Speech for Myself as a Ghost “Whoever I was, whatever I may have done, speaks to me and you now in the voice of this rainy light carrying us back to where moments ago I was the steam rising from your coffee and then further back to a room made shadowy by sunlight, a Murphy… Continue reading Tom Sleigh
I’ve read there is no such thing as a single tear, that old poetic trope. And perhaps there isn’t, since hers was simply a companion to my own. – Elizabeth Kostova, The Historian. (Time Warner Paperbacks; New Ed edition 2006)
A desire for the pulse to drop, In the cleft of a ruby; the fruit of Badakhshan ; and a crying face; In the birth of eyelashes and the soft fabric of shivering dew, To appear and to nestle between tresses —Kamran Mir Hazar, from “A Bronzed Face And Tiny Purple Veins,” Poetry International: Afghanistan.… Continue reading Kamran Mir Hazar
She was bored. She loved, had capacity to love, for love, to give and accept love. Only she tried twice and failed twice to find somebody not just strong enough to deserve it, earn it, match it, but even brave enough to accept it. — William Faulkner, The Town: A Novel of the Snopes Family.… Continue reading William Faulkner
Time cannot break the bird’s wing from the bird. Bird and wing together Go down, one feather. No thing that ever flew, Not the lark, not you, Can die as others do.” ― Edna St. Vincent Millay, “To a Young Poet,” Collected Poems of Edna St. Vincent Millay. (HarpPeren July 10, 1981) Originally published 1956.
What if everything in the world were a misunderstanding, what if laughter were really tears? — Søren Kierkegaard, Either/Or: A Fragment of Life. (Penguin Classics; Revised ed. edition December 1, 1992) Originally published 1843.
Yes, I have a thousand tongues, And nine and ninety-nine lie. Though I strive to use the one, It will make no melody at my will, But is dead in my mouth. —Stephen Crane, from “Black Riders: IV ,” The Black Riders and Other Lines. (Yalebooks October 1998) Originally published 1895.
We die containing a richness of lovers and tribes, tastes we have swallowed, bodies we have plunged into and swum up as if rivers of wisdom, characters we have climbed into as if trees, fears we have hidden in as if caves. I wish for this all to be marked on my body when I… Continue reading Michael Ondaatje
It is a negligence of the mind not to notice how at dusk heron comes to the pond and stands there in his death robes, perfect servant of the system, hungry, his eyes full of attention, his wings pure light. —Mary Oliver, “How Heron Comes,” Swan: Poems and Prose Poems. (Beacon Press; 1St Edition edition… Continue reading Mary Oliver
You are the sky. Everything else – it’s just the weather. ― Pema Chödrön, When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times. (Shambhala Publications September 14, 2010)
The Vale of Soul-Making 