the sky is everywhere

I wanted to share a few of my favorite quotes from The Sky Is Everywhere by Jandy Nelson, which I recently read.

Grief is a house
where the chairs
have forgotten how to hold us
the mirrors how to reflect us
the walls how to contain us
grief is a house that disappears
each time someone knocks at the door
or rings the bell
a house that blows into the air
at the slightest gust
that buries itself deep in the ground
while everyone is sleeping
grief is a house where no one can protect you
where the younger sister
will grow older than the older one
where the doors
no longer let you in
or out.

When I’m with him,
there is someone with me
in my house of grief,
someone who knows
its architecture as I do
who can walk with me,
from room to sorrowful room,
making the whole rambling structure
of wind and emptiness
not quite as scary, as lonely
as it was before.

If this doesn't change out lives,
I don't know what will - this,
Lennie, is the color of extraordinary.

I look into his sorrowless eyes
and a door in my heart blows open.
And when we kiss,
I see that on the other side
of that door
is sky.

I told him I was looking up at the sky.
He said, "That's a misconception,
Lennie, the sky is everywhere,
it begins at your feet."

source