We'll Leave Now, So That This Moment

Dear God," She Prayed, "let Me Be Something Every Minute Of Every Hour Of My Life. Let Me Be Gay; Let Me Be Sad. Let Me Be Cold; Let Me Be Warm. Let Me Be Hungry...have Too Much To Eat. Let Me Be Ragged Or Well Dressed. Let Me Be Sincere - Be Deceitful. Let Me Be Truthful; Let Me Be A Liar. Let Me Be Honorable And Let Me Sin. Only Let Me Be Something Every Blessed Minute. And When I Sleep, Let Me Dream All The Time So That Not One Little Piece Of Living Is Ever Lost.

A Lie Was Something You Told Because You Were Mean Or A Coward. A Story Was Something You Made Up Out Of Something That Might Have Happened. Only You Didn't Tell It Like It Was, You Told It Like You Thought It Should Have Been.

It Was A Good Thing That She Got Herself Into This Other School. It Showed Her That There Were Other Worlds Beside The World She Had Been Born Into And That These Other Worlds Were Not Unattainable.

Everything, Decided Francie After That First Lecture, Was Vibrant With Life And There Was No Death In Chemistry. She Was Puzzled As To Why Learned People Didn't Adopt Chemistry As A Religion.

No Matter Where Its Seed Fell, It Made A Tree Which Struggled To Reach The Sky. It Grew In Boarded-up Lots And Out Of Neglected Rubbish Heaps, And It Was The Only Tree That Grew Out Of Cement. It Grew Lushly, But Only In The Tenements Districts.... That Was The Kind Of Tree It Was. It Liked Poor People.