Quotes from Laurel Corona

Desire gives pain to the heart from which springs both hope and worry. Out of suspicion I make mistakes that grow into lasting ills. And from my stubborn delusions come a thousand deceits, which later I accept as damage I've done.

You need to put on a pretty dress and have Corinne arrange your hair... and don't forget to bring your mind. --Julie de Bercy

My prayers and dreams are wrapped up together, vague and contradictory. "Let me leave my mark in the world," I say to the air around me. I don't want to feel so invisible, yet I'm torn between wishing to move away from this place and wanting it to be me and I it.

calling out to the world to forget everything except the sublime.

The heavens closed, and the people began to spill out into the October twilight.

I understand Jesus perfectly," Mama tells me. "I just don't understand Christians, and I don't think he would either.

She was tired of playing the dutiful assistant to a great man.

Nothing is more practical than poetry," he says with a quizzical smile. "It teaches us how to be human.

It's terrible to be born to do something you will never be permitted to do. Especially while you watch yourself go through life doing something else.

The Holy One. I have never stopped believing in him. I don't understand the idea that God wants to be worshipped one way alone, and when I feel overwhelmed by the immensity and beauty of his creation, I am glad my mother taught me to bless and praise him everywhere. My

She would never let anyone interfere with her right to use her mind.

Each note floated over the listeners like a feather held aloft by the breath of angels.

There's a knowledge deep in our bones that some lines cannot be crossed without becoming unrecognizable to ourselves-the only death truly to be feared. I know who I have been. I know who I am. I know who I will remain.

I shut my eyes and feel the memories crowding in again. My breath leaks out and time goes backward with it.

When people think there's only one right place to stand, they say foolish things like 'You're doing it wrong.' All you have to do is go to the other side and look again at how many ways there are to see the world.

I saw then in her face the spirit of an angel, truthfully

When people began singing again, instead of trying to see the woman, Chiaretta looked at the air in front of the voice, trying to understand how something invisible could be so beautiful.

She daydreamed and made up stories in her head, and the cloister and solitude of the pieta suited her.

The music whirled and flirted with the air, spinning like snowflakes in an alley.

She shut her eyes, her head full of music yearning to be played.