Background Image

...

Additionally, Liesl And Po Is The Embodiment Of What Writing Has Always Been For Me At Its Purest And Most Basic--not A Paycheck, Certainly; Not An Idea, Even; And Not An Escape. Actually, It Is The Opposite Of An Escape; It Is A Way Back In, A Way To Enter And Make Sense Of A World That Occasionally Seems Harsh And Terrible And Mystifying. (from The "author's Note" At The End).

-Lauren Oliver

...

Please Wait....
Translating....

Additionally, Liesl And Po

Lauren Oliver

...

Additionally, Liesl And Po Is The Embodiment Of What Writing Has Always Been For Me At Its Purest And Most Basic--not A Paycheck, Certainly; Not An Idea, Even; And Not An Escape. Actually, It Is The Opposite Of An Escape; It Is A Way Back In, A Way To Enter And Make Sense Of A World That Occasionally Seems Harsh And Terrible And Mystifying. (from The "author's Note" At The End).

Views: 8

Topic

More From Lauren Oliver

Even The Greatest Movements On Earth, Have Their Beginnings With Something Small.

Time Becomes A Stutter-the Space Between Drumbeats, Splintered Into Fragments, And Also Endlessly Long, As Long As Soaring Guitar Notes That Melt Into One Another, As Full As The Dark Mass Of Bodies Around Me. I Feel Like The Air Downstairs Has Gone To Liquid, To Sweat And Smell And Sound, And I Have Broken Apart In It. I Am Wave: I Am Pulled Into The Everything. I Am Energy And Noise And A Heartbeat Going Boom, Boom, Boom, Echoing The Drums.

They Told Us Love Was A Disease. They Told Us It Would Kill Us In The End. For The Very First Time I Realize, That This, Too, Might Also Be A Lie.

You Can't Be Happy Unless You're Unhappy Sometimes".

I Was Glad When The Invalids Were Executed

It's The Rule Of The Wilds. You Must Be Bigger, And Stronger, And Tougher. A Coldness Radiates Through Me, A Solid Wall That Is Growing, Piece By Piece, In My Chest. He Doesn't Love Me. He Never Loved Me. It Was All A Lie. "the Old Lena Is Dead." I Say, And Then Push Past Him. Each Step Is More Difficult Than The Last; The Heaviness Fills Me And Turns My Limbs To Stone. You Must Hurt Or Be Hurt.

But If You Do Believe, Then You Already Know All About Magic.

This Is What Happens When You Try To Help People. You Get Screwed.

They've Lied About Everything.-about The Fence, And The Existence Of Invalids, About A Million Other Things Besides. They Told Us The Raids Were Carried Out For Our Own Protection. They Told Us The Regulators Were Only Interested In Keeping The Peace. They Told Us Love Was A Disease. They Told Us It Would Kill Us In The End. For The Very First Time I Realize, That This, Too, Maight Also Be A Lie.

You Don't Reach Points In Life At Which Everything Is Sorted Out For Us. I Believe In Endings That Should Suggest Our Stories Always Continue.

I Feel An Overwhelming Rush Of Sadness... I'm Just Struck With A Sense Of Time Passing So Quickly, Rushing Forward. One Day I'll Wake Up And My Whole Life Will Be Behind Me, And It Will Seem To Have Gone As Quickly As A Dream.

I’ve Always Hated Being Looked At.

Is This Freedom? Is It Happiness? I Don't Know. I Don't Care Anymore. It Is Different--it Is Being Alive.

I Know The Past Will Drag You Backward And Down, Have You Snatching At Whispers Of Wind And The Gibberish Of Trees Rubbing Together, Trying To Decipher Some Code, Trying To Piece Together What Was Broken. It's Hopeless. The Past Is Nothing But A Weight. It Will Build Inside You Like A Stone.

Take It From Me: If You Hear The Past Speaking To You, Feel It Tugging Up Your Back And Runing Its Fingers Up Your Spine, The Best Thing To Do-the Only Thing-is Run.

You Should Only Fall In Love With People Who Will Fall In Love With You Back.

Falling In Love

Rainstorms Are Incredible: Falling Shards Of Glass, The Air Full Of Diamonds.

I Reach Out And Grab Her Wrist. It Feels Impossibly Tiny In My Hand, Like This One Time I Found A Baby Bird Near Goose Point, And I Picked It Up And It Died There, Taking Its Final Gasping Fluttering Breaths In My Palm.

That's When You Really Lose People, You Know.when The Pain Passes.

It's Connecticut: Being Like The People Around You Is The Whole Point.

It's As Though The Words Are Trapped, Buried Under Past Fears, Past Lives, Like Fossils Compressed Under Layers Of Dirt.

That Is What Hatred Is. It Will Feed You And At The Same Time Turn You To Rot. It Is Hard And Deep And Angular, A System Of Blockades. It Is Everything And Total. Hatred Is A High Tower. In The Wilds, I Start To Build, And To Climb.

