A long time ago a bunch of people reached a general consensus as to what’s real and what’s not and most of us have been going along with it ever sinc… - Charles de Lint

While he was out of the room, Tucker sauntered over to the worktable and had a look at the poetry. He read a line here and there, but couldn’t make a lot of sense out of any of it. That was the trouble with poems. It seemed you had to have a doctorate just to understand the references. Still. Some of it had a nice ring to it. …like Manjushri, I have met death,
and bear my own victory,
though not a sword… Nice. Yeah. If you knew what the hell it meant.

There are as many stories to be told as there are people to tell them about; only the mean-spirited would consider there to be a competition at all.

I've always believed the lies we use to make our fictions reveal the truth with far more honesty than any history or herstory or life story.