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““Love is a stream of water,” says Ask. “It can erode a mountain into grains of sand. But a stream of water is also easily broken. Don’t take love for granted.” Linda tries to perceive the wisdom of this. But love can be taken in so many ways, too, and she is thinking not of the passion of a woman for her man but of the bond between a mother and her daughter left behind.”

“Carmen reached out and tucked back a strand of Nina’s hair. The dachshund had ears like heavy silk. Everything in Carmen’s life had slowed down all of a sudden in the presence of this small child. She saw water lapping the sides of the Espinas’ tub, spilling onto the tiled floor, and slipping into the basement through imperceptible cracks. She felt it moving in currents above Danny’s apartment…”

“She calls him honey. He calls her hey. Her voice is a lynx coat. His hands go to his pockets. She murmurs into his hair. Rainey watches like she knows them. The wife glances at Rainey and Rainey smiles at her, a slowball smile that says, There is no house I can’t break into.

She can’t wait to tell Tina: My God, it was like the first kiss ever. It was like we had the same mouth.”

“Rainey takes Howard’s bomber jacket off a hook in the foyer. Her father is now tearing his hair over the piano damage. In his jacket pockets are Kools and a yellow BIC lighter, keys, and a bunch of bills. Jammed in a sleeve is a thrift-shop ruby cashmere scarf, a gift from Rainey’s mother. This jacket could nurture her for days.”

“King Jupiter whips his hand up as if to slap Rainey’s face, then freezes it inches from her skin. But Rainey doesn’t blink. She picks her father’s pack of Kools from the mess on the rug and lights one. Two things make her proud in this world: what she achieves, which is her art, and what she denies to others, which is satisfaction. She’s not giving him a damn thing.”

“His gaze slid over to her. A bridge formed between them, gold and silver strands shining in the watery sun. He looked older than her by at least several years. He would be skipping class too…He did not take his eyes off her. She tipped her head and smiled down at him. After a moment, he …ambled up the steps slowly till he reached her. The silvery bridge collapsed into thin air. They did not need it anymore.”

“Linda looked into her own clasped hands and understood that a normal mother would race into the burning building and save her daughter’s life. Your words reverberate in the cracked vase of my heart, she would say. I will stay.

In the bathroom that day, only Gordy had thought to ask about Linda’s wish. I wish her beauty, said Linda, and in a voice harder than she knew she had: I want her armed.”

She was just standing there, but she had a fearsome way of just standing there, like a snake gliding up a pole. His mother was right: Something had turned her into a woman. And however he might squeeze his uncle’s hand back, he was going to remain a stalk of wheat. Wheat was the third-largest crop in the United States. He would always look like a stalk of wheat.

“And you always put her in something nice,” says Mr. Kleid. “Those lavender underthings. Pretty.” She knows from the magazines and from her sister that a man wants his wife dressed up that way, and so she always slips Mrs. Kleid’s stockinged feet into high heels that make her slim ankles look pert. But what about the bruises inside Mrs. Kleid’s pale, slender thighs? What do the magazines say about those?

Soberly, she kissed her index fingertip and pressed it to his mouth, a gesture that seemed designed to seal his silence. Then she stepped out of his mother’s robe and hung it back on the bedpost. He could not look directly at her, lest it blind him, yet he saw that her garters dangled, bereft of nylons, and her skin was the glass of milk he drank that morning, the curves of her hips the mountain-pass switchbacks…

Place my bones in a hollow tree
to be a bird’s nest foundation.
Writing this brings me close to animals,
and the rote animal in me that is afraid.
It’s good to say blunt things.
It’s ok to die at times—

“The universe does not have or need a mind,
but it should grow a mouth,
since I would like its voice
to shake the fluid in my cochleae
and ruffle tiny cilia.”

“I am writing the poem to be my parents now, because I give birth to it.
I use metaphors so they fail,
use writing as glasses,
use people as examples of symptoms,
and I’m dying of life,
but Mommy gave birth so she could be seen.
I came out of the womb with a job I can’t quit.”

“But some say translation is love.
Maybe, like love, it has to be secured in vast insecurity.

We feel at home being stuck in (not out of) translation.
A desire to mean might be a desire to feel—
on and off what touched.”

OK, I like the book, but this guy is super confused. The Finger Lakes are in New York. There are no mountains in Kansas. And there are no mountains tall enough to have snow on them in Missouri. I wish he had done more research. He makes Missouri sound like a fairy tale land and trust me, it’s not. Also, this was supposed to have Route 66 in it somewhere??

It is the month of long reads y’all. At this point in March I was at over 20 books - right now I’m at 13 and I’m in the middle of a 600 pager. I still feel behind!

WOW THIS IS GOOD!!