This Is What We Are Made For: Promises, Pledges, And Sworn Oaths Of Obedience.

Happiness Is Found When No One Is Looking

Feelings Aren't Forever. Time Waits For No One, But Progress Waits For Man To Enact It.

Droplets, Droplets: We Are All Identical Drips And Drops Of People, Hovering, Waiting To Be Tipped, Waiting For Someone To Show Us The Way, To Pour Us Down A Path. ... He Has Tipped Us Over, All Of Us In Our Teetering Expectancy, And Now We Are Pouring Toward Him, Coursing On A Wave Of Sound, Of Roaring Shouts And Applause. ... They Are The Moon; We Are A Tide, Their Tide, And Under Their Direction We Will Wipe Clean All The Sickness And Blight From The World.

Yeah, But Our Choices Are Limited. We Choose From A List That They Chose For Us." She Said. "well, Choices Are Supposed To Be Limited. That's Life" I Snapped

Somewhere In The Endless Spinning Of Eternity That One, Tiny, Fraction Of A Second Where Our Lips Met Is Lost Forever.

Each Step Is More Difficult Than The Last; The Heaviness Fills Me And Turns My Limbs To Stone. You Must Hurt Or Be Hurt.

He's Stuck With Me And I'm Stuck With Him. We're Stuck. That's What Growing Up Is All About, I Guess.

I Loved To Be Alone In The Woods, Especially In The Late Fall When Everything Is Crisp And Golden, The Leaves The Color Of Fire, And It Smells Like Things Turning Into Earth. I Loved The Silence - The Only Sound The Steady Drum Of The Hooves And The Horse's Breathing.

The Priests And The Scientists Are Right About One Thing: At Our Heart, At Our Base, We Are No Better Than Animals.

It's So Strange How Life Works: You Want Something And You Wait And Wait And Feel Like It's Taking Forever To Come. Then It Happens And It's Over And All You Want To Do Is Curl Back Up In That Moment Before Things Changed.

Most Of Us Won't See One Another After Graduation, And Even If We Do It Will Be Different. We'll Be Different. We'll Be Adults--cured, Tagged And Labeled And Paired And Identified And Placed Neatly On Our Life Path, Perfectly Round Marbles Set To Roll Down Even, Well-defined Slopes.

People Are Like Houses. They Could Open Their Doors. You Could Walk Through Their Rooms And Touch The Objects Hidden In Their Corners. But Something--the Structure, The Wiring, The Invisible Mechanism That Kept The Whole Thing Standing--remai Ned Invisible, Suggested Only By The Fact Of Its Existing At All.

The Rules Of Panic Are Simple. Anyone Can Enter. But Only One Person Will Win.

I Know What The Problem Is, Of Course. The Disorientation, The Distraction, The Difficulty Focusing - All Classic Phase One Signs Of Deliria. But I Don't Care. If Pneumonia Felt This Good I'd Stand Out In The Snow In The Winter With Bare Feet And No Coat, Or March Into The Hospital And Kiss Pneumonia Patients

This Is What Amazes Me: That People Are New Every Day. That They Are Never The Same. You Must Always Invent Them, And They Must Always Invent Themselves, Too.

The Flip Side Of Freedom Is This: When You're Completely Free, You're Also Completely On Your Own.

I Have Had To Give Up So Much, So Many Selves And Lives Already. I Have Grown Up And Out Of The Rubble Of My Old Lives, Of Things And People I Have Cared For.

That's The Thing: We Didn't Really Care. A World Without Love Is Also A World Without Stakes.

They’d Already Taken Her From Me Once. I Didn’t Want To Lose Her Again.

...if You Are One Tardy Away From Missing Out On A Big Competition, You Should Probably Make Your Coffee At Home.

This Is What Hatred Is. It Will Feed You And At The Same Time Turn You To Rot.

I Suppose That's The Secret, If You're Ever Wishing For Things To Back The Way They Were. You Just Have To Look Up.

That’s What You Do For Family. Anything.

Love: It Will Kill You And Save You, Both

We Are All Punished For The Lives We Have Chosen, In One Way Or Another.

That's The Thing About Faith. It Works.

I Keep Having The Urge To Cross My Hands Over My Chest, To Cover Up My Breasts, To Hide. I'm Suddenly Aware Of How Pale I Look In The Sunshine, And How Many Moles I Have Spotting Up And Down My Chest, And I Just Know He's Looking At Me Thinking I'm Wrong Or Deformed. But The He Breathes, 'beautiful' And When His Eyes Meet Mine I Know That He Really, Truly Means It.

