“
You think, as you walk away from Le Cirque des Rêves and into the creeping dawn, that you felt more awake within the confines of the circus.
You are no longer quite certain which side of the fence is the dream.
”
”
Erin Morgenstern (The Night Circus)
“
Only that day dawns to which we are awake. There is more day to dawn. The sun is but a morning star.
”
”
Henry David Thoreau (Walden)
“
When one door closes, find another."
Kylie gazed back up. "And what if there isn't another door?"
"Then you try the window."
"And if there's not a window?" Kylie asked.
"Then you find a sledgehammer and make a window.
”
”
C.C. Hunter (Awake at Dawn (Shadow Falls, #2))
“
What you are doesn't matter. Because what you are isn't going to change who you are.
”
”
C.C. Hunter (Awake at Dawn (Shadow Falls, #2))
“
We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake, not by mechanical aids, but by an infinite expectation of the dawn, which does not forsake us even in our soundest sleep. I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by a conscious endeavour. It is something to be able to paint a particular picture, or to carve a statue, and so to make a few objects beautiful; but it is far more glorious to carve and paint the very atmosphere and medium through which we look, which morally we can do. To affect the quality of the day, that is the highest of arts.
”
”
Henry David Thoreau (Walden)
“
Life isn't supposed to be easy. Generally speaking, the harder something is the more rewarding the results will be.
”
”
C.C. Hunter (Awake at Dawn (Shadow Falls, #2))
“
She leaned into him to soak up his warmth.
"You are so hot," she said.
"It's about time you noticed," he teased.
”
”
C.C. Hunter (Awake at Dawn (Shadow Falls, #2))
“
Why does ice cream go with a broken heart?” Kylie asked. “Because if you eat enough of it, it freezes the heart and numbs the pain for a bit,
”
”
C.C. Hunter (Awake at Dawn (Shadow Falls, #2))
“
Maybe I'm a supernatural retard.
”
”
C.C. Hunter (Awake at Dawn (Shadow Falls, #2))
“
Thanks, but that's not going to fix anything. It's like putting a Band-Aid on a bullet wound.
”
”
C.C. Hunter (Awake at Dawn (Shadow Falls, #2))
“
Let this be the hour when we draw swords together. Fell deeds awake. Now for wrath, now for ruin, and the red dawn. Forth, Eorlingas!
”
”
J.R.R. Tolkien (The Lord of the Rings (Spark Notes))
“
That woman is the most difficult, the most stubborn redhead I've ever had the displeasure of meeting."
He shot off, leaving only a blurry streak in his wake.
"And you're falling in love with her," Kylie whispered.
”
”
C.C. Hunter (Awake at Dawn (Shadow Falls, #2))
“
I’m so sleepy.”
“My beautiful girl, dawn nears. And all good vampires are to bed.”
She eased up, arching a brow at him. “Then you’ll stay awake.
”
”
Kresley Cole (Lothaire (Immortals After Dark, #11))
“
I missed you all my life,” Kylie said. “I
didn’t know I missed you, but I know it now. You were supposed to be
there.
”
”
C.C. Hunter (Awake at Dawn (Shadow Falls, #2))
“
Being committed or loyal to someone doesn’t mean you won’t ever be attracted to someone else. It means you won’t physically act upon the attraction.
”
”
C.C. Hunter (Awake at Dawn (Shadow Falls, #2))
“
Wow,” Kylie muttered, and grinned.
“Yeah, wow.” Della leaned in closer. “I think Perry just grew a pair.”
Kylie bit down on her lip to keep from laughing. “If this was a movie,
there would be some music playing in the background.”
“I could sing,” Della chuckled.
“And ruin it,” Kylie teased back. “I’ve heard you singing in the
shower.” Both grinning, they looked back at the kissing couple.
”
”
C.C. Hunter (Awake at Dawn (Shadow Falls, #2))
“
You're attracted to him," Kylie said. "And don't try to deny it. You've even admitted that much to me."
"Okay, I won't deny that. He's got that whole hard body, vampire magnetism going for him. But when I was young, I had a crush on Big Bird. That wouldn't have worked out either.
”
”
C.C. Hunter (Awake at Dawn (Shadow Falls, #2))
“
Just because a person is young doesn’t mean that being loyal to someone isn’t important. And it still hurts if someone isn’t loyal to you.
”
”
C.C. Hunter (Awake at Dawn (Shadow Falls, #2))
“
Foolishness sleeps soundly, while knowledge turns with each thinking hour, longing for the dawn of answers.
”
”
Anthony Liccione
“
You knocked the door down." Disbelief rang in his matter-of-fact tone.
"I know," she answered,unable to say anything else. Unable to look away from his body.
"But it's solid oak."
"I know." She felt the solid oak beneath her and a little shocked that she'd done it, too. If it mattered at all, her shoulder felt a little bruised. And it was the slight pain that brought some reality back into the moment.
"You don't have any clothes on." Oh, God, did she really say that?
”
”
C.C. Hunter (Awake at Dawn (Shadow Falls, #2))
“
When we care about people, we sometimes overstep our grounds.
”
”
C.C. Hunter (Awake at Dawn (Shadow Falls, #2))
“
A verbal ménage à trois,” Della said.
“Gross,” Miranda said.
“You wanna hear gross?” Della asked. “I just peed on my hand trying
to piss on this damned drug stick while talking on the phone to you.”
Kylie laughed. “I miss you guys.” The sound of a toilet flushing filled
the line.
“Oh, double gross,” Miranda snapped. “I told you not to flush while I
was on the phone.
”
”
C.C. Hunter (Awake at Dawn (Shadow Falls, #2))
“
Long story short, ghosts just coming out of the closet sucked at communication. Probably as bad as a beginner ghost whisperer sucked at getting them to communicate.
”
”
C.C. Hunter (Awake at Dawn (Shadow Falls, #2))
“
Friday morning, Kylie, Miranda, and Della, each carting suitcases, walked
the trail to meet up with their parents. They walked slowly, like condemned prisoners moving to their executions.
“I’m going to be peeing on a drug test stick every hour,” Della
muttered.
Miranda sighed. “I’m going to screw up at my competition and my
mom is going to give me up for adoption.”
“I’m going to a ghost hunt,” Kylie added. Both girls looked at her.
“Don’t ask.
”
”
C.C. Hunter (Awake at Dawn (Shadow Falls, #2))
“
There are days when she mourns the prospect of another year, another decade, another century. There are nights when she cannot sleep, moments when she lies awake and dreams of dying.
But then she wakes, and sees the pink and orange dawn against the clouds, or hears the lament of a lone fiddle, the music and the melody, and remembers there is such beauty in the world.
And she does not want to miss it—any of it.
”
”
Victoria E. Schwab (The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue)
“
God won’t give you more than you can handle.’” Holiday chuckled. “And we just wish He didn’t trust us so much, right?
”
”
C.C. Hunter (Awake at Dawn (Shadow Falls, #2))
“
See,” he said playfully, and arched his eyebrows. “Admit it.” He moved in. His mouth ame so close to hers that she could practically feel it moving when he spoke.
“Admit what?” She put a little tease in her own voice, hoping she drove him crazy as he drove her.
