Quotes from Creatures of Light and Darkness

“If you ever loved anything in your life, try to remember it. If you ever betrayed anything, pretend for a moment that you have been forgiven. If you ever feared anything, pretend for an instant that those days are gone and will never return. Buy the lie and hold to it for as long as you can. Press your familiar, whatever its name, to your breast and stroke it till it purrs.”
― Roger Zelazny, quote from Creatures of Light and Darkness

“Between you and me,
the words,
like mortar,
separating, holding together
those pieces of the structure ourselves.
To say them,
to cast their shadows on the page,
is the act of binding mutual passions,
is cognizance, yourself/myself,
of our sameness under skin;
it rears possible cathedrals
indicating infinity with steeply-high styli.
For when tomorrow comes it is today,
and if it is not the drop
that is eternity
glistening at the pen’s point,
then the ink of our voices
surrounds like an always night,
and mortar marks the limit of our cells.”
― Roger Zelazny, quote from Creatures of Light and Darkness

“You are a deviant from the social norm!"
"Is that an insult or a diagnosis?”
― Roger Zelazny, quote from Creatures of Light and Darkness

“Insofar as I may be heard by anything, which may or may not care what I say, I ask, if it matters, that you be forgiven for anything you may have done or failed to do which requires forgiveness. Conversely, if not forgiveness but something else may be required to insure any possible benefit for which you may be eligible after the destruction of your body, I ask that this, whatever it may be, be granted or withheld, as the case may be, in such a manner as to insure your receiving said benefit. I ask this in my capacity as your elected intermediary between yourself and that which may not be yourself, but which may have an interest in the matter of your receiving as much as it is possible for you to receive of this thing, and which may in some way be influenced by this ceremony. Amen.”
― Roger Zelazny, quote from Creatures of Light and Darkness

“Wheels turning, the motorcycle’s roar grows steady, which, too, is a form of silence.”
― Roger Zelazny, quote from Creatures of Light and Darkness

“Trouble can be purchased cheaply, though the refund may be more than you can bear.”
― Roger Zelazny, quote from Creatures of Light and Darkness

“It would be an act of wisdom to depart immediately… but wisdom is itself the product of knowledge; and knowledge, unfortunately, is generally the product of foolish doings. So, to add to my own knowledge and to enhance my wisdom I shall remain another day, to see what occurs.”
― Roger Zelazny, quote from Creatures of Light and Darkness

“What difference does it make whether you slay him or Horus slays him? He will be just as dead either way."
Wakim pauses, apparently considering the matter, as if for the first time.
"This thing is my mission, not his." he says at length.
"He will be just as dead, either way," Vramin repeats.
"But not by my hand."
"True. But I fail to see the distinction."
"So do I, for that matter. But it is I who have been charged with the task."
"Perhaps Horus has also."
"But not by my master."
"Why should you have a master, Wakim? Why are you not your own man?"
Wakim rubs his forehead.
"I—do not—really know…. But I must do as I am told.”
― Roger Zelazny, quote from Creatures of Light and Darkness

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Popular quotes

“Library books were, I suddenly realized, promiscuous, ready to lie down in the arms of anyone who asked. Not like bookstore books, which married their purchasers, or were brokered for marriages to others.”
― Elizabeth McCracken, quote from The Giant's House

“We are ever brutal to those who love and serve us in silence, but the time may come when, for our cruelty, we shall be deserted by these best friends of ours.”
― Kakuzō Okakura, quote from The Book of Tea

“Live or die, but don't poison everything...

Well, death's been here
for a long time --
it has a hell of a lot
to do with hell
and suspicion of the eye
and the religious objects
and how I mourned them
when they were made obscene
by my dwarf-heart's doodle.
The chief ingredient
is mutilation.
And mud, day after day,
mud like a ritual,
and the baby on the platter,
cooked but still human,
cooked also with little maggots,
sewn onto it maybe by somebody's mother,
the damn bitch!

Even so,
I kept right on going on,
a sort of human statement,
lugging myself as if
I were a sawed-off body
in the trunk, the steamer trunk.
This became perjury of the soul.
It became an outright lie
and even though I dressed the body
it was still naked, still killed.
It was caught
in the first place at birth,
like a fish.
But I play it, dressed it up,
dressed it up like somebody's doll.

Is life something you play?
And all the time wanting to get rid of it?
And further, everyone yelling at you
to shut up. And no wonder!
People don't like to be told
that you're sick
and then be forced
to watch
you
come
down with the hammer.

Today life opened inside me like an egg
and there inside
after considerable digging
I found the answer.
What a bargain!
There was the sun,
her yolk moving feverishly,
tumbling her prize --
and you realize she does this daily!
I'd known she was a purifier
but I hadn't thought
she was solid,
hadn't known she was an answer.
God! It's a dream,
lovers sprouting in the yard
like celery stalks
and better,
a husband straight as a redwood,
two daughters, two sea urchings,
picking roses off my hackles.
If I'm on fire they dance around it
and cook marshmallows.
And if I'm ice
they simply skate on me
in little ballet costumes.

Here,
all along,
thinking I was a killer,
anointing myself daily
with my little poisons.
But no.
I'm an empress.
I wear an apron.
My typewriter writes.
It didn't break the way it warned.
Even crazy, I'm as nice
as a chocolate bar.
Even with the witches' gymnastics
they trust my incalculable city,
my corruptible bed.

O dearest three,
I make a soft reply.
The witch comes on
and you paint her pink.
I come with kisses in my hood
and the sun, the smart one,
rolling in my arms.
So I say Live
and turn my shadow three times round
to feed our puppies as they come,
the eight Dalmatians we didn't drown,
despite the warnings: The abort! The destroy!
Despite the pails of water that waited,
to drown them, to pull them down like stones,
they came, each one headfirst, blowing bubbles the color of cataract-blue
and fumbling for the tiny tits.
Just last week, eight Dalmatians,
3/4 of a lb., lined up like cord wood
each
like a
birch tree.
I promise to love more if they come,
because in spite of cruelty
and the stuffed railroad cars for the ovens,
I am not what I expected. Not an Eichmann.
The poison just didn't take.
So I won't hang around in my hospital shift,
repeating The Black Mass and all of it.
I say Live, Live because of the sun,
the dream, the excitable gift.”
― Anne Sexton, quote from The Complete Poems

“Haksızlık, ihanet, utanç... Artemisia bunları hiç yorulmadan renklere döküyordu. Esin kaynaklarını tarihteki büyük kadınların gururlu mücadelesinde derinleştiriyordu. Yalana karşı koyan, İncil'deki kadın kahramanlar. Zorbalığa başkaldıran, efsaneleşmiş çehreler... Judith tuvallerinde, baştan çıkardığı despot kralı öldürerek halkını özgürlüğe kavuşturuyordu. Yael, düşmanının şakağına çekiçle vura vura bir çivi çakarak ailesinin geleceğini güvence altına alır. Lucrece hançerine, Kleopatra da yılanına sarılır: Her iki kadın da daha güçlü olanın yasalarına boyun eğmektense yaşamlarına son verirler. Kılıç, zehir, hançer, Amazon kadınları, günahkarlar, baştan çıkaran kadınlar, Marie-Madelaine, Galatee, Esther ve Bethsabee, hepsi de aşk ölüm ve özgürlük arasında çırpınırlar, Hepsi de zafer kazanır.”
― Alexandra Lapierre, quote from Artemisia

“I've always assumed he'd be around to be, you know, yelled at and taken for granted. And of course I was wrong. Nobody's going to put up with that forever.”
― MaryJanice Davidson, quote from Undead and Unappreciated

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