The Secret Is,” I Say, Whispering Right Into His Ear, “that Yours Was The Best Kiss I’ve Ever Had In My Life.” “but I’ve Never Kissed You,” He Whispers Back. Around Us The Rain Sounds Like Falling Glass. “not Since Third Grade, Anyway.” I Smile, But I’m Not Sure If He Can See It. “better Get Started, Then,” I Say, “because I Don’t Have Much Time.

Two Weeks Until Your Cure" She Says Finally. "sixteen Days" I Say, But In My Head I'm Counting: Seven Days. Seven Days Until I'm Free And Away From All These People And Their Sliding Superficial Lives Brushing Past One Another Gliding, Gliding, Gliding From Life To Death. For Them There's Hardly A Change Between The Two.

Everything I See And Touch Reminds Me Of Him, And So Everything I See And Touch Is Perfect.

The Wilds Aren't Safe Anymore.

Of All The Systems Of The Body - Neurological, Cognitive, Special, Sensory - The Cardiological System Is The Most Sensitive And Easily Disturbed. The Role Of Society Must Be To Shelter These Systems From Infection And Decay, Or Else The Future Of The Human Race Is At Stake. Like A Summer Fruit That Is Protected From Insect Invasion, Bruising, And Rot By The Whole Mechanism Of Modern Farming; So Must We Protect The Heart.

It's Like High School Holds Two Different Worlds, Revolving Around Each Other An Never Touching; The Haves And The Have-nots. I Guess It's A Good Thing. High School Is Supposed To Prepare You For The Real World, After All.

Quiet Through The Grave Go I; Or Else Beneath The Graves I Lie

A Good Friend Keeps Your Secrets For You. A Best Friend Helps You Keep Your Own Secrets.

Keeping Secrets

Best Kept Secrets

Most Things, Even The Greatest Movements On Earth, Have Their Beginnings In Something Small. An Earthquake That Shatters A City Might Begin With A Tremble, A Breath. Music Begins With A Vibration . . . And God Created The Whole Universe From An Atom No Bigger Than A Thought.

Raven Has Lost Deeply, Again And Again, And She, Too, Has Buried Herself. There Are Pieces Of Her Scattered All Over. Her Heart Is Nestled Next To A Small Set Of Bones Buried Beside A Frozen River, Which Will Emerge With The Spring Thaw, A Skeleton Ship Rising Out Of The Water”.

There Were Days I Asked For It-prayed For It When I Went To Sleep. The Belief That I Would See You Again, That I Could Find You-the Hope For It-was The Only Thing That Kept Me Going.

The Deadliest Of All Deadly Things: It Kills You Both When You Have It And When You Don’t.

And When We Are With Alex, I Might As Well Not Be There. They Speak In A Language Of Whispers And Giggles And Secrets; Their Words Are Like A Fairy-tale Tangle Of Thorns, Which Place A Wall Between Us.

My Boyfriend's An Idiot," I Say As Soon As He Lurches Away."a Cute Idiot," Ally Corrects Me."that's Like Saying 'a Cute Mutant.' Doesn't Exist.

Sometimes I Feel Like If You Just Watch Things, Just Sit Still And Let The World Exist In Front Of You - Sometimes I Swear That Just For A Second Time Freezes And The World Pauses In Its Tilt. Just For A Second. And If You Somehow Found A Way To Live In That Second, Then You Would Live Forever.

I've Learned To Get Really Good At This - Say One Thing When I'm Thinking About Something Else, Act Like I'm Listening When I'm Not, Pretend To Be Calm And Happy When I'm Really Freaking Out. It's One Of The Skills You Perfect As You Get Older

...into Hate, Into Refusal, Against Hope And Without Fear

I Will Make A Pact With You: I Will Do It If You Will Do It, Always And Forever. Take Down The Walls.

I've Never Really Thought About It Before, But It's A Miracle How Many Kinds Of Light There Are In The World, How Many Skies: The Pale Brightness Of Spring, When It Feels Like The Hole World's Blushing; The Lush, Bright Boldness Of A July Noon; Purple Storm Skies And A Green Queasiness Just Before Lightning Strikes And Crazy Multicolored Sunsets That Look Like Someone's Acid Trip.

Sometimes I Think Maybe They Were Right All Along, The People On The Other Side In Zombieland. Maybe It Would Be Better If We Didn't Love. If We Didn't Lose Either. If We Didn't Get Our Hearts Stomped On, Shattered: If We Didn't Have To Patch And Repatch Until We're Like Frankenstein Monsters, All Sewn Together And Bound Up By Who Knows What. If We Could Just Float Along, Like Snow. But How Could Anyone Who's Ever Seen A Summer - Big Explosions Of Green And Skies Lit Up Electric With Splashy Sunsets, A Riot Of Flowers And Wind That Smells Like Honey - Pick The Snow?

That's The Thing About Best Friends. That's What They Do. They Keep You From Spinning Off The Edge.