“Admit that you like my kisses and yes to going out with me
”
”
C.C. Hunter (Awake at Dawn (Shadow Falls, #2))
“
Whatever you are, whatever gifts you end up getting, you’ll find that time will make those changes less scary as well.
”
”
C.C. Hunter (Awake at Dawn (Shadow Falls, #2))
“
We awake at dawn.
To sink or swim.
”
”
Kiera Woodhull (Chaos of the Mind)
“
[H]e lay awake, dreading the dawn when he would have to say good-bye to the small universe he had built for himself over the years.
”
”
Carlos Ruiz Zafón (The Prince of Mist (Niebla, #1))
“
to one whose elastic and vigorous thoughts keep pace with the sun, the day is a perpetual morning. It matters not the labors and attitudes of men, morning is when I am awake and there is dawn in me.
”
”
Henry David Thoreau
“
ONLY THE DAY DAWNS TO WHICH WE ARE AWAKE,IF WE ARE TO GRASP THE REALITY OF OUR LIFE WHILE WE HAVE IT,WE WILL NEED TO WAKE UP TO OUR MOMENTS,OTHERWISE,WHOLE DAYS,EVEN A WHOLE LIFE COULD SLIP BY UNNOTICED..
”
”
Henry David Thoreau (Walden)
“
Then from those profound slumbers we awake in a dawn, not knowing who we are, being nobody, newly born, ready for anything, the brain emptied of that past which was life until then. And perhaps it is more wonderful still when our landing at the waking-point is abrupt and the thoughts of our sleep, hidden by a cloak of oblivion, have no time to return to us gradually, before sleep ceases. Then, from the black storm through which we seem to have passed (but we do not even say we), we emerge prostrate, without a thought, a we that is void of content.
”
”
Marcel Proust (Sodom and Gomorrah)
“
Holiday's eyes pooled with tears. And that pretty much made it a cry fest. Even Della joined in the tear party.
Right then, Burnett walked in the office. His gaze went from one female to the other. Kylie could almost hear him groaning inwardly.
"I...I'll be...right out there." Obviously even a hard-bodied vampire trained by the FRU wasn't capable of dealing with four crying women.
”
”
C.C. Hunter (Awake at Dawn (Shadow Falls, #2))
“
The living and the dead,
The awake and the sleeping,
The young and the old are all one and the same.
When the ones change, they become the others.
When those shift again, they become these again.
God is day and night.
God is winter and summer.
God is war and peace.
God is fertility and famine.
He transforms into many things.
Day and night are one.
Goodness and badness are one.
The beginning and the end of a circle are one.
”
”
Yukio Mishima (The Temple of Dawn (The Sea of Fertility, #3))
“
Okay, Kylie had put her foot in her mouth before, but she'd never had it in there so deep she felt her toes wiggling against her tonsils.
”
”
C.C. Hunter (Awake at Dawn (Shadow Falls, #2))
“
Kylie stormed into Holiday's office. She dropped down into the seat across from the desk and looked her friend and camp leader right in the eyes. "I hate boys. I'm seriously considering going lesbian."
Holiday's expression was part grin, part groan. "If it was that easy, ninety percent of the women in the world would be gay." She made a funny little face and then asked, "So...boy problems?
”
”
C.C. Hunter (Awake at Dawn (Shadow Falls, #2))
“
Sometimes...I’d lie awake in the dark, right before dawn, and wonder if I’d ever be glad to see morning again. If I’d ever really come out on the other side.
”
”
Justine Davis (The Morning Side of Dawn (Holt, #3))
“
We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake, not by mechanical aids, but by an infinite expectation of the dawn, which does not forsake us in our soundest sleep.
”
”
Henry David Thoreau
“
Morning is when I'm awake, and there is dawn in me.
”
”
Henry David Thoreau (Walden)
“
And at 3am you sit near the window and wonder if there is magic... because all you need are some fairies to take your pain away and help you sleep... you take a book to read... you take a pen and a paper to write...you cling on some music that might just make you fall asleep... yet nothing helps... another sleepless night and all you want is the dawn to break soon....
”
”
Sanhita Baruah
“
Tess was awake before dawn — at the marginal minute of the dark when the grove is still mute, save for one prophetic bird who sings with a clear-voiced conviction that he at least knows the correct time of day, the rest preserving silence as if equally convinced that he is mistaken.
”
”
Thomas Hardy (Tess of the D’Urbervilles)
“
In between waking up from bed in the morning and going back in the evening, let something happen. God will bless that “something” for you.
”
”
Israelmore Ayivor (Become a Better You)
“
Night Watch
Awake for hours and staring at the ceiling
Through the unsettled stillness of the night
He grows possessed of the obsessive feeling
That dawn has come and gone and brought no light.
”
”
Vikram Seth
“
It was an hour before dawn. When all the Whos down in Whoville were asnooze in their beds without care. Sorry, wrong book. If I get to stay awake until dawn, I get just a tad slaphappy.
”
”
Laurell K. Hamilton (Circus of the Damned (Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter, #3))
“
I believed in Oxford, and cobblestoned squares, and old bricks thick with ivy,a nd rainy days curled up reading books. I believed in my mother's strong coffee and in the lonely, aching scent of early dawn before anyone else in my boardinghouse was awake. I believed in my favorite men's cardigan and the way the wind felt on the back of my neck. I believed in life as it lay before me, spinning out slowly, day after day of warm springs and thunderstorms and laughter. These were the things I believed in.
”
”
Simone St. James (An Inquiry into Love and Death)
“
A Blessing; May the light of your soul guide you; May the light of your soul bless the work you do with the secret love and warmth of your heart; May you see in what you do the beauty of your own soul; May the sacredness of your work bring healing, light and renewal to those who work with you and to those who see and receive your work; May your work never weary you; May it release within you wellsprings of refreshment, inspiration and excitement; May you be present in what you do. May you never become lost in the bland absences; May the day never burden; May dawn find you awake and alert, approaching your new day with dreams, possibilities and promises; May evening find you gracious and fulfilled; May you go into the night blessed, sheltered and protected; May your soul calm, console and renew you.
”
”
John O'Donohue
“
Only at dawn should a man awake from excess - at dawn agleam with red and sorrowful resolve.
”
”
Patrick Hamilton (Twenty Thousand Streets Under the Sky (Twenty Thousand Streets Under the Sky, #1-3))
“
Before you speak... I have already heard. Before you see... I had seen a million times. Before you reach... I came and departed, so is the way and life of a versatile soul.
”
”
Michael Bassey Johnson
“
I rejoice that there are owls. Let them do the idiotic and maniacal hooting for men. It is a sound admirably suited to swamps and twilight woods which no day illustrates, suggesting a vast and undeveloped nature which men have not recognized. They represent the stark twilight and unsatisfied thoughts which all have. All day the sun has shown on the surface of some savage swamp, where the double spruce stands hung with usnea lichens, and small hawks circulate above, and the chickadee lisps amid the evergreens, and the partridge and rabbit skulk beneath; and now a more dismal and fitting day dawns, and a different race of creatures awakes to express the meaning of Nature there.
”
”
Henry David Thoreau
“
The light which puts out our eyes is darkness to us. Only that day dawns to which we are awake. There is more day to dawn. The sun is but a morning star.
”
”
Henry David Thoreau
“
You saw me. Not the chair or the injury. You saw me. It was the first time I’d felt … seen. Felt awake, in a long time.
