It seemed as if the mountains, wave after wave of them, were like the sea, going outward forever into distance, till, far away, they became engulfed in clouds, and joined—mountain and sky in one. Standing there on top, facing the enormity of the wo...
The more she thought about it, the more Madeleine understood that extreme solitude didn't just describe the way she was feeling about Leonard. It explained how she'd always felt when she was in love. It explained what love was like and, just maybe, w...
He never even thought of tenderness and emotion; his considerations about Durham remained cold. Durham didn't dislike him, he was sure. That was all he wanted. One thing at a time. He didn't so much as have hopes, for hope distracts, and he had a gre...
This is the age of the specialist, and years ago Rollo had settled on his career. Even as a boy, hardly capable of connected thought, he had been convinced that his speciality, the one thing he could do really well, was to inherit money.
What a funny girl, I thought, and then I realized something. To the three-year-old ye, and maybe even to the thirty year old eye, weeds and grass look very similar. Same color, same feeling, same texture.
Then Ben’s mouth descended again and her thoughts, as fickle as tiny fish, swam out of her head. Gentle brushes of his lips turned into more insistent strokes of his mouth. Sexually frustrated widow or not, there was little doubt the man could kiss...
Such excessive preoccupation with his faults is not a truly spiritual activity but, on the contrary, a highly egoistic one.The recognition of his own faults should make a man humbler, when it is beneficial, not prouder, which the thought that he ough...
Now an extraordinary and helpful fact is that by making Mind the object of our attention, not only does the serenity which is its nature begin to well up of its own accord but its steady unchanging character itself helps spontaneously to repel all di...
Life is given to us to be lived...Most of us spend an entire lifetime preparing to live." What is it that you are doing ...LIVING or PREPARING TO LIVE at some point ! Are you waiting for the IF AND WHEN THAT HAPPENS or Are you living NOW ! A thought ...
Some people say dying alone is a fate worse than death itself. Well, they should try being alone during the living part sometimes. There's no quicker way to make you wonder why the hell you ever thought you'd want to return.
All I feel are the assaults of apprehension and terror at the thought that I am the only one who is entirely unlike the rest. It is almost impossible for me to converse with other people. What should I talk about, how should I say it? - I don't know.
I always thought when I got older that God would sort of come into my life in some way. He didn't. I don't blame him. If I was him I'd have the same opinion about me that he does.
Excuse me?" I said, palms down on the Formica tabletop. "Coffee? I thought we came here for pie." "I don't eat the kind of pie they serve here." I felt a flash of heat go through my stomach. I knew firsthand the kind of pie Ranger liked.
Men, she thought, were one of the world's few sure comforts, like a fire on a cold October night, like cocoa, like broken-in-slippers. Their clumsy affections, their bristly faces, and their willingness to do what needed to be done - cook an omelette...
Word like that, others' opinions of you, shouldn't have that kind of power, Saint." But they did and therein lay the problem. I was always guilty of letting other people's words and actions hurt me and dictate how I felt about myself, and it was cost...
Who did she know in Raleigh who took the time off to fix a house? Or read Whitman or Eliot, finding images in the mind, thoughts of the spirit? Or hunted dawn from the bow of a canoe? These weren't the things that drove society, but she felt they sho...
And after his unparsable response, including a passage where he said he was 'blurring the boundaries between a thing and thought,' she said, 'Thank you, I get lost sometimes,' while laying two fingers on his folded arm.
I think of the memory as being rather like a dam," he said, after a pause for thought. "It irrigates and gives life to our whole spirit. But, like a dam, it needs overflow channels if it's not to burst its banks. Because if it ever does overflow or b...
He raised himself above her pallid face and kissed her on both closed eyes and thought: she thinks she is taking and does not know that she is giving; in her loneliness she has fled to me and does not suspect my loneliness.
The ice cube melted slowly like a candle, and I thought about my love for her and how it was like an ice cube candle and that I’ve always wanted to drink fire and make love with the ferociousness of a cooked spaghetti noodle.
In the park I saw an empty bench, and I thought, “That’s like my love for her.” At first I was sad, but then I smiled when I realized I’m more of a sofa kind of guy.