This Is What I Want. This Is The Only Thing I've Ever Wanted. Everything Else—every Single Second Of Every Single Day That Has Come Before This Very Moment, This Kiss—has Meant Nothing.

It's Surprisingly Nice Out Here, Peaceful And Pretty-strange To Be Standing In The Middle Of A Little Garden While Enclosed By The Massive Stone Walls Of The Prison, Like Being At The Exact Center Of A Hurricane, And Finding Peace And Silence In The Middle Of So Much Shrieking Damage.

So Are You Going To Be My Knight In Shining Armor Or What?' Kent Does A Little Bow. 'you Know I Can't Resist A Damsel In Distress.

The Walls Are Covered -crammed- With Writing. No. Not Writing. They Are Covered With A Single Four-letter Word That Has Been Inscribed Over And Over, On Every Available Surface. Love.

For A Second I Feel A Rush Of Sadness: For The Horizons That Vanish Behind Us, For The People We Leave Behind, The Tiny-doll Selves That Get Stored Away And Ultimately Buried.

Po Swirled Upward From Where It Had Been Sitting, And Floated Over To The Window. "when You Go Swimming And You Put Your Head Under The Water," Po Said, "and Everything Is Strange And Underwater-sounding, And Strange And Underwater-looking, You Don't Miss The Air Do You? You Don't Miss The Above-water Sounds And The Above-water Look. It's Just Different." "true." Liesl Was Quiet For A Moment. Then She Added, "but I Bet You'd Miss It If You Were Drowning. I Bet You'd Really Miss The Air Then."

That’s What Made It So Frightening To The Lawmakers: Love Obeys No Laws Other Than Its Own.

I Wonder If This Is How People Always Get Close: They Heal Each Other's Wounds; They Repair The Broken Skin.

Maybe This Is The Secret To Talking To Boys--maybe You Just Have To Be Angry All The Time.

I Guess That's What Saying Good-bye Is Always Like--like Jumping Off An Edge. The Worst Part Is Making The Choice To Do It. Once You're In The Air, There's Nothing You Can Do But Let Go.

We're Killers, All Of Us: We Kill Our Lives, Our Past Selves, The Things That Mattered. We Bury Them Under Slogans And Excuses.

Let Me Tell You Something About Dying: It's Not As Bad As They Says. It's The Coming-back-to-life Part That Hurts.

This Is Not The Person I Wanted To Become: Hatred Has Carved A Permanent Place Inside Me, A Hollow Where Things Are So Easily Lost.

Promise Me We'll Stay Together, Okay? His Eyes Are Once Again The Clear Blue Of A Perfectly Transparent Pool. They Are Eyes To Swim In, To Float In, Forever. "you And Me". "i Promise". I Say. Behind Us The Door Creaks Open, And I Turn Around, Expecting Raven, Just As A Voice Cuts Through The Air: "don't Believe Her.

I Wonder Whether She Was Sorry For Leaving Us Behind.

Everytime He Brushes Me With His Fingers, Time Seems To Tether For A Second, Like It Is In Danger Of Dissolving. The Whole World Is Dissolving, I Decide, Except For Us. Us.

Suicide. A Sideways Word, A Word That People Whisper And Mutter And Cough: A Word That Must Be Squeezed Out Behind Cupped Palms Or Murmured Behind Closed Doors. It Was Only In Dreams That I Heard The Word Shouted, Screamed.

The Only Thing Worse Than Having No Friends Is Being Pitied For Having No Friends.

The House, The Pond, The Tree-it Was All Both Overwhelmingly Familiar And Different From What She Remembered-smaller And Shabbier, Somehow. It Was Like Waking Up To Find That Your Reflection In The Mirror Had Aged Overnight, Or Had Sprouted A New Mole: You Were Forced To Admit That Things Changed, Whether You Gave Them Permission To Or Not.

Time And Space Recede And Blast Away Like A Universe Expanding Forever Outward, And Leaving Only Darkness And The Two Of Us On Its Periphery, Darkness And Breathing And Touch.

The Memories Seem Like Snapshots From Someone Else’s Life.

And We Did, And It Wasn’t Bad. We Ate The Whole Stupid Can, We Were So Hungry. And When It Started To Get Dark You Pointed To The Sky, And Told Me There Was A Star For Every Thing You Loved About Me.” I’m Gasping, Feeling As Though I Am About To Drown; I’m Reaching For Him Blindly, Grabbing At His Collar.

Poetry Isn't Like Any Writing I've Ever Heard Before. I Don't Understand All Of It, Just Bits Of Images, Sentences That Appear Half-finished, All Fluttering Together Like Brightly Colored Ribbons In The Wind.

Grief Is Like Sinking, Like Being Buried.

Anything, Anything Is Possible, If You Can Just See The Sky.

Anything Is Possible

We Leave Pippa Behind, Standing In The Dark, Teeming Bowels Of The Camp, While The Sun Begins To Stain The Sky Electric, And From All Sides The Guns Draw Closer.