”
”
Sarah J. Maas (Tower of Dawn (Throne of Glass, #6))
“
But Ruhn lay awake, holding her tight, and did not let go until dawn.
”
”
Sarah J. Maas (House of Flame and Shadow (Crescent City, #3))
“
The rain is, in a sense,
The sole sad friend of those who find themselves
Thinking, wide awake, until the dawn,
Who, in bed, alone, with fevered hands,
Listen to it, soothed. They like the company
Of its faint moan across the sleeping plain,
Its rustling in the garden all night long.
- On the Great Grey Road (Sur ce Grand Chemin Gris...)
”
”
Alain-Fournier (Poems)
“
You never answered," he said. "You got the hots for me, or not?" His dark eyes lit up with a smile.
Squaring her shoulders, Holiday started talking. "Della assumed I might have the hots for you. And you know what they say about assuming, right?"
“It makes an ass out of you and me," Della answered, and gave Kylie the elbow. "Get it. A.S.S.U.M.E."
Holiday cut her eyes to Della in visual reprimand, then started walking away. She got three steps and swung back around. "Are you coming?" she snapped at Burnett.
"You didn't ask me to," He answered.
"Well, I assumed you would know I needed to discuss what happened."
He arched one dark brow upward. "And what did you just about assuming?
”
”
C.C. Hunter (Awake at Dawn (Shadow Falls, #2))
“
Normally death came at night, taking a person in their sleep, stopping their heart or tickling them awake, leading them to the bathroom with a splitting headache before pouncing and flooding their brain with blood. It waits in alleys and metro stops. After the sun goes down plugs are pulled by white-clad guardians and death is invited into an antiseptic room.
But in the country death comes, uninvited, during the day. It takes fishermen in their longboats. It grabs children by the ankles as they swim. In winter it calls them down a slope too steep for their budding skills, and crosses their skies at the tips. It waits along the shore where snow met ice not long ago but now, unseen by sparkling eyes, a little water touches the shore, and the skater makes a circle slightly larger than intended. Death stands in the woods with a bow and arrow at dawn and dusk. And it tugs cars off the road in broad daylight, the tires spinning furiously on ice or snow, or bright autumn leaves.
”
”
Louise Penny (Still Life (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache, #1))
“
I am so tired; all I want to do is sleep. I want to sleep all the day, from dawn until twilight that every evening comes a little earlier and a little more drearily. In the daytime, all I can think about is sleeping. But in the night I do is try to stay awake.
”
”
Philippa Gregory (The White Princess (The Plantagenet and Tudor Novels, #5))
“
Over the weekend, Bruce introduced me to the game of backgammon, which was enjoying almost cult-like popularity in Los Angeles. He told me about a private club called PIPS that held tournaments on the weekends and was all the rage. Though I had never played the game before, something about backgammon brought the two hemispheres of my brain together, as Stuart had described.
To win at backgammon, one needs strategy and luck. Bruce reveled in the role of playing teacher, and I knew if I put my mind to it, I could learn the game and become a fierce opponent, which I hoped would amuse Bruce and help keep a roof over my head. We stayed awake until dawn, snorting coke and playing backgammon. I don’t know if it was the game or the cocaine, but something made me intent on becoming the best.
”
”
Samantha Hart (Blind Pony: As True A Story As I Can Tell)
“
May the light of your soul guide you; May the light of your soul bless the work you do with the secret love and warmth of your heart; May you see in what you do the beauty of your own soul; May the sacredness of your work bring healing, light and renewal to those who work with you and to those who see and receive your work; May your work never weary you; May it release within you wellsprings of refreshment, inspiration and excitement; May you be present in what you do. May you never become lost in the bland absences; May the day never burden; May dawn find you awake and alert, approaching your new day with dreams, possibilities and promises; May evening find you gracious and fulfilled; May you go into the night blessed, sheltered and protected; May your soul calm, console and renew you.
”
”
John O'Donohue
“
Dawn is a friend of the muses, even if they aren't awake to appreciate it.
”
”
Kimberly Morgan (On Angels and Rabbit Holes)
“
Why me?"
“Because I lie awake at night, dreaming of all the things I want to do to your body, of leaving marks on your skin so that everyone knows that you are mine. And only mine.” He leaned back against one of the larger metal tables. “But you fight yourself even as you fight me, and I love that, too. I love watching you squirm, because it gives me some idea of how you'll look when I'm inside you. I want to be your last thought at night, and your first taste at dawn. I want to teach you, own you, control you.
”
”
Nenia Campbell (Horrorscape (Horrorscape, #2))
“
It was the cool gray dawn, and there was a delicious sense of repose and peace in the deep pervading calm and silence of the woods. Not a leaf stirred; not a sound obtruded upon great Nature's meditation [...] Gradually the cool dim gray of the morning whitened, and as gradually sounds multiplied and life manifested itself. The marvel of Nature shaking off sleep and going to work unfolded itself to the musing boy [...] All Nature was wide awake and stirring, now; long lances of sunlight pierced down through the dense foliage far and near, and a few butterflies came fluttering upon the scene.
”
”
Mark Twain (The Adventures of Tom Sawyer)
“
We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake, not by mechanical aids, but by an infinite expectation of the dawn.
”
”
Henry David Thoreau
“
Desearía que pudieras verte a través de mis ojos. Desearía que pudieras ver lo especial que eres.
”
”
C.C. Hunter (Awake at Dawn (Shadow Falls, #2))
“
A Remedy for Insomnia
Not sheep coming down the hills,
not cracks on the ceiling--
count the ones you loved,
the former tenants of dreams
who would keep you awake,
once meant the world to you,
rocked you in their arms,
those who loved you...
You will fall asleep, by dawn, in tears.
”
”
Vera Pavlova
“
Over the vistas broke a cold gray light, such as seen in those false dawns that are neither night nor true morning, when the world and all its contents seem but shapes of mist, formed in vain hope and desire... If you awake from troubled sleep at such a time, you can only sit by the window and think of those that have been lost to you, those that followed your parents into those cold and heartless regions below the grass, silent and dark. Eventually, morning comes and the world resumes its solidity, but another tiny thread of ice has been stitched into your heart forever.
”
”
K.W. Jeter (Morlock Night)
“
If I’m lonely
it must be the loneliness
of waking first, of breathing
dawns’ first cold breath on the city
of being the one awake
in a house wrapped in sleep
If I’m lonely
it’s with the rowboat ice-fast on the shore
in the last red light of the year
that knows what it is, that knows it’s neither
ice nor mud nor winter light
but wood, with a gift for burning
from “Song
”
”
Adrienne Rich (Diving Into the Wreck)
“
Between the roof of the shed and the big plant that hangs over the fence from the house next door I could see the constellation Orion. People say that Orion is called Orion because Orion was a hunter and the constellation looks like a hunter with a club and a bow and arrow, like this:
But this is really silly because it is just stars, and you could join up the dots in any way you wanted, and you could make it look like a lady with an umbrella who is waving, or the coffeemaker which Mrs. Shears has, which is from Italy, with a handle and steam coming out, or like a dinosaur.
