Derek Yang

“From time to time, as he walks, he emits quite loud, prolonged farts.”
― Christopher Isherwood

“And now that you don't have to be perfect, you can be good.”
― John Steinbeck, East of Eden

“Empathy is easier when it comes to concrete particulars. I can't imagine being in prison, but I can imagine choosing a snack.”
― Leslie Jamison, The Empathy Exams: Essays

“Do you know what a poem is, Esther?'
No, what?' I would say.
A piece of dust.'
Then, just as he was smiling and starting to look proud, I would say, 'So are the cadavers you cut up. So are the people you think you're curing. They're dust as dust as dust. I reckon a good poem lasts a whole lot longer than a hundred of those people put together.'
And of course Buddy wouldn't have any answer to that, because what I said was true. People were made of nothing so much as dust, and I couldn't see that doctoring all that dust was a bit better than writing poems people would remember and repeat to themselves when they were unhappy or sick or couldn't sleep.”
― Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar