Songs remain. They last. The right song can turn an emperor into a laughing-stock, can bring down dynasties. A song can last long after the events and the people in it are dust and dreams are gone. That's the power of songs.
Her blonde tresses now lay unbound and flowing in comely waves down her back, like pale serpents against the blue sea of her costume.
...What does the blessing of heaven mean? We know the kirin is just an animal, not a mythical creature." It has become a symbol now.... That is the way human beings deal with the world.
We are in the middle of what looks increasingly like the zombie apocalypse. Moaning people don't need help. Moaning people are intending to eat us.
I work in a restaurant in an airport in Taiwan. I am eighteen years old and I don’t like my job because everyone gets on planes and leaves. And I want to leave too.
Charity groped for the phone, coming up with it at last and croaking "hello" in a voice that sounded exactly like a bullfrog's mating call. Which made a kind of twisted sense -- last night she'd been hunting for a mate as well.
The wretch, concentred all in self, Living, shall forfeit fair renown, And, doubly dying, shall go down To the vile dust, from whence he sprung, Unwept, unhonored, and unsung.
A life is no less valuable or beloved if one lives in an age of decline, than in an age of progress.
It is possible, however, that the artist is both thin-skinned and prophetic and, like the canary lowered into the mine shaft to test the air, has caught a whiff of something lethal.
I'd watched too many schoolmates graduate into mental institutions, into group homes and jails, and I knew that locking people up was paranormal - against normal, not beside it. Locks didn't cure; they strangled.
The Americans have perfected weather forecasts: a model presents a model of the Earth, a map, and jabs at it with her pointer – here and here, this is going to happen. Voodoo.
Wait," said Butler. "Just wait, Holly. Artemis has a plan." He squinted through the green dome. "What is your plan, Artemis?" All Artemis could do was smile and shrug.
I don’t have home without him”, Carrie said when doctor asked her to go home. “I won’t give up on him. Do you hear me, Doctor? Don’t you give up on him!
I don't remember ordering the bride of an evil maniac," said Magnus. "It was definitely beef and broccoli. What about you, Tessa? Did you order the bride of an evil maniac?
Because I was single, there was a chance I was a homosexual. Because I went to Syracuse, wherever that was, then I was probably a Communist. Or worse, a Liberal. Because I was from Memphis, I was a subversive intent on embarrassing Ford County.
I’d compare college tuition to paying for a personal trainer at an athletic club. We professors play the roles of trainers, giving people access to the equipment (books, labs, our expertise) and after that, it is our job to be demanding.
But don't blame me for the food. My wife knows a hundred and one ways to incinerate a cow, and as far as I can tell she's still experimenting.
God comes to each of us in the form we can best perceive Him. To you, just now, He was a heron. To someone else, He might come as a flower or even a breeze.
Want to have a short phone call with someone? Call them at 11:55 a.m., right before lunch. They'll talk fast. You may think you are interesting, but you are not more interesting than lunch.
But secondly you say 'society must exact vengeance, and society must punish'. Wrong on both counts. Vengeance comes from the individual and punishment from God.
And when demigods use cell phones, the signals agitate every monster within a hundred miles. It's like sending up a flare: Here I am! Please rearrange my face!