And there aren't any lines in space, so you could join bits of Orion to bits of Lepus or Taurus or Gemini and say that they were a constellation called the Bunch of Grapes or Jesus or the Bicycle (except that they didn't have bicycles in Roman and Greek times, which was when they called Orion Orion). And anyway, Orion is not a hunter or a coffeemaker or a dinosaur. It is just Betelgeuse and Bellatrix and Alnilam and Rigel and 17 other stars I don't know the names of. And they are nuclear explosions billions of miles away. And that is the truth.
I stayed awake until 5:47. That was the last time I looked at my watch before I fell asleep. It has a luminous face and lights up if you press a button, so I could read it in the dark. I was cold and I was frightened Father might come out and find me. But I felt safer in the garden because I was hidden. I looked at the sky a lot. I like looking up at the sky in the garden at night. In summer I sometimes come outside at night with my torch and my planisphere, which is two circles of plastic with a pin through the middle. And on the bottom is a map of the sky and on top is an aperture which is an opening shaped in a parabola and you turn it round to see a map of the sky that you can see on that day of the year from the latitude 51.5° north, which is the latitude that Swindon is on, because the largest bit of the sky is always on the other side of the earth.
And when you look at the sky you know you are looking at stars which are hundreds and thousands of light-years away from you. And some of the stars don't even exist anymore because their light has taken so long to get to us that they are already dead, or they have exploded and collapsed into red dwarfs. And that makes you seem very small, and if you have difficult things in your life it is nice to think that they are what is called negligible, which means that they are so small you don't have to take them into account when you are calculating something.
I didn't sleep very well because of the cold and because the ground was very bumpy and pointy underneath me and because Toby was scratching in his cage a lot. But when I woke up properly it was dawn and the sky was all orange and blue and purple and I could hear birds singing, which is called the Dawn Chorus. And I stayed where I was for another 2 hours and 32 minutes, and then I heard Father come into the garden and call out, "Christopher...? Christopher...?
”
”
Mark Haddon (The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time)
“
She had been struck by the figure of a woman's back in a mirror. She stopped and looked. The dress the figure wore was the color called ashes of roses, and Ada stood, held in place by a sharp stitch of envy or th woman's dress and the fine shape of her back and her thick dark hair and the sense of assurance she seemed to evidence in her very posture.
Then Ada took a step forward, and the other woman did too, and Ada realized that it was herself she was admiring, the mirror having caught the reflection of an opposite mirror on the wall behind her. The light of the lamps and the tint of the mirrors had conspired to shift colors, bleaching mauve to rose. She climbed the steps to her room and prepared for bed, but she slept poorly that night, for the music went on until dawn. As she lay awake she thought how odd it had felt to win her own endorsement.
”
”
Charles Frazier (Cold Mountain)
“
In the early days of her pupilage with Maurice, he had told Maisie of his teachers, the wise men who spoke of the veil that was lifted in the early hours, of the all-seeing eye that was open before the day was awake. The hours before dawn were the sacred time, before the intellect rose from slumber. At this time one’s inner voice could be heard.
”
”
Jacqueline Winspear (Maisie Dobbs (Maisie Dobbs, #1))
“
It was a still night, tinted with the promise of dawn. A crescent moon was just setting. Ankh-Morpork, largest city in the lands around the Circle Sea, slept.
That statement is not really true On the one hand, those parts of the city which normally concerned themselves with, for example, selling vegetables, shoeing horses, carving exquisite small jade ornaments, changing money and making tables, on the whole, slept. Unless they had insomnia. Or had got up in the night, as it might be, to go to the lavatory. On the other hand, many of the less law-abiding citizens were wide awake and, for instance, climbing through windows that didn’t belong to them, slitting throats, mugging one another, listening to loud music in smoky cellars and generally having a lot more fun. But most of the animals were asleep, except for the rats. And the bats, too, of course. As far as the insects were concerned…
The point is that descriptive writing is very rarely entirely accurate and during the reign of Olaf Quimby II as Patrician of Ankh some legislation was passed in a determined attempt to put a stop to this sort of thing and introduce some honesty into reporting. Thus, if a legend said of a notable hero that “all men spoke of his prowess” any bard who valued his life would add hastily “except for a couple of people in his home village who thought he was a liar, and quite a lot of other people who had never really heard of him.” Poetic simile was strictly limited to statements like “his mighty steed was as fleet as the wind on a fairly calm day, say about Force Three,” and any loose talk about a beloved having a face that launched a thousand ships would have to be backed by evidence that the object of desire did indeed look like a bottle of champagne.
”
”
Terry Pratchett (The Light Fantastic (Discworld, #2; Rincewind, #2))
“
In my dream, in my last morning-dream, I stood today on a promontory— beyond the world; I held a pair of scales, and weighed the world.
Alas, that the rosy dawn came too early to me: she glowed me awake, the jealous one! Jealous is she always of the glows of my morning-dream.
”
”
Friedrich Nietzsche
“
In my dream, in my last morning-dream, I stood today on a promontory— beyond the world; I held a pair of scales, and weighed the world."
Alas, that the rosy dawn came too early to me: she glowed me awake, the jealous one! Jealous is she always of the glows of my morning-dream.
”
”
Friedrich Nietzsche
“
In the early hours of the morning the house was dark and quiet. […] and Elizabeth lay in bed wide awake. Images of Mr. Darcy’s face, his nod, and his tall, handsome demeanour flooded her thoughts. She knew that even if she were spared these thoughts by sleep coming upon her, he would invade her dreams. And when she did fall asleep just before dawn,he was there just as she had expected.
”
”
Kara Louise (Only Mr. Darcy Will Do)
“
The step through the gates that takes you from painted grounf to bare grass feels heavy.
You think, as you walk away from Le Cirque des Reves and into the creeping dawn, that you felt more awake within the confines of the circus.
You are no longer quite certain which side of the fence is the dream.
”
”
Erin Morgenstern (The Night Circus)
“
The step through the gates that takes you from painted ground to bare grass feels heavy.
You think, as you walk away from Le Cirque des Reves and into the creeping dawn, that you felt more awake within the confines of the circus.
You are no longer quite certain which side of the fence is the dream.
”
”
Erin Morgenstern (The Night Circus)
“
The tolling bell
Measures time not our time, rung by the unhurried
Ground swell, a time
Older than the time of chronometers, older
Than time counted by anxious worried women
lying awake, calculating the future,
Trying to unweave, unwind, unravel
And piece together the past and the future,
Between midnight and dawn, when the past is all deception,
The future futureless, before the morning watch
When time stops and time is never ending;
And the ground swell, that is and was from the beginning,
Clangs
The Bell
”
”
T.S. Eliot (Four Quartets)
“
There are nights when she cannot sleep, moments when she lies awake and dreams of dying. But then she wakes, and sees the pink and orange dawn against the clouds, or hears the lament of a lone fiddle, the music and the melody, and remembers there is such beauty in the world. And she does not want to miss it—any of it.
”
”
Victoria E. Schwab (The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue)
“
Think of all the things that you, alone, don't have to do. You don't have to turn out your light when you want to read, because somebody else wants to sleep. You don't have to have the light on when you want to sleep, because somebody else wants to read. You don't have to...lie awake listening to snores, or be vivacious when you're tired, or cheerful when you're blue, or sympathetic when you're bored. You probably have your bathroom all go yourself too, which is unquestionably one of Life's Great Blessings...From dusk until dawn, you can do exactly as you please, which, after all, is a pretty good allotment in this world where a lot of conforming is expected of everyone.