He Is No Longer Mine To Lose, But The Grief Is There, A Gnawing Sense Of Disbelief.

I Love You. They Can't Take It Away.

An Itchy Feeling Began To Work Its Way Through My Body, As Though A Thousand Mosquitoes Were Circulating Through My Blood, Biting Me From The Inside, Making Me Want To Scream, Jump, Squirm. I Ran.

Every Choice Is Limited. That's Life.

Things Change After You Die, Though, I Guess Because Dying Is The Loneliest Thing You Can Do.

But This Isn’t Like Anything I’ve Ever Seen, Or Imagined, Or Even Dreamed: This Is Like Music Or Dancing But Better Than Both.

This Was What True Fear Was--that You Could Never Know Other People, Not Completely. That You Were Always Just Guessing Blind.

We're On The Other Side Of The Fence Now, Lena,' She Says, Tiredly, As She Passes. "don't You Get It? You Can't Tell Me What To Feel.

For All The People Who Have Infected Me With Amor Deliria Nervosa In The Past - You Know Who You Are. For The People Who Will Infect Me In The Future - I Can't Wait To See Who You'll Be. And In Both Cases: Thank You.

There's Still Always The Possibility That I've Gone Totally, Clinically Cuckoo. But Somehow I Don't Think So Anymore. An Article I Once Read Said That Crazy People Don't Worry About Being Crazy - That's The Whole Problem.

Love, The Deadliest Of All Things: It Kills You Both When You Have It And When You Don't. But That Isn't It, Exactly. The Condemner And The Condemned. The Executioner; The Blade; The Last-minute Reprieve; The Gasping Breath And The Rolling Sky Above You And The Thank You, Thank You, Thank You God. Love: It Will Kill You And Save You, Both.

No Guy In His Right Mind Would Ever Choose Me When There Are People Like Hana In The World: It Would Be Like Settling For A Stale Cookie When What You Really Want Is A Big Bowl Of Ice Cream, Whipped Cream And Cherries And Chocolate Sprinkles Included.

I Was Glad When The Invalids Were Executed. Some People Complained That Lethal Injection Was Too Humane For Convicted Terrorists, But I Thought It Sent A Powerful Message: We Are Not The Evil Ones. We Are Reasonable And Compassionate. We Stand For Fairness, Structure, And Organization. It’s The Other Side, The Uncureds, Who Bring The Chaos.

When You Love Someone, When You Care For Someone, You Have To Do It Through The Good And The Bad. Not Just When You're Happy And It's Easy.

When You Love Someone

It's An Incredible Thing, How You Can Feel So Taken Care Of By Someone And Yet Feel, Also, Like You Would Die Or Do Anything Just For The Chance To Protect Him Back.

The Thing Is, You Don't Get To Know. It's Not Like You Wake Up With A Bad Feeling In Your Stomach. You Don't See Shadows Where There Shouldn't Be Any. You Don't Remember To Tell Your Parents You Love Them Or--in My Case--remember To Say Good-bye To Them At All.

Things Would Get Difficult Again. But That Was Okay Too. The Bravery Was In Moving Forward, No Matter What.

It's Like There's A Filter Set Up In My Brain, Except Instead Of Making Things Better, It Twists Everything Around So What Comes Out Of My Mouth Is Totally Wrong, Totally Different From What I Was Thinking.

In One Of The Tents, Julian Is Sleeping. And In Another: Alex

So Many Things Become Beautiful When You Really Look.

There Is Nothing Else For People To Do. They Do Not Think. They Feel No Passion, No Hatred, No Sadness; They Feel Nothing But Fear, And A Desire To Control. So They Watch, And Poke, And Pry.

I Can Admit, Now, That I Must Have Loved Lena. Not In An Unnatural Way, But My Feelings For Her Must Have Been A Kind Of Sickness. How Can Someone Have The Power To Shatter You To Dust--and Also To Make You Feel So Whole?

The Sun Has Just Risen, Weak And Watery-looking, Like It Had Just Spilled Itself Over The Horizon And Is Too Lazy To Clean Itself Up.

....love And Desire Enjoy A Symbiotic Relationship, Meaning That One Cannot Exist Without The Other. Desire Is An Enemy To Contentment; Desire Is Illness, A Feverish Brain. Who Can Be Considered Healthy Who Wants? The Very Word Want Suggests A Lack, An Impoverishment, And That Is What Desire Is: An Impoverishment Of The Brain, A Flaw, A Mistake.

Black Is Too Morbid; Red Will Set Them On Edge; Pink Is Too Juvenile; Orange Is Freakish

I Think Of Grace And Feel A Sharp Pain In My Chest.

