I took off our language and wore my English, like a mask, so that others would see my face, and therefore yours.

Because freedom, I am told, is nothing but the distance between the hunter and its prey.

When does a war end? When can I say your name and have it mean only your name and not what you left behind?

All this time I told myself we were born from war—but I was wrong, Ma. We were born from beauty.

To be a monster is to be a hybrid signal, a lighthouse: both shelter and warning at once.

Perhaps to lay hands on your child is to prepare him for war.

What I wanted to say to them, as I rode away, and also the next morning, all mornings, is what I want to say to you now: Sorry. Sorry that it would be so long before they would see their loved ones, that some might not make it back across the desert border alive, taken by dehydration and exposure or murdered by drug cartels or the right-wing crack

Because freedom, I am told, is nothing but the distance between the hunter and its prey.

I am writing to reach you—even if each word I put down is one word further from where you are.