”
”
Marjorie Hillis
“
At some point in the night she had a dream. Or it was possible that she was partially awake, and was only remembering a dream? She was alone among the rocks on a dark coast beside the sea. The water surged upward and fell back languidly, and in the distance she heard surf breaking slowly on a sandy shore. It was comforting to be this close to the surface of the ocean and gaze at the intimate nocturnal details of its swelling and ebbing. And as she listened to the faraway breakers rolling up onto the beach, she became aware of another sound entwined with the intermittent crash of waves: a vast horizontal whisper across the bossom of the sea, carrying an ever-repeated phrase, regular as a lighthouse flashing: Dawn will be breaking soon. She listened a long time: again and again the scarcely audible words were whispered across the moving water. A great weight was being lifted slowly from her; little by little her happiness became more complete, and she awoke. Then she lay for a few minutes marveling the dream, and once again fell asleep.
”
”
Paul Bowles (Up Above the World)
“
But then he was awake, his lips forming a half-sleepy greeting, and his hand was already reaching for mine. We lay there, like that, until the cave was bright with morning, and Chiron called.
We ate, then ran to the river to walk. I savored the miracle of being able to watch him openly, to enjoy the play of dappled light on his limbs, the curving of his back as he drove beneath the water. Later, we lay on the riverbank, learning the lines of each other's bodies anew. This, and this and this. We were like gods at the dawning of the world, and our joy was so bright we could see nothing else but the other.
”
”
Madeline Miller (The Song of Achilles)
“
TIME THERE SEEMED TO PASS DIFFERENTLY. WHEN YOU ARE shut off from the world, every day is exactly the same as the one before. This sameness has a way of wearing down your soul until you become nothing but a breathing, toiling, consuming thing that awakes to the sun and sleeps at the dawning of the dark. The emptiness runs deep, deeper with each slowing day, and you become increasingly invisible and inconsequential. That’s how I felt at times, a tiny insect circling itself, only to continue, and continue. There, in that relentless vacuum, nothing moved. No news came in or out. No phone calls to or from anyone.
”
”
Suki Kim (Without You, There Is No Us: My Time with the Sons of North Korea's Elite)
“
Towards dawn he awoke. O what sweet music! His soul was all dewy wet. Over his limbs in sleep pale cool waves of light had passed. He lay still, as if his soul lay amid cool waters, conscious of faint sweet music. His mind was waking slowly to a tremulous morning knowledge, a morning inspiration. A spirit filled him, pure as the purest water, sweet as dew, moving as music. But how faintly it was inbreathed, how passionlessly, as if the seraphim themselves were breathing upon him! His soul was waking slowly, fearing to awake wholly. It was that windless hour of dawn when madness wakes and strange plants open to the light and the moth flies forth silently.
”
”
James Joyce (A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man)
“
To live is to hold your child, your own flesh, your very blood, in your arms. To see her smile and wrap five tiny fingers around just one of yours. To live is to hold your wife close to you as you lie in bed and listen to her breathe -- to fall asleep, one against the other, fitted as if you were made for each other, and then awaked in the dawn when she turns to you and whispers your name. To live is to walk your land, knowing every tree and footpath and foxhole, and come home to the smell of a pot of stew, boiling over the fire. Home, wife, children. That is what it is to live.
”
”
N. Gemini Sasson (Worth Dying For (The Bruce Trilogy, #2))
“
ON THE DEATH OF THE BELOVED Though we need to weep your loss, You dwell in that safe place in our hearts Where no storm or night or pain can reach you. Your love was like the dawn Brightening over our lives, Awakening beneath the dark A further adventure of color. The sound of your voice Found for us A new music That brightened everything. Whatever you enfolded in your gaze Quickened in the joy of its being; You placed smiles like flowers On the altar of the heart. Your mind always sparkled With wonder at things. Though your days here were brief, Your spirit was alive, awake, complete. We look toward each other no longer From the old distance of our names; Now you dwell inside the rhythm of breath, As close to us as we are to ourselves. Though we cannot see you with outward eyes, We know our soul’s gaze is upon your face, Smiling back at us from within everything To which we bring our best refinement. Let us not look for you only in memory, Where we would grow lonely without you. You would want us to find you in presence, Beside us when beauty brightens, When kindness glows And music echoes eternal tones. When orchids brighten the earth, Darkest winter has turned to spring; May this dark grief flower with hope In every heart that loves you. May you continue to inspire us: To enter each day with a generous heart. To serve the call of courage and love Until we see your beautiful face again In that land where there is no more separation, Where all tears will be wiped from our mind, And where we will never lose you again.
”
”
John O'Donohue (To Bless the Space Between Us: A Book of Blessings)
“
I believed in Oxford, and cobblestoned squares, and old bricks thick with ivy, a nd rainy days curled up reading books. I believed in my mother's strong coffee and in the lonely, aching scent of early dawn before anyone else in my boardinghouse was awake. I believed in my favorite men's cardigan and the way the wind felt on the back of my neck. I believed in life as it lay before me, spinning out slowly, day after day of warm springs and thunderstorms and laughter. These were the things I believed in.
”
”
Simone St. James (An Inquiry into Love and Death)
“
Make sure that you don’t get so absorbed and exhausted in taking care of all your day-by-day obligations that you lose track of the time and doze off, oblivious to God. The night is about over, dawn is about to break. Be up and awake to what God is doing! God is putting the finishing touches on the salvation work he began when we first believed. We can’t afford to waste a minute, must not squander these precious daylight hours in frivolity and indulgence, in sleeping around and dissipation, in bickering and grabbing everything in sight. Get out of bed and get dressed! Don’t loiter and linger, waiting until the very last minute. Dress yourselves in Christ, and be up and about! ROMANS 13:11 – 14 MSG
”
”
Christine Caine (Unstoppable: Running the Race You Were Born To Win)
“
We are, in a certain way, defined as much by our potential as by its expression. There is a great difference between an acorn and a little bit of wood carved into an acorn shape, a difference not always readily apparent to the naked eye. The difference is there even if an acorn never has the opportunity to plant itself and become an oak. Remembering its potential changes the way in which we think of an acorn and react to it. How we value it. If an acorn were conscious, knowing its potential would change the way it might think and feel about itself. The Hindus use the greeting "Namaste" instead of our more noncommittal "Hello." The connotation of this is roughly, whatever your outer appearance, I see and greet the soul in you. There is a wisdom in such ways of relating. Sometimes we can best help other people by remembering that what we believe about them may be reflected back to them in our presence and may affect them in ways we do not fully understand. Perhaps a sense of possibility is communicated by our tone of voice, facial expression, or certain choice of words . . .
Holding and conveying a sense of possibility does not mean making demands or having expectations. It may mean having no expectations, but simply being open to whatever promise the situation may hold and remembering the inability of anyone to know the future. Thoreau said that we must awaken and stay awake not by mechanical means, but by a constant expectation of the dawn. There's no need to demand the dawn, the dawn is simply a matter of time. And patience. And the dawn may look quite different from the story we tell ourselves about it. My experience has shown me the wisdom of remaining open to the possibility of growth in any and all circumstances, without ever knowing what shape that growth may take.
