Lucille Clifton Quotes

There's a lot of conflict and darkness inside everybody's family. We all pretend to outsiders that it's not so, but behind locked doors, there are usually high emotions running.

You think we're a family,' Cody said, turning back. 'You think we're some jolly, situation-comedy family when we're in particles, torn apart, torn all over the place, and our mother was a witch.

Love came in wounded and frantic ways to my dismaying family.

The real demon in my life is my father.

When I was a little girl, my family was extremely close, loving and really happy, and then overnight, things just became a nightmare, and instead of them becoming a nightmare and getting better, they became a nightmare and just kept getting worse.

Remembering how my mother looked before she gave birth to my sister is frightening. But even more frightening is the feeling that I wanted them to catch me and beat me. Why did I want to be punished? Shadows out of the past clutch at my legs and drag me down. I open my mouth to scream, but I am voiceless. My hands are trembling, I feel cold, and there is a distant humming in my ears.

I've made love to my mother, killed my father, and my brother. What am I to do?

If you are going through something with one of your parents, you know that there is this feeling inside you constantly that something is wrong. Even if you want to pretend that it doesn't matter to you or you don't care, the truth of the matter is that you do, because they are your parents and you love them.

My mother did what many men do. She left.

My parents' divorce made an important change in my life. It affected me. After that, when I can't play Wimbledon, it was tough. For one month I was outside the world.

Nothing is quite so emotional and passionate as what goes on inside of a family. People are driven to distraction by a father or a mother or a husband. Or a child.

Family quarrels are bitter things. They don't go according to any rules. They're not like aches or wounds, they're more like splits in the skin that won't heal because there's not enough material.

I hated my father long before I knew there was a word for hate.

I didn't come from a background where I saw a lot of loving couples. All my aunts and uncles were either split up or fighting all the time. The only healthy relationships I saw were on TV.

I voluntarily inflicted a certain level of insanity on myself.

I loved my parents... but that can never change the fact that my father's violence ruined my childhood.

My parents' marriage was very rocky. They were always arguing. When they split up when I was in my 20s, my brother and I were both delighted because we knew they weren't good for each other.

I've lost lots of men in my life, besides my mother, which is a whole different loss.

I used the diabetes as my weapon. Of course, I was only hurting myself and making myself sicker, but I guess it was something I had to go through. I never went overboard so much that I really hurt myself, but my early teenage years were very tough.

Everybody has a story... and a scream.

I became the unnatural son of a few score of beaten men.

The idea that the family is this locus of support but can also hold you back and keep you down makes for good drama.

A family going through a divorce, a child under attack by a demon, all these things I could relate to.

For many people, the family is portrayed as the settled place of reasonable safety, but as anyone who has read 'The God of Small Things' would know, for me it was a dangerous place. I felt humiliated in that space. I wanted to get away as soon as I could.