Back

I always have a few quotes running around in my head, a poem or a line from a novel, something that caught my eye.  I thought it would be fun to post them here.

Every year without knowing it I have passed the day

When the last fires will wave to me

And the silence will set out

Tireless traveler

Like the beam of a lightless star.

Then I will no longer

Find myself in life as in a strange garment

Surprised at the earth

And the love of one woman

And the shamelessness of men

As today writing after three days of rain

Hearing the wren sing and the falling cease

And bowing not knowing to what.

– W.S. Merwin, For the Anniversary of my Death

She tells her love while half asleep,

In the dark hours,

With half-words whispered low:

As Earth stirs in her winter sleep

And puts out grass and flowers

Despite the snow,

Despite the falling snow.

– Robert Graves

It’s nice if you can make ends meet, but it’s even nicer if you can tie a bow.

– Phillip Kerr

And the fruit of my vanity is shame,

and repentance, and the clear knowledge

that whatever the world finds pleasing,

is but a brief dream.

– Petrarch

O you heavenly charmers,

What things you make of us! For what we lack

We laugh; for what we have are sorry; still

Are children in some kind.  Let us be thankful.

For that which is, and with you leave dispute

That are above our question.  Let’s go off,

And bear us like the time.

–Shakespeare, The Two Noble Kinsmen (The last lines he wrote)

…we have now sunk to a depth at which the restatement of the obvious is the first duty of intelligent men.

– George Orwell

Nevertheless, tonight you might stay here

And rest yourself awhile in this green meadow;

The apples are ripe, the chestnuts are plump and mealy,

There’s plenty of good pressed cheese you’re welcome to.

Already there’s smoke you can see from the nieghbors’ chimneys

And the shadows of the hills are lengthening as they fall.

 –Virgil, Eclogue 1

Thyrsis:

 Then I’ll go on: There, sheep are full

 Of sweetest grass, and softest wool;

 There, birds sing consorts, garlands grow,

 Cool winds do whisper, springs do flow.

 There, always is a rising sun,

 And day is ever but begun.

 –Andrew Marvell, Thyrsis and Dorinda