”
”
Rachel Naomi Remen (Kitchen Table Wisdom: Stories that Heal)
“
What sort of place had I come to, and among what kind of people? What sort of grim adventure was it on which I had embarked? ...I began to rub my eyes and pinch myself to see if I were awake. It all seemed like a horrible nightmare to me, and I expected that I should suddenly awake, and find myself at home, with the dawn struggling in through the windows, as I had now and again felt in the morning after a day of overwork. But my flesh answered the pinching test, and my eyes were not to be deceived. I was indeed awake and among the Carpathians. All I could do now was to be patient, and to wait the coming of the morning.
”
”
Elizabeth Kostova (The Historian)
“
AWAKENING To open both your drowsy eyes, To stretch your limbs and realise That day is here. To watch the dancing, shifting beam Of sun, awake yet half in dream, Uncertain if the fitful gleam Be far or near. To turn with soft, contented sigh, And through the window watch the sky, All opal blue. To feel the air steal in the room, Made fragrant by the soft perfume Of lime-trees, when their scented bloom Is damp with dew. To hear the rustling voice of leaves, The chirp of birds beneath the eaves, But now awake. The tiny hum of timid things That fly with gauzy, fragile wings, Where yet the dusk to daylight clings, When mornings break. To feel the soul look forth and smile, Contented with each fruitful mile That it beholds. To hear the heart beat loud and strong, In unison with Nature's song, That echoes tremulous and long While dawn unfolds. To know yourself a thing complete, With strength of mind and limb replete, With vast desire; A creature made to dominate The lesser things of earth, a fate On whom the universe must wait, With force entire. And then to cry in deep delight God made the world and made it right; Dear Heaven above! Was ere completeness so complete, Was ever sweetness half so sweet, Was ever loving half so meet; Thank God for love.
”
”
Radclyffe Hall (The Poetry Of Radclyffe Hall - Volume 2 - 'Twixt Earth and Stars: "…we're all part of nature, some day the world will recognise this…")
“
My darling,
My day’s sweetest moments are at dawn, for I awake with dreams of you still in my head. As the light touches my lips, I can almost feel yours upon mine. I imagine your footsteps coming up the walk, but today is the same as the day before. It is only fanciful thinking.
As the first beams of morning sunlight dance across my weary shoulders I cry out, “How can you be so cheery and bright with so much sorrow across our land?”
I know I must be strong and face another day, but tears fill my eyes. Suddenly, a white dove lands upon my window sill. Surely this be the omen that peace is near at hand. Just like the breath of the coming Spring, this little dove now brings me new hope. God has heard our prayers and our Southland will flower again.
”
”
Nancy B. Brewer (Beyond Sandy Ridge)
“
At Jeanette’s slumber party, I told Kitty Coffey she smelled like a hamper and was delighted when she cried. I ate greedily, danced myself into a sweat, and laughed so loud that Mrs. Nord had to come in and speak to me. “Keep it down, honey, will you? I can hear you all over the house,” she said. “Shut up, you whore,” I thought of saying, but only made a face. I dared each girl there to stay awake as long as I could—to match my energy. When the last of them faded off to sleep, I started shaking so hard that I couldn’t stop myself. Maybe he’d left because I was a bad person. Because I’d wished he’d married Mrs. Nord instead of Ma. Because I told Ma she was ugly. By dawn, my eyes burned from no sleep. I tiptoed amongst my girlfriends in the blanketed clumps on Jeanette’s floor, pretending they were all dead from some horrible explosion. Because I had stayed awake, I was the only survivor. Birds chirped outside in the Nords’ graying yard. I got dressed, walked down the hall, and pedaled barefoot back to Bobolink Drive.
”
”
Wally Lamb (She's Come Undone)
“
It’s like those nights when I was a kid, lying awake thinking the darkness would go on forever. And I couldn’t go back to sleep because of the dream of the whatever it was in the cellar coming out of the corner. I’d lie in the hot, rumpled bed, hot burning hot, trying to shut myself away and know that there were three eternities before the dawn. Everything was the night world, the other world where everything but good could happen, the world of ghosts and robbers and horrors, of things harmless in the daytime coming to life, the wardrobe, the picture in the book, the story, coffins, corpses, vampires, and always squeezing, tormenting darkness, smoke thick. And I’d think of anything because if I didn’t go on thinking I’d remember whatever it was in the cellar down there, and my mind would go walking away from my body and go down three stories defenceless, down the dark stair past the tall, haunted clock, through the whining door, down the terrible steps to where the coffin ends were crushed in the walls of the cellar – and I’d be held helpless on the stone floor, trying to run back, run away, climb up----
”
”
William Golding (Pincher Martin)
“
Instead, as the crystal splinters entered Hornwrack's brain, he experienced two curious dreams of the Low City, coming so quickly one after the other that they seemed simultaneous. In the first, long shadows moved across the ceiling frescoes of the Bistro Californium, beneath which Lord Mooncarrot's clique awaited his return to make a fourth at dice. Footsteps sounded on the threshold. The women hooded their eyes and smiled, or else stifled a yawn, raising dove-grey gloves to their blue, phthisic lips. Viriconium, with all her narcissistic intimacies and equivocal invitations welcomed him again. He had hated that city, yet now it was his past and it was he had to regret...The second of these visions was of the Rue Sepile. It was dawn, in summer. Horse-chestnut flowers bobbed like white wax candles above the deserted pavements. An oblique light struck into the street - so that its long and normally profitless perspective seemed to lead straight into the heart of a younger, more ingenuous city - and fell across the fronts of the houses where he had once lived, warming up the rotten brick and imparting to it a not unpleasant pinkish colour. Up at the second-floor casement window a boy was busy with the bright red geraniums arranged along the outer still in lumpen terra-cotta pots. He looked down at Hornwrack and smiled. Before Hornwrack could speak he drew down the lower casement and turned away. The glass which no separated them reflected the morning sunlight in a silent explosion; and Hornwrack, dazzled mistaking the light for the smile, suddenly imagined an incandescence which would melt all those old streets!
Rue Sepile; the Avenue of Children; Margery Fry Court: all melted down! All the shabby dependencies of the Plaza of Unrealized Time! All slumped, sank into themselves, eroded away until nothing was left in his field of vision but an unbearable white sky above and the bright clustered points of the chestnut leaves below - and then only a depthless opacity, behind which he could detect the beat of his own blood, the vitreous humour of the eye. He imagined the old encrusted brick flowing, the glass cracking and melting from its frames even as they shrivelled awake, the sheds of paints flaring green and gold, the geraniums toppling in flames to nothing, not even white ash, under this weight of light! All had winked away like reflections in a jar of water glass, and only the medium remained, bright, viscid, vacant. He had a sense of the intolerable briefness of matter, its desperate signalling and touching, its fall; and simultaneously one of its unendurable durability
He thought, Something lies behind all the realities of the universe and is replacing them here, something less solid and more permanent. Then the world stopped haunting him forever.
”
”
M. John Harrison (Viriconium (Viriconium, #1-4))
“
She was only twenty-three, not even a quarter of a century old.She had spent the last five years living exclusively in the human world. Now her wild nature was calling to her. Gregori was touching something untamed in her, something to which she had forbidden herself access. Something wild and unhibited and incredibly sensuous.
