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“I feel naked in my Tommy hoodie and Victoria's Secret sweatpants with PINK written across the ass. The sweatpants aren't pink though - they're gray. This always confuses me when I put them on, because shouldn't they say GRAY - on the backside? Maybe Victoria's secret is she's colorblind.”
― Fanny Merkin, Fifty Shames of Earl Grey

“An attractive blonde behind the receptionist's desk smiles at me as I walk in. I assume she’s the receptionist, because I can’t think of any other reason she would be sitting behind the receptionist’s desk. Unless maybe she’s filling in for the real receptionist, who could be on her lunch break. But then I remember: it’s almost two, and I doubt anyone takes their lunch breaks that late. So this must be the actual receptionist.”
― Fanny Merkin, Fifty Shames of Earl Grey

“Nature is a haunted house--but Art--is a house that tries to be haunted.”
― Emily Dickinson, The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson

“oxygen

Everything needs it: bone, muscles, and even,
while it calls the earth its home, the soul.
So the merciful, noisy machine

stands in our house working away in its
lung-like voice. I hear it as I kneel
before the fire, stirring with a

stick of iron, letting the logs
lie more loosely. You, in the upstairs room,
are in your usual position, leaning on your

right shoulder which aches
all day. You are breathing
patiently; it is a

beautiful sound. It is
your life, which is so close
to my own that I would not know

where to drop the knife of
separation. And what does this have to do
with love, except

everything? Now the fire rises
and offers a dozen, singing, deep-red
roses of flame. Then it settles

to quietude, or maybe gratitude, as it feeds
as we all do, as we must, upon the invisible gift:
our purest, sweet necessity: the air.”
― Mary Oliver, Thirst