“My father had always identified himself as a writer to my mother when ...” — Nick Flynn Quote

“My father had always identified himself as a writer to my mother when they met. When they met, he was writing this great novel, there was no doubt about it. Part of why she left him was this delusion of greatness and identifying it very directly with being an artist.”

“That Dick Cheney is pro-torture surprises no one; he freely admits it.”

“The attention one gets from being a poet isn't great.”

“Women are women, and so are men, and the delusion that we are spiritually separate from or are about to spiritually separate from the rest of existence is a psychosis that spins us into virulence.”

“It is a great delusion in those whose understanding has been darkened by self-love, to think that there is any obedience in the subject who tries to draw the superior to what he wishes.”

“The form of my poem rises out of a past that so overwhelms the present with its worth and vision that I'm at a loss to explain my delusion that there exist any real links between that past and a future worthy of it.”