Quotes, Poems, & Sayings...

[DMW]

Robert Frost (1874–1963). Mountain Interval. 1920.

1. The Road Not Taken


TWO roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth; 5

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same, 10

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back. 15

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference. 20

[Kent]

Education is the proper way to promote compassion and tolerance in society. Compassion and peace of mind bring a sense of confidence that reduces stress and anxiety, whereas anger and hatred come from frustration and undermine our sense of trust. Because of ignorance, many of our problems are our own creation. Education, however, is the instrument that increases our ability to employ our own intelligence.
- Dalai Lama

[grenade]

Tonight I Can Write... Pablo Neruda


Tonight I can write the saddest lines.

Write for example, "The night is shattered
and the blue stars shiver in the distance."


The night wind revolves in the sky and sings.


Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
I loved her,
and sometimes she loved me too.


Through nights like this one, I held her in my arms.
I kissed her again and again under the endless sky.


She loved me, sometimes I loved her too.
How could one not have loved her great still eyes.


Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
To think that I do not have her.
To feel that I have lost her.


To hear the immense night,
still more immense without her.
And the verse falls to the soul like dew to the pasture.


What does it matter that my love could not keep her.
The night is shattered
and she is not with me.


This is all.
In the distance someone is singing.
In the distance.
My soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.


My sight searches for her as though to go to her.
My heart looks for her,
and she is not with me.


The same night whitening the same trees.
We, of that time, are no longer the same.


I no longer love her, that's certain,
but how I loved her.
My voice tried to find the wind to touch her hearing.


Another's. She will be another's.
Like my kisses before.
Her bright body.
Her infinite eyes.


I no longer love her, that's certain,
but maybe I love her. Love is so short,
forgetting is so long.


Because through nights like this one I held her in my arms
my soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.


Thought this be the last pain that she makes me suffer
and these the last verses that I write for her.

[grenade]

I crave your mouth... Pablo Neruda


I crave your mouth, your voice, your hair.
Silent and starving, I prowl through the streets.
Bread does not nourish me, dawn disrupts me, all day
I hunt for the liquid measure of your steps.


I hunger for your sleek laugh,
your hands the color of a savage harvest,
hunger for the pale stones of your fingernails,
I want to eat your skin like a whole almond.


I want to eat the sunbeam flaring in your lovely body,
the sovereign nose of your arrogant face,
I want to eat the fleeting shade of your lashes,


and I pace around hungry, sniffing the twilight,
hunting for you, for your hot heart,
Like a puma in the barrens of Quitratue.

[Nomad]

building trust takes years of thought, effort, patience, tears, humility, and honesty; all oft repeated. unbuilding trust can take a single second, a hasty assumption, a thoughtless act; especially when oft repeated.

Abraham Lincoln


the manner in which one endures that which must be endured is more important than the thing to be endured

also Abraham Lincoln


self respect is about saying 'stop' when someone hurts you, saying 'no' to the person you love most, saying 'unacceptable' when you're being fed a line of shit and saying 'step off' when even G*d treds on your toes

Dad


i refuse to give someone power if they refuse to respect the fact that i did it. that's like putting your balls in someone elses vice and forgetting to pocket the key

also Dad

[weatherboi]

But O, how bitter a thing it is to look into happiness through another man's eyes.
William Shakespeare

With mirth and laughter let old wrinkles come.
William Shakespeare

I bear a charmed life.
William Shakespeare

[Talon]

If there ever comes a day where we can't be together,
keep me in your heart..I'll stay there forever.

~Winnie the Pooh

[grenade]

Song by Allen Ginsberg


The weight of the world
is love.
Under the burden
of solitude,
under the burden
of dissatisfaction

the weight,
the weight we carry
is love.

Who can deny?
In dreams
it touches
the body,
in thought
constructs
a miracle,
in imagination
anguishes
till born
in human--
looks out of the heart
burning with purity--
for the burden of life
is love,

but we carry the weight
wearily,
and so must rest
in the arms of love
at last,
must rest in the arms
of love.

No rest
without love,
no sleep
without dreams
of love--
be mad or chill
obsessed with angels
or machines,
the final wish
is love
--cannot be bitter,
cannot deny,
cannot withhold
if denied:

the weight is too heavy

--must give
for no return
as thought
is given
in solitude
in all the excellence
of its excess.

The warm bodies
shine together
in the darkness,
the hand moves
to the center
of the flesh,
the skin trembles
in happiness
and the soul comes
joyful to the eye--

yes, yes,
that's what
I wanted,
I always wanted,
I always wanted,
to return
to the body
where I was born.

San Jose, 1954

[grenade]

John Keats

I cannot exist without you - I am forgetful of every thing but seeing you again - my Life seems to stop there - I see no further. You have absorb'd me. I have a sensation at the present moment as though I was dissolving - I should be exquisitely miserable without the hope of soon seeing you. I should be afraid to separate myself far from you. My sweet Fanny, will your heart never change? My love, will it? I have no limit now to my love - You note came in just here - I cannot be happier away from you - 'T is richer than an Argosy of Pearles. Do not threat me even in jest. I have been astonished that Men could die Martyrs for religion - I have shudder'd at it - I shudder no more - I could be martyr'd for my Religion - Love is my religion - I could die for that - I could die for you.

