Finally, in 1888, Cixi approved the Western-style Navy Regulations. It was in endorsing these Regulations that she effectively unveiled China’s first national flag. The country had had no national ensign, until its engagement with the West at the b...
A smaller rocket cut across the sky, trailing smoke. It exploded in a red heart. "Awwwww!" said the crowd. "Upside down," said Sean. The heart was, indeed, upside down. It grew and grew, upside down, until it's lights trailed and faded. A bigger rock...
I'm starting to understand that attempting to be perfect has been the goal of my life. Our lives. Attempting to be this fault-free, smiling person in this loving, happy family that fits so perfectly in this pretty, inoffensive little town. What was s...
For a week the sun had been nothing but a puffy, seamless sheet of white, and this Tuesday had begun the same. But as the day progressed, the grayness receded like a mist, the sky’s white became more illumined from behind, then occasionally a patch...
So here's the deal: I speak up in class, I get sent to office. Megan speaks up in class, she's a "strong, assertive model student."I post a few flyers saying that the vending machines on school property are a sign that our school has sold out to corp...
England has her Stratford, Scotland has her Alloway, and America, too, has her Dresden. For there, on August 11, 1833, was born the and noblest of the Western World; an immense personality, -- unique, lovable, sublime; the peerless orator of all time...
Grace: Outside, deep in the woods, I heard a long keening wail, and then another, as the wolves began to howl. More voices pitched in, some low and mournful, others high and short, an eerie and beautiful chorus. I knew my wolf's howl; his rich tone s...
Now there was great rejoicing at the rumor of Alderic's quest, for all folk knew that he was a cautious man, and they deemed that he would succeed and enrich the world, and they rubbed their hands in the cities at the thought of largesse; and there w...
It's one of these juvenile therapy scams,” he went on, sprinkling a pinch of the Golden Virginia tobacco along the rolling paper. “They advertise help for your troubled teen by staring at the stars and singing ‘Kumbaya’. Instead, it’s a bun...
Yet when, one day, standing on the outskirts of Yokohama town, bristling with its display of modern miscellanies, I watched the sunset in your southern sea, and saw its peace and majesty among your pine-clad hills,—with the great Fujiyama growing f...
I touched the moon last night; a golden glow beyond my grasp. Eons before me it rested there. It will remain when I am dust. My hand now glows from the embrace. Voices echo through nights past, and with the glow, caress my face. My finger faints from...
When she walked by the two officers, they didn't recognize her. "Have you seen the luscious bonbon with the golden braids?" She grinned up at them with such impish mischief that they almost forgot their quest for the singer. "She is with her lover," ...
There is a level of consciousness between sleeping and fully wakening when the worries of the day have not settled upon us; the body is stilled, and the senses wholly receptive. If the sun is bright, there is pure silence, or the birds are beginning ...
My eyes went straight to a soft woman who sat facing the wrong way at the bar top. Soft, because I knew if I were to touch her skin, it would feel like a peach, the kind of woman you could almost smell from inside the building. Instead of facing Andy...
Perhaps ... To R.A.L. Perhaps some day the sun will shine again, And I shall see that still the skies are blue, And feel one more I do not live in vain, Although bereft of you. Perhaps the golden meadows at my feet, Will make the sunny hours of sprin...
If you want to draw some advantage from your history, you must accept not only this miracle but also many others. In memory, everything can become miraculous. All you have to do is wish it, and freezing winter turns into spring, miserable rooms fill ...
There is one secret place...it is beautiful and peaceful, where gentle water flows, and most beautiful garden grows, yet, nobody could ever go to... You reach deep within my soul drawing out all the dreams that I hid beneath the doubt for long castin...
Calm, gleam of your emerald kingdom raising my spirit beyond for perspective welcomes a smooth adventure with your golden waves of knowledge and wisdom nurturing the life within...never still, never quiet... Your voice calls out to me, and I follow t...
Don't wait for the right answer and the golden path to present themselves. This is precisely why you're stuck. Starting without seeing the end is difficult, so we often wait until we see the end, scanning relentlessly for the right way, the best way ...
When your heart flows broad and full like a river, a blessing and a danger to those living near: there is the origin of your virtue. When you are above praise and blame, and your will wants to command all things, like a lover's will: there is the ori...
Bithiah: Moses, do not enter! There is only sorrow here. Moses: Are you comforting it, my mother? I followed you here to find this woman Yochabe... [to Yochabel] Moses: You were the woman who was caught between the stones. Yochabel: Until you came. B...
