You’re not the cold clay lump with a big belly you leave behind when you die. You’re not your collection of walking personality disorders. You are spirit, you are love.