Savannah looked up at his dark, handsome face. It was so male. So carnal. So powerful. Gregori. The Dark One. Just looking at him made her go weak with need. One glance from his slashing silver eyes could bring a rush of liquid heat, fire racing through her.She became soft and pliant. She became his.
Gregori's palm cupped her face. "Whatever you are thinking is making you fear me,Savannah," he said softly. "Stop it."
"You're making me into something I'm not," she whispered.
"You are Carpathian, my lifemate. You are Savannah Dubrinsky. I cannot take any of those things from you. I do not want a puppet, or a different woman. I want you as you are." His voice was soft and compelling. He lifted her in his arms,carried her to his bed and tucked the covers around her.
The storm lashed at the windows and whistled against the walls. Gregori wove the safeguards in preparation for their sleep. Savannah as exhausted, her eyes already trying to close. Then he slipped into the bed and gathered her into his arms. "I would never change anything about you,ma patite, not even your nasty little temper."
She settled against his body as if she was made for it.He felt the brush of her lips against his chest and the last sigh of air as it escaped from her lungs.
Gregori lay awake for a long time, watching as the dawn crept forward, pushing away the night. One wave of his hand closed and locked the heavy shutters over the windows. Still he lay awake, holding Savannah close.
Because he had always known he was dangerous, he had feared for mortals and immortals alike at his hand. But somehow,perhaps naively, he had thought that once he was bound to his lifemate, he would become tamer, more domesticated. His fingers bunched in her hair. But Savannah made him wild. She made him far more dangerous than he had ever been. Before Savannah, he had had no emotions. He had killed when it necessary because it was necessary. He had feared nothing because he loved nothing and had nothing to lose. Now he had everything to lose.And so he was more dangerous.For no one, nothing, would ever threaten Savannah and live.
”
”
Christine Feehan (Dark Magic (Dark, #4))
“
She woke to find dawn light, pearly silver tinged with pink, washing into the room. For a moment, she wondered what had woken her, then she glanced at Breckenridge-into his hazel eyes.
"You're awake!" She only just managed not to squeal. The joy leaping through her was near impossible to contain.
He smiled weakly. His lids drooped, fell. "I've been awake for some time, but didn't want to wake you."
His voice was little more than a whisper.
She realized it was the faint pressure of his fingers on hers that had drawn her rom sleep. Those fingers, his hand, were no longer over-warm. Reaching out, she laid her fingers on his forehead. "Your temperature's normal-the fever's broken. Thank God."
Retrieving her hand, refocusing on his face, she felt relief crash through her in a disorienting, almost overpowering wave. "You have to rest." That was imperative; she felt driven by flustered urgency to ensure he understood. "You're mending nicely. Now the crisis has passed, you'll get better day by day. Catriona says that with time you'll be as good as new." Algaria had warned her to assure him of that.
He swallowed; eyes closed, he shifted his head in what she took to be a nod. "I'll rest in a minute. But first...did you mean what you said out there by the bull pen? That you truly want a future with me?"
"Yes." She clutched his hand more tightly between hers. "I meant every word."
His lips curved a fraction, then he sighed. Eyes still closed-she sensed he found his lids too heavy to lift-he murmured, "Good. Because I meant every word, too."
She smiled through sudden tears. "Even about our daughters being allowed to look like Cordelia?"
His smile grew more definite. "Said that aloud, did I? Yes, I meant that, but for pity's sake don't tell her--she'll never let me hear the end of it, and Constance will have my head to boot."
His words were starting to slur again; he was slipping back into healing sleep.
Catriona's words, her warning, rang in Heather's head. She remembered her vow. Rising, she leaned over him; his hand still clasped between hers, and kissed him gently. "Go to sleep and get well, but before you do, I need to tell you this. I love you. I will until the end of my days. I don't expect you to love me back, but that doesn't matter anymore. You have my love regardless, and always will." She kissed him again, sensed he'd heard, but that he was stunned, surprised. He didn't respond.
She drew back. "And now you need to put your mind to getting better. We have a wedding to attend, after all."
She knew he heard that-his features softened, eased.
As he slid into sleep, he was, very gently, smiling.
”
”
Stephanie Laurens (Viscount Breckenridge to the Rescue (Cynster, #16; The Cynster Sisters Trilogy, #1))
“
What I cannot understand is how your uncle could consider these two men suitable when they aren’t. Not one whit!”
“We know that,” Elizabeth said wryly, bending down to pull a blade of grass from between the flagstones beneath the bench, “but evidently my ‘suitors’ do not, and that’s the problem.” As she said the words a thought began to form in her mind; her fingers touched the blade, and she went perfectly still. Beside her on the bench Alex drew a breath as if to speak, then stopped short, and in that pulsebeat of still silence the same idea was born in both their fertile minds.
“Alex,” Elizabeth breathed, “all I have to-“
“Elizabeth,” Alex whispered, “it’s not as bad as it seems. All you have to-“
Elizabeth straightened slowly and turned.
In that prolonged moment of silence two longtime friends sat in a rose garden, looking raptly at each other while time rolled back and they were girls again-lying awake in the dark, confiding their dreams and troubles and inventing schemes to solve them that always began with “If only…”
“If only,” Elizabeth said as a smile dawned across her face and was matched by the one on Alex’s, “I could convince them that we don’t suit-“
“Which shouldn’t be hard to do,” Alex cried enthusiastically, “because it’s true!”
The joyous relief of having a plan, of being able to take control of a situation that minutes before had threatened her entire life, sent Elizabeth to her feet, her face aglow with laughter. “Poor Sir Francis,” she chuckled, looking delightedly from Bentner to Alex as both grinned at her. “I greatly fear he’s in for the most disagreeable surprise when he realizes what a-a” she hesitated, thinking of everything an old roué would most dislike in his future wife-“a complete prude I am!”
“And,” Alex added, “what a shocking spendthrift you are!”
“Exactly!” Elizabeth agreed, almost twirling around in her glee. Sunlight danced off her gilded hair and lit her green eyes as she looked delightedly at her friends. “I shall make perfectly certain to give him glaring evidence I am both. Now then, as to the Earl of Canford…”
“What a pity,” Alex said in a voice of exaggerated gloom, “you won’t be able to show him what a capital hand you are with a fishing pole.
“Fish?” Elizabeth returned with a mock shudder. “Why, the mere thought of those scaly creatures positively makes me swoon!”
“Except for that prime one you caught yesterday,” Bentner put in wryly.
“You’re right,” she returned with an affectionate grin at the man who’d taught her to fish. “Will you find Berta and break the news to her about going with me? By the time we come back to the house she ought to be over her hysterics, and I’ll reason with her.” Bentner trotted off, his threadbare black coattails flapping behind him.
”
”
Judith McNaught (Almost Heaven (Sequels, #3))
“
Elizabeth snapped awake in a terrified instant as the door to her bed chamber was flung open near dawn, and Ian stalked into the darkened room. “Do you want to go first, or shall I?” he said tightly, coming to stand at the side of her bed.
“What do you mean?” she asked in a trembling voice.
“I mean,” he said, “that either you go first and tell me why in hell you suddenly find my company repugnant, or I’ll go first and tell you how I feel when I don’t know where you are or why you want to be there!”
