On Talent and Lightning

"I do not know if I am talented or handsome, or untalented or unhandsome; I have no propensity to worry about those things," said the writer. "I will write because I desire to write, and I will reach for the cores of all of you and rip them out and show them to you because that is what I want to do in this world."

He said, "I do not give a fuck for talent. Those who are concerned can keep it."

He cared about heart, and he knew he had this because he felt the lingering silence between beats, the sound that has stayed with us for some reason. And then he pushed that sound outward.

"And that," he said, "is a story about lightning rods."