For A Second We Just Stand There In Silence. Then, Suddenly, Alex Is Back, Easy And Smiling Again. “i Left A Note For You One Time. In The Governor’s Fist, You Know?” I Left A Note For You One Time. It’s Impossible, Too Crazy To Think About, And I Hear Myself Repeating, “you Left A Note For Me?” “i’m Pretty Sure It Said Something Stupid. Just Hi, And A Smiley Face, And My Name. But Then You Stopped Coming.” He Shrugs. “it’s Probably Still There. The Note, I Mean. Probably Just A Bit Of Paper Pulp By Now.

He Is My World And My World Is Him And Without Him There Is No World.

Holy Mother Of Lord Cocoa Puffs

For The First Time In My Life I've Done Something For Me And By Choice And Not Because Somebody Told Me It Was Good Or Bad.

It's Funny How You Can Know Your Friends So Well, But You Still End Up Playing The Same Games With Them.

It Won't Matter If Nobody Ever Thinks I'm Pretty (although Sometimes I Wish, Just For A Second, That Somebody Would)

They Haven't Killed Us Yet," I Say, And I Imagine That One Day I Will Fly A Plane Over Portland, Over Rochester, Over Every Fenced-in City In The Whole Country, And I Will Bomb And Bomb And Bomb, And Watch All Their Buildings Smoldering To Dust, And All Those People Melting And Bleeding Into Flame, And I Will See How They Like It. If You Take, We Will Take Back. Steal From Us, And We Will Rob You Blind. When You Squeeze, We Will Hit. This Is The Way The World Is Made Now.

I Wish I Could Close My Eyes And Be Blown Into Dust And Nothingness, Feel All My Thoughts Disperse Like Dandelion Fluff Drifting Off On The Wind. But His Hands Keep Pulling Me Back: Into The Alley, And Portland, And A World That Has Suddenly Stopped Making Sense.

Here's Something Else You Might As Well Learn Now: If You Want Something, If You Take It For Your Own, You'll Always Be Taking It From Someone Else. That's A Rule Too. And Something Must Die So That Others Can Live.

I Don't Know Where To Go. I Don't Know What Comes Now." "don't Worry," Will Said. "we'll Figure Something Out." Liesl Managed To Smile At Him. She Liked That Word: *we*. It Sounded Warm And Open, Like A Hug.

There's A Place For Everything And Everyone, You Know. That Is The Mistake They Make Above. They Think That Only Certain People Have A Place. Only Certain Kinds Of People Belong. The Rest Is Waste. But Even Waste Must Have A Place. Otherwise It Will Clog And Clot, And Rot And Fester.

It Strikes Me How Strange People Are. You Can See Them Every Day - You Can Think You Know Them - And Then You Fшnd Out You Hardly Know Them At All.

I'm Gone, Lost, Floating Away Into Nothingness Like I Am In My Dream, But This Time It's A Good Feeling - Like Soaring, Like Being Totally Free, And I Can Feel The Impression Of His Fingers Everywhere That They Touch, And I Think Of Stars Streaking Through The Sky And Leaving Burning Trails Behind Them, And In That Moment - However Long It Lasts, Seconds, Minutes, Days - While He's Saying My Name Into My Mouth And I'm Breathing Into Him, I Realize This, Right Here, Is The First And Only Time I've Ever Been Kissed In My Life.

Please Understand. Please Forgive Me. I Prayed Every Day For You To Be Alive, Until Hope Became Painful. Don't Hate Me. I Still Love You.

Willing Me To Understand: That People Should Be Sacrificed To Causes, That Beauty Can Be Built On The Backs Of The Dead.

We'll Walk Together Holding Hands, And Kiss In Broad Daylight, And Love Each Other As Much As We Want To, And No One Will Ever Try To Keep Up Apart.

It Was As Though The Darkness Was A Sheet Of Raw Cookie Dough And Someone Had Just Taken A Cookie Cutter And Made A Child-sized Shape Out Of It.

So Far I've Seen The Life Studies Packet Used As (1) An Umbrella, (2) A Makeshift Towel, (3) A Pillow, And Now This. I Have Never Actually Seen Anyone Study With It, Which Either Means That Everyone Who Graduates From Thomas Jefferson Will Be Totally Unprepared For Life Or That Certain Things Can't Be Learned In Bullet-point Format.

Is It Possible To Tell The Truth In A Society Of Lies? Or Must You Always, Of Necessity, Become A Liar?

Telling The Truth

I Don't Know How I Stay On My Feet, Why I Don;t Just Shatter Into Dust Right There, Why My Heart Keeps Beating When I Want It So Badly To Stop

I Hate Skin; I Hate Bones And Bodies. I Want To Curl Up Inside Of Him And Be Carried There Forever.

The Tunnels May Be Long, And Twisted, And Dark; But You Are Supposed To Go Through Them.

If Singing Were A Feeling It Would Be This, This Light, This Lifting, Like Laughing.

