“When You Return
Fallen leaves will climb back into trees.
Shards of the shattered vase will rise
and reassemble on the table.
Plastic raincoats will refold
into their flat envelopes. The egg,
bald yolk and its transparent halo,
slide back in the thin, calcium shell.
Curses will pour back into mouths,
letters un-write themselves, words
siphoned up into the pen. My gray hair
will darken and become the feathers
of a black swan. Bullets will snap
back into their chambers, the powder
tamped tight in brass casings. Borders
will disappear from maps. Rust
revert to oxygen and time. The fire
return to the log, the log to the tree,
the white root curled up
in the un-split seed. Birdsong will fly
into the lark’s lungs, answers
become questions again.
When you return, sweaters will unravel
and wool grow on the sheep.
Rock will go home to mountain, gold
to vein. Wine crushed into the grape,
oil pressed into the olive. Silk reeled in
to the spider’s belly. Night moths
tucked close into cocoons, ink drained
from the indigo tattoo. Diamonds
will be returned to coal, coal
to rotting ferns, rain to clouds, light
to stars sucked back and back
into one timeless point, the way it was
before the world was born,
that fresh, that whole, nothing
broken, nothing torn apart.”
― Ellen Bass, quote from Like a Beggar
“This choreography of ruin, the world breaking
like glass under a microscope,
the way it doesn’t crack all at once,
but spreads out from the damaged cavities.
Still for a moment it all recedes.
The backyard potatoes swell quietly
buried beneath their canopy of leaves.
The wind rubs its hands through the trees.”
― Ellen Bass, quote from Like a Beggar
“It's a hard time to be human. We know too much
and too little.”
― Ellen Bass, quote from Like a Beggar
“The World Has Need Of You”
everything here
seems to need us
—Rainer Maria Rilke
I can hardly imagine it
as I walk to the lighthouse, feeling the ancient
prayer of my arms swinging
in counterpoint to my feet.
Here I am, suspended
between the sidewalk and twilight,
the sky dimming so fast it seems alive.
What if you felt the invisible
tug between you and everything?
A boy on a bicycle rides by,
his white shirt open, flaring
behind him like wings.
It’s a hard time to be human. We know too much
and too little. Does the breeze need us?
The cliffs? The gulls?
If you’ve managed to do one good thing,
the ocean doesn’t care.
But when Newton’s apple fell toward the earth,
the earth, ever so slightly, fell
toward the apple.”
― Ellen Bass, quote from Like a Beggar
“the dolphins stitch sky to sea.”
― Ellen Bass, quote from Like a Beggar
“Funnier still how much faith her parents put in him, considering the fact that Jay would officially be younger than Violet in less than a week.
Violet was about to turn seventeen, while Jay would still be sixteen for nearly two full months/
Jay liked that, the whole older-woman thing. He also liked to joke about the fact that Violet would soon be dating a younger man.
One night, when Violet’s parents had gone out, he teased her about it, whispering against his throat, “I should probably be dating girls my own age now that you’ll be over-the-hill.” Jay was stretched out on Violet’s bed as she curled against him.
Violet laughed, rising to the bait. “Fine,” she challenged, pulling away and leaning up on her elbow. “I’m sure there are plenty of men my own age who would be willing to finish what you’ve started.”
― Kimberly Derting, quote from Desires of the Dead
“say that people are “humane” is to say that they are kind; to say that they are “beastly,” “brutal,” or simply that they behave “like animals” is to suggest that they are cruel and nasty. We rarely stop to consider that the animal who kills with the least reason to do so is the human animal. We think of lions and wolves as savage because they kill; but they must kill, or starve. Humans kill other animals for sport, to satisfy their curiosity, to beautify their bodies, and to please their palates. Human beings also kill members of their own species for greed or power. Moreover, human beings are not content with mere killing. Throughout history they have shown a tendency to torment and torture both their fellow human beings and their fellow animals before putting them to death. No other animal shows much interest in doing this. While”
― Peter Singer, quote from Animal Liberation
“I never said I didn't want to marry. It just didn't happen-Iam not the sort of lady a man chooses to marry, for I am too plain and too serious. Now I am reconciled to being on my own.”
― Tracy Chevalier, quote from Remarkable Creatures
“You mean to tell me,’ I said, ‘that every time I pleasure a young lady, I shoot into her two thousand million spermatozoa?’ ‘Absolutely.’ ‘All squiggling and squirming and thrashing about?’ ‘Of course.’ ‘No wonder it gives her a charge,’ I said. A.”
― Roald Dahl, quote from My Uncle Oswald
“I believe in justice, as long as I'm holding a knife at the throat of the judge.”
― Matthew Woodring Stover, quote from Heroes Die
BookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.
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