“Mother to Son
Well, son, I'll tell you:
Life for me ain't been no crystal stair.
It's had tacks in it,
And splinters,
And boards torn up,
And places with no carpet on the floor -
Bare.
But all the time
I'se been a'climbin' on,
And reachin' landin's,
And turnin' corners,
And sometimes goin' in the dark
Where there ain't been no light.
So boy, don't you turn back.
Don't you set down on the steps
'Cause you finds it's kinder hard.
Don't you fall now -
For I'se still goin', honey,
I'se still climbin',
And life for me ain't been no crystal stair.
- Langston Hughes (112)”
― Sapphire, quote from Push
“Every blade of grass has its Angel that bends over it and whispers, "Grow, grow." - The Talmud”
― Sapphire, quote from Push
“Listen baby, Muver love you. Muver not dumb. Listen baby: ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ.
Thas the alphabet. Twenty- six letters in all. Them letters make up words. Them words everything.”
― Sapphire, quote from Push
“I say I drownin' in river. She don't look me like I'm crazy but say, If you just sit there the river gonna rise up drown you! Writing could be the boat carry you to the other side. (97)”
― Sapphire, quote from Push
“How that is so I don't know. How Mama and Daddy know me sixteen years and hate me, how a stranger meet me and love me. (131)”
― Sapphire, quote from Push
“How is something a memory if you never forgit?”
― Sapphire, quote from Push
“I bite my fingernails till they look like disease, pull strips of my skin away. Get Daddy's razor out cabinet. Cut cut cut arm wrist, not trying to die, trying to plug myself back in. (111)”
― Sapphire, quote from Push
“Is life a hammer to beat me down?”
― Sapphire, quote from Push
“Every blade of grass has its Angel that bends over it and whispers: "Grow, Grow".”
― Sapphire, quote from Push
“Some folks got a light around them that shine for other peoples. I think that maybe some of them was in tunnels, and in that tunnel, maybe the only light they had was inside of them. And then, even long after they escaped that tunnel... They still be shining for everybody else.”
― Sapphire, quote from Push
“Almost all instruction seems to revolve around language ac-(Jermaine spelling now) "q, a-kwi-si-tion acquisition!" ("What that?" I ask. "You know, to get. Language acquisition, to get some language.")”
― Sapphire, quote from Push
“I feel like my blood a giant river swell up inside me and I'm drowning. My head all dark inside. Feel like giant river I never cross in front me now. Ms Rain say, You not writing Precious. I say I drownin' in river. She don't look me like I'm crazy but say, If you just sit there the river gonna rise up drown you! Writing could be the boat to carry you to the other side.”
― Sapphire, quote from Push
“I wanna say I am somebody. I wanna say it on subway, TV, movie, LOUD. I see the pink faces in suits look over top of my head. I watch myself disappear in their eyes, their tesses. I talk loud but still I don't exist.”
― Sapphire, quote from Push
“Show me what's inside the crystal ball. She look at it a long time then say, Ahh Negrita, you don't want to know.”
― Sapphire, quote from Push
“One thing I say about Farrakhan and Alice Walker they help me like being black. I wish I wasn't fat but I am. Maybe one day I like that too, who knows.”
― Sapphire, quote from Push
Sapphire
Born place: in Fort Ord, California, The United States
Born date August 4, 1950
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“The noblest of ideas have always been protected by warriors.”
― Tom Clancy, quote from The Sum of All Fears
“Legionnaire’s disease hit a group of predominantly white, heterosexual, middle-aged members of the American Legion. The respectability of the victims brought them a degree of attention and funding for research and treatment far greater than that made available so far to the victims of Kaposi’s sarcoma.
I want to emphasize the contrast, because the more popular Legionnaire’s disease affected fewer people and proved less likely to be fatal. What society judged was not the severity of the disease but the social acceptability of the individuals affected with it…. I intend to fight any effort by anyone at any level to make public health policy regarding Kaposi’s sarcoma or any other disease on the basis of his or her personal prejudices regarding other people’s sexual preferences or life-styles”
― Randy Shilts, quote from And the Band Played On: Politics, People, and the AIDS Epidemic
“Although we credit God with designing man, it turns out He's not sufficiently skilled to have done so. In point of fact, He unintentionally knocked over the first domino by creating a palette of atoms with different shapes. Electron clouds bonded, molecules bloomed, proteins embraced, and eventually cells formed and learned how to hang on to one another like lovebirds. He discovered that by simmering the Earth at the proper distance from the Sun, it instinctively sprouted with life. He's not so much a creator as a molecule tinkerer who enjoyed a stroke of luck: He simply set the ball rolling by creating a smorgasbord of matter, and creation ensued.”
― David Eagleman, quote from Sum: Forty Tales from the Afterlives
“M'Dear," I said cordially, "Your butt's blocking my bumper. Do you think you could move your loitering five feet to the south and let me leave?”
― Maggie Stiefvater, quote from Ballad: A Gathering of Faerie
“When it comes to people -- don't write about who you know; but what you know of human nature.”
― Candace Bushnell, quote from The Carrie Diaries
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4:50 from Paddington
The Power of a Prayi...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.
We thoughtfully gather quotes from our favorite books, both classic and current, and choose the ones that are most thought-provoking. Each quote represents a book that is interesting, well written and has potential to enhance the reader’s life. We also accept submissions from our visitors and will select the quotes we feel are most appealing to the BookQuoters community.
Founded in 2023, BookQuoters has quickly become a large and vibrant community of people who share an affinity for books. Books are seen by some as a throwback to a previous world; conversely, gleaning the main ideas of a book via a quote or a quick summary is typical of the Information Age but is a habit disdained by some diehard readers. We feel that we have the best of both worlds at BookQuoters; we read books cover-to-cover but offer you some of the highlights. We hope you’ll join us.
