How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #1
It seizes a victim with these legs, hugs it tight, and paralyzes it with enzymes injected during a vicious bite. That one bite is the only bite it ever takes. (1.15)
Giant water bugs inject frogs with venom that melts their guts, and then the bugs suck the guts out through the bite hole. They might be evil, but at least they're efficient.
Quote #2
And we the people are so vulnerable. Our bodies are shot with mortality. Our legs are fear and our arms are time. (6.36)
Dillard symbolizes God as an archer under the ultimate cover—invisibility—and he's such a good hunter that he builds death into the bodies of his creations. We're all expiring, every day.
Quote #3
The tomcat that used to wake me is dead; he was long since grist for an earthworm's casting, and is now the clear sap of a Pittsburgh sycamore, or the honeydew of aphids sucked from that sycamore's high twigs and sprayed in sticky drops on a stranger's car. (6.56)
Here, the author presents reincarnation as scientific fact. Reincarnating as an earthworm is way less glamorous than reincarnating as royalty, but your atoms are guaranteed to live on. It's all about re-conceptualizing life and death, learning other ways to see them.