Outrun the Moon

by Stacey Lee

She said that your circumstances don’t determine where you can go, only your starting point.

She speaks some English but never with us, since she doesn’t want us to forget our village dialect.

No, the key to wealth was opportunity. And if opportunity didn’t come knocking, then Mrs. Lowry says you must build your own door.

For all their disdain of Chinese people, Americans certainly like our goods—silks,

This is true of all things not our own

Ma says we can measure our lives by our pain. There is the pain of our first steps, and of losing our first tooth. The pain of a parent’s anger, and the disappointment when something doesn’t go our way. Each advances us in some way, leading us further into the experience of being human.

what is a weed, other than a plant that’s out of place through no fault of its own?

a thoughtful person makes a better friend than a person full of thoughts.

The poor man, whose intentions were so quickly imagined for him because of the way the light hits his skin.