Nobody Ever Said Life Was Fair.

He’s Speaking In The Tone Of Voice That Everyone Uses When They’re About To Break You Apart. Gentle—kind, Even—like They Can Make The News Sound Better Just By Speaking In A Lullaby Voice.

The Mark Of The Procedure. A Real One. Lu Is Cured.

And I Guess That's When It Starts To Hit Me: The Whole Point Is, You Do What You Can.

Everything In Me Feels Fluttering And Free, Like I Could Take Off From The Ground At Any Second. Music, I Think, He Makes Me Feel Like Music.

Something Must Die So That Others Can Live.

Who Knows? Maybe They’re Right. Maybe We Are Driven Crazy By Our Feelings. Maybe Love Is A Disease, And We Would Be Better Off Without It. But We Have Chosen A Different Road. And In The End That Is The Point Of Escaping The Cure: We Are Free To Choose. We Are Even Free To Choose The Wrong Thing.

At A Certain Point Your Brain Stops To Rationalize Things. At A Certain Point It Gives Up, Shuts Off, Shuts Down.

People Are Like Ants: Just A Few Of Them Give All The Orders. And Most Of Them Spend Their Lives Getting Squashed.

Maybe Before You Die, It's Your Ghosts You See.

Through Wind, And Tempest, Storm, And Rain; The Calm Shall Be Buried Inside Of Me; A Warm Stone, Heavy And Dry; The Root, The Source, A Weapon Against Pain

But Now I Give In, Let The Anger Surge. I'm Sick Of People Acting Like This World, This Other World Is The Normal One, While I'm The Freak. It's Not Fair; Like All The Rules Have Suddenly Changed And Somebody Forgot To Tell Me.

A String Of Bright White Buildinh, Glistening Like Teeth Over The Slurping Mouth Of The Ocean.

Popularity's A Weird Thing. You Can't Really Define It, And It's Not Cool To Talk About, But You Know It When You See It. Like A Lazy Eye, Or Porn.

For A Moment, My Heart Aches For Him. I Should Never Have Asked Him To Join Me Here; I Should Never Have Asked Him To Cross.

I Said, I Prefer The Ocean When It's Gray. Or Not Really Gray. A Pale, In-between Color. It Reminds Me Of Waiting For Something Good To Happen.

That's What Time Does: We Stand Stubbornly Like Rocks While It Flows All Around Us, Believing That We Are Immutable - And All The Time We're Being Carved, And Shaped, And Whittled Away.

Summer Explodes Into Portland. In Early June The Heat Was There But Not The Color--the Green Were Still Pale And Tentative, The Morning Had A Biting Coolness--but By The Last Week Of School Everything Is Technicolor And Splash, Outrageous Blue Skies And Purple Thunderstorms And Ink-black Night Skies And Red Flowers As Brights As Spots Of Blood.

Here's Another Thing To Remember: Hope Keeps You Alive. Even When You're Dead, It's The Only Thing That Keeps You Alive.

Then I Think Of The Dark, And The Lights, And The Roaring, And Juliet, And Before I Can Think Of Anything Else, I Fight The Final Few Steps To The Door And Step Out Into The Cold, Where The Rain Is Still Coming Down Like Shards Of Moonlight, Or Like Steel.

If You’re Smart, You Care. And If You Care, You Love.

Over The Past Week, I’ve Accepted That I Will Never Love Julian As Much As I Loved Alex. But Now That Idea Is Overwhelming, Like A Wall Between Us. I Will Never Love Julian Like I Love Alex.

His Eyes Are The Color Of Honey. These Are The Eyes I Remember From My Dreams.

Chance. Stupid, Dumb, Blind Chance. Just A Part Of The Strange Mechanism Of The World, With Its Fits And Coughs And Starts And Random Collisions.

Still, The Vivid Green Of The Grass-where The Grass Is Actually Managing To Assert Itself Through The Dirt-seems Out Of Place. This Seems Like A Place Where The Sun Should Never Shine: A Place On The Edge, At The Limit, A Place Completely Removed From Time And Happiness And Life.

And I Have Julian. I Found Him, And He Followed Me. I Reach Out In The Half Dark, Wordlessly, And Find His Hands. We Interlace Our Fingers, And Though He Doesn't Say Anything Either, I Can Feel The Warmth And Energy Passing Between Us, A Soundless Dialogue. Thank You, He Is Saying, And I Am Saying, I Am So Happy, I Am So Happy, I Needed You To Be Safe.

Mice? Fine. Flying Mice? Not So Fine.

That's What Zombieland Is: Frozen, Calm, Quiet.

Welcome To The Free World. We Give People The Power To Choose. They Can Even Choose The Wrong Thing. Beautiful, Isn't It?

Requiem Has Been Controversial Because People Dont Feel I Gave It Closure.