[JAGG]

“Never judge someone by their relatives.” - Charles Martin


“You want the fairy tale, I want a chance at it.” ― Rachel Gibson


“It is with the soul that we grasp the essence of another human being, not with the mind, nor even with the heart.” ― Henry Miller

[Talon]

The weakness of man is the thing to be feared, not his strength.

[JAGG]

“I heard what you said. I’m not the silly romantic you think. I don’t want the heavens or the shooting stars. I don’t want gemstones or gold. I have those things already. I want…a steady hand. A kind soul. I want to fall asleep, and wake, knowing my heart is safe. I want to love, and be loved.” ― Shana Abé

“You know,” he said, “this is why I love you so much.”
Her tone was heartbreakingly warm. “What do you mean?”
You don’t ask me to go inside because it’s cold. You just want to make it easier for me to be where I want to stand.”― J.R. Ward


" What a luxury it was, for people to hold their loved ones whenever they wanted." - Ceclia Athern

[Talon]

Jacob served seven years for Rachel,
and they seemed to him but a few days because of the love he had for her.


~Genesis 29:20

[Kelt]

Here's an old army phrase I just saw;

"Always spend good money on your shoes and your bed, because if you're not in one you're in the other."

*Demonstrating my deeply philosophical side*

[Angeltoes]

Quietly

By Kenneth Rexroth

Lying here quietly beside you,
My cheek against your firm, quiet thighs,
The calm music of Boccherini
Washing over us in the quiet,
As the sun leaves the housetops and goes
Out over the Pacific, quiet—
So quiet the sun moves beyond us,
So quiet as the sun always goes,
So quiet, our bodies, worn with the
Times and penances of love, our
Brains curled, quiet in their shells, dormant,
Our hearts slow, quiet, reliable
In their interlocked rhythms, the pulse
In your thigh caressing my cheek. Quiet.

[Angeltoes]

The thing is

by Ellen Bass

to love life, to love it even
when you have no stomach for it
and everything you've held dear
crumbles like burnt paper in your hands,
your throat filled with the silt of it.
When grief sits with you, its tropical heat
thickening the air, heavy as water
more fit for gills than lungs;
when grief weights you like your own flesh
only more of it, an obesity of grief,
you think, How can a body withstand this?
Then you hold life like a face
between your palms, a plain face,
no charming smile, no violet eyes,
and you say, yes, I will take you
I will love you, again.

[Angeltoes]

Certain People

by Richard Jones

My father lives by the ocean
and drinks his morning coffee
in the full sun on his deck,
talking to anyone
who walks by on the beach.
And in the afternoons he works
part-time at the golf course–
sailing the fairways like sea captain
in a white golf cart.
My father must talk
to a hundred people a day,
yet we haven't spoken in weeks.
As I get older, we hardly speak at all.
It's as if he were a stranger
and we had never met.
I wonder, if I
were a tourist on the beach
or a golfer lost in woods
and met him now for the very first time,
what we'd say to each other,
how his hand would feel in mine
as we introduced ourselves,
and if, as is the case
with certain people, I'd feel,
when I looked him in the eye,
I'd known him all my life.

[Angeltoes]

"Whatever one loves most is beautiful." --Sappho

[Angeltoes]

Falling Leaves and Early Snow
by Kenneth Rexroth

In the years to come they will say,
"They fell like the leaves
In the autumn of nineteen thirty-nine."
November has come to the forest,
To the meadows where we picked the cyclamen.
The year fades with the white frost
On the brown sedge in the hazy meadows,
Where the deer tracks were black in the morning.
Ice forms in the shadows;
Disheveled maples hang over the water;
Deep gold sunlight glistens on the shrunken stream.
Somnolent trout move through pillars of brown and gold.
The yellow maple leaves eddy above them,
The glittering leaves of the cottonwood,
The olive, velvety alder leaves,
The scarlet dogwood leaves,
Most poignant of all.

In the afternoon thin blades of cloud
Move over the mountains;
The storm clouds follow them;
Fine rain falls without wind.
The forest is filled with wet resonant silence.
When the rain pauses the clouds
Cling to the cliffs and the waterfalls.
In the evening the wind changes;
Snow falls in the sunset.
We stand in the snowy twilight
And watch the moon rise in a breach of cloud.
Between the black pines lie narrow bands of moonlight,
Glimmering with floating snow.
An owl cries in the sifting darkness.
The moon has a sheen like a glacier.

[Duchess]

Old friends pass away, new friends appear. It is just like the days. An old day passes, a new day arrives. The important thing is to make it meaningful: a meaningful friend - or a meaningful day.

~Dalai Lama