“I’ve sent word to you both nights.”
“You sent a damned note that arrived long after nightfall both times, informing me that you intended to sleep somewhere else. I want to know why!”
He has men beaten like animals, she reminded herself.
“Stop shouting at me,” Elizabeth said shakily, getting out of bed and dragging the covers with her to hide herself from him.
His brows snapped together in an ominous frown. “Elizabeth?” he asked, reaching for her.
“Don’t touch me!” she cried.
Bentner’s voice came from the doorway. “Is aught amiss, my lady?” he asked, glaring bravely at Ian.
“Get out of here and close that damned door behind you!” Ian snapped furiously.
“Leave it open,” Elizabeth said nervously, and the brave butler did exactly as she said.
In six long strides Ian was at the door, shoving it closed with a force that sent it crashing into its frame, and Elizabeth began to vibrate with terror. When he turned around and started toward her Elizabeth tried to back away, but she tripped on the coverlet and had to stay where she was.
Ian saw the fear in her eyes and stopped short only inches in front of her. His hand lifted, and she winced, but it came to rest on her cheek. “Darling, what is it?” he asked. It was his voice that made her want to weep at his feet, that beautiful baritone voice; and his face-that harsh, handsome face she’d adored. She wanted to beg him to tell her what Robert and Wordsworth had said were lies-all lies. “My life depends on this, Elizabeth. So does yours. Don’t fail us,” Robert had pleaded. Yet, in that moment of weakness she actually considered telling Ian everything she knew and letting him kill her if he wanted to; she would have preferred death to the torment of living with the memory of the lie that had been their lives-to the torment of living without him.
“Are you ill?” he asked, frowning and minutely studying her face.
Snatching at the excuse he’d offered, she nodded hastily. “Yes. I haven’t been feeling well.”
“Is that why you went to London? To see a physician?”
She nodded a little wildly, and to her bewildered horror he started to smile-that lazy, tender smile that always made her senses leap. “Are you with child, darling? Is that why you’re acting so strangely?” Elizabeth was silent, trying to debate the wisdom of saying yes or no-she should say no, she realized. He’d hunt her to the ends of the earth if he believed she was carrying his babe.
“No! He-the doctor said it is just-just-nerves.”
“You’ve been working and playing too hard,” Ian said, looking like the picture of a worried, devoted husband. “You need more rest.”
Elizabeth couldn’t bear any more of this-not his feigned tenderness or his concern or the memory of Robert’s battered back. “I’m going to sleep now,” she said in a strangled voice. “Alone,” she added, and his face whitened as if she had slapped him.
During his entire adult life Ian had relied almost as much on his intuition as on his intellect, and at that moment he didn’t want to believe in the explanation they were both offering. His wife did not want him in her bed; she recoiled from his touch; she had been away for two consecutive nights; and-more alarming than any of that-guilt and fear were written all over her pale face.
“Do you know what a man thinks,” he said in a calm voice that belied the pain streaking through him, “when his wife stays away at night and doesn’t want him in her bed when she does return?
”
”
Judith McNaught (Almost Heaven (Sequels, #3))
“
I imagine you not telling me to whisper. I imagine you not saying oh don't say this literally. You want me to evoke as opposed to mere describing. You want me to be an invisible scribe that an octoepoose was hiding. I'm not sure if my facial features are an autograph that your Picasso smile is signing. Infamous for the mirror I shook when my sock puppets were pining? I am not just a fish that you gave wings to! I don't simply flop in the air whenever you brush some mannequinn's hair. There is a reason for the bad timing. Exquisite imbalances. A child enjoying the pink sky. I won't say that is my clue! Playing The Beatles on a kazoo is beautiful oooh ooooh
Your laughter is a woman with alot of eyeballs on her stomach that pretends that she doesn't see the colors of all them songs. In the pre dawn hours we dance with delusions and illusions. The eternal seamstress does not care for Frakenstein's dress(she still loves our unique caress ) She loves and laughs despite some so-called scientist. Where is that emperor and his nakedness! Darling, our atoms need never split. We compliment in so many ways that all our night's and days have become one swirling sunrise/sunset that only true lovers can scoff at(those who shhhhh) The flower is not passive or apologetic. It blooms through the fractured net. Floating magnetic(eep eeep)
You are not just some seductress. You are the leader of an elite group of intergalactic seductress impersonators who reveal corruption but then choose to love.
We embrace conclusions that make the puddle heart awake with ethereal drum beat gongs. You think of a heroic poodle in the dark. We both know that the trapeze artist that followed us was not a cliche. He smelled differently. He had never met a floating lady that showed him how to appreciate a symphony without taking away his love for a good rock n roll melody. I am not sure I can only whisper of such realities. I am not sure I can only whisper of such realities.-
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Junipurr- Sometimes Trudy
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When other birds are still, the screech owls take up the strain, like mourning women their ancient u-lu-lu. Their dismal scream is truly Ben Jonsonian.( Wise midnight hags! It is no honest and blunt tu-whit tu-who of the poets, but, without jesting, a most solemn graveyard ditty, the mutual consolations of suicide lovers remembering the pangs and the delights of supernal love in the infernal groves. Yet I love to hear their wailing, their doleful responses, trilled along the woodside; reminding me sometimes of music and singing birds; as if it were the dark and tearful side of music, the regrets and sighs that would fain be sung. They are the spirits, the low spirits and melancholy forebodings, of fallen souls that once in human shape night-walked the earth and did the deeds of darkness, now expiating their sins with their wailing hymns or threnodies in the scenery of their transgressions. They give me a new sense of the variety and capacity of that nature which is our common dwelling. Oh-o-o-o-o that I never had been bor-r-r-r-n! sighs one on this side of the pond, and circles with the restlessness of despair to some new perch on the gray oaks. Then — that I never had been bor-r-r-r-n! echoes another on the farther side with tremulous sincerity, and — bor-r-r-r-n! comes faintly from far in the Lincoln woods.
I was also serenaded by a hooting owl. Near at hand you could fancy it the most melancholy sound in Nature, as if she meant by this to stereotype and make permanent in her choir the dying moans of a human being — some poor weak relic of mortality who has left hope behind, and howls like an animal, yet with human sobs, on entering the dark valley, made more awful by a certain gurgling melodiousness — I find myself beginning with the letters gl when I try to imitate it — expressive of a mind which has reached the gelatinous, mildewy stage in the mortification of all healthy and courageous thought. It reminded me of ghouls and idiots and insane howlings. But now one answers from far woods in a strain made really melodious by distance — Hoo hoo hoo, hoorer hoo; and indeed for the most part it suggested only pleasing associations, whether heard by day or night, summer or winter.
I rejoice that there are owls. Let them do the idiotic and maniacal hooting for men. It is a sound admirably suited to swamps and twilight woods which no day illustrates, suggesting a vast and undeveloped nature which men have not recognized. They represent the stark twilight and unsatisfied thoughts which all have. All day the sun has shone on the surface of some savage swamp, where the double spruce stands hung with usnea lichens, and small hawks circulate above, and the chickadee lisps amid the evergreens, and the partridge and rabbit skulk beneath; but now a more dismal and fitting day dawns, and a different race of creatures awakes to express the meaning of Nature there.
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Henry David Thoreau (Walden)