I Feel Like I'm Playing Some Giant Video Game, Or Trying To Solve A Really Complicated Math Equation. 'one Girl Is Trying To Avoid Forty Raiding Parties Of Between Fifteen To Twenty People Each, Spread Out Across A Radius Of Seven Miles. If She Has To Make It 2.7 Miles Through The Center, What Is The Probablitiy She Will Wake Up Tomorrow Morning In A Jail Cell? Please Feel Free To Round Pi To 3.14'.

There Are More Of Us Than You Think.

But Maybe You Carried Your Demons With You Everywhere, The Way You Carried Your Shadow.

My Former People Were Not Totally Wrong. Love Is A Kind Of Possession. It’s A Poison. And If Alex No Longer Loves Me, I Can’t Bear To Think That He Might Love Somebody Else.

You Can Try To Pin Me Down With A Hundred Thousand Arms, But I Will Find A Way To Resist

And A Face Above Mine, White And Beautiful, Eyes As Large As The Moon. You Saved Me. A Hand On My Cheek, Cool And Dry. Why Did You Save Me? Words Welling Up On A Tide: No, The Opposite. Eyes The Colour Of A Dawn Sky, A Crown Of Blond Hair, So Bright And White And Blinding I Could Swear It Was A Halo.

And In That Moment, The Wordless Thing Passed Between Us, The Thing That Wasn't Quite Love But Was So Close I Could Believe In It Sometimes.

This Is The First Day Of My New Beginning. From Now On I'm Going To Do Things Right. I'm Going To Be A Different Person, A Good Person. I'm Going To Be The Kind Of Person Who Would Be Remembered Well, Not Just Remembered.

We Wanted The Freedom To Love. We Wanted The Freedom To Choose. Now We Have To Fight For It.

Fighting For Love

I Remember Lena's Expression When He Knocked On The Door; And How Alex Had Looked At Her When She Finally Let Him Into The Storeroom. I Remember Exactly What He Was Wearing, Too, And The Mess Of His Hair, The Sneakers With Their Blue-tinged Laces. His Right Shoe Was Untied. He Didn't Notice. He Didn't Notice Anything But Lena.

If Cassie Was Invalidated Because She Caught The Disease, Or Because Fred Suspected Her Of It, I Can Only Imagine What He Will Do To Me And To My Family If He Discovers That The Cure Did Not Work Perfectly.

And Now I Realize Lindsay's Not Fearless. She's Terrified. She's Terrified That People Will Find Out She's Faking, Bullshitting Her Way Through Life, Pretending To Have Everything Together When Really She's Just Floundering Like The Rest Of Us. Lindsay, Who Will Bite At You If You Even Look In Her Direction The Wrong Way, Like On Of Those Tiny Attack Dogs That Are Always Barking And Snapping In The Air Before They're Jerked Backward On The Chains That Keep Them In One Place.

And It's The Funniest Thing: As Soon As I See It, The Whistling In My Ears Stops And The Feeling Of Terror Drains Away, And I Realize This Whole Time I Haven't Been Falling At All. I've Been Floating.

I Put My Forehead On His Collarbone, Place One Hand On His Chest. Its Rhythm Reassures Me: He Is Real, And He Is Now.

I'm Not Scared, If That's What You're Wondering. The Moment Of Death Is Full Of Sound And Warmth And Light Shooting Away, Arcing Up And Up And Up, And If Singing Were A Feeling It Would Be This, This Light, This Lifting, Like Laughing... The Rest You Have To Find Out For Yourself.

That's When You Realize That Most Of It-life, The Relentless Mechanism Of Existing-isn't About You. It Doesn't Include You At All. It Will Thrust Onward Even After You've Jumped The Edge. Even After You're Dead.

I'm So Tired After Dinner I Fall Asleep With My Clothes On, Almost As Soon As My Head Hits The Pillow, And So I Forget To Ask God, In My Prayers, To Keep Me From Waking Up.

Less Than A Month Ago All Of August Still Stretched Before Us - Long And Golden And Reassuring, Like An Endless Period Of Delicious Sleep.

Po Flickered. "thank You?" It Repeated. "what Is That?" Liesl Thought. "it Means, You Were Wonderful," She Said. "it Means, I Couldn't Have Done It Without You.

There Is No Before. There Is Only Now, And What Comes Next.

People Themselves Are Full Of Tunnels: Winding, Dark Spaces And Caverns; Impossible To Know All The Places Inside Of Them. Impossible Even To Imagine.

Life Isn't Life If You Just Float Through It.

I Close My Eyes. An Image Flashes—emerging From The Van With Julian After Our Escape From New York City; Believing, In That Moment, That We Had Escaped The Worst, That Life Would Begin Again For Us. Instead Life Has Only Grown Harder.

There's Always Some Relief In Giving Up.

Trending Author

Bainbridge Colby

Jerry Lee Lewis

Category