Celestial Tea Quotes

On the 'Celestial Seasonings' green tea packet there is a short explanation of its benefits: 'Green tea is a natural source of antioxidants, which neutralize harmful molecules in the body known as free radicals. By taming free radicals, antioxidants help the body maintain its natural health.' Mutatis mutandis, is not the notion of totalitarianism one of the main ideological antioxidants, whose function throughout its career was to tame free radicals, and thus to help the social body to maintain its politico-ideological good health?

Now that he was navigating, his celestial mood was shattered. Wild, animal thirst for life, mixed with homesick longing for the free airs and the sights and smells of earth-for grass and meat and beer and tea and the human voice-awoke in him.

Keep your whiskers crisp and clean. Do not let the mice grow lean. Do not let yourself grow fat Like a common kitchen cat. Have you set the kittens free? Do they sometimes ask for me? Is our catnip growing tall? Did you patch the garden wall? Clouds are gentle walls that hide Gardens on the other side. Tell the tabby cats I take All my meals with William Blake, Lunch at noon tea at four, Served in splendor on the shore At the tinkling of a bell. Tell them I am sleeping well. Tell them I have come so far, Brought by Blake's celestial cat, Buffeted by wind and rain, I may not get home again. Take this message to my friends. Say the King of Catnip sends To the cat who winds his clocks A thousand sunsets in a box, To the cat who brings the ice The shadows of a dozen mice (serve them with assorted dips and eat them like potato chips), And to the cat who guards his door A net for catching stars, and more (if patience he abide): Catnip from the other side.

You, O king, live far away across many seas. Yet, driven by the humble desire to share in the blessings of our culture, you have sent a delegation, which respectfully submitted your letter. You assure us that it is your veneration for our celestial ruling family that fills you with the desire to adopt our culture, and yet the difference between our customs and moral laws and your own is so profound that, were your envoy even capable of absorbing the basic principles of our culture, our customs and traditions could never grow in your soil. Were he the most diligent student, his efforts would still be vain. Ruling over the vast world, I have but one end in view, and it is this: to govern to perfection and to fulfil the duties of the state. Rare and costly objects are of no interest to me. I have no use for your country’s goods. Our Celestial Kingdom possesses all things in abundance and wants for nothing within its frontiers. Hence there is no need to bring in the wares of foreign barbarians to exchange for our own products. But since tea, silk and porcelain, products of the Celestial Kingdom, are absolute necessities for the peoples of Europe and for you yourself, the limited trade hitherto permitted in my province of Canton will continue. Mindful of the distant loneliness of your island, separated from the world by desert wastes of sea, I pardon your understandable ignorance of the customs of the Celestial Kingdom. Tremble at my orders and obey.

I’m not long for this world. I’m not long for this world. That’s something I grew accustomed to hearing my grandmother avow while waiting for instance for the kettle to boil. The dull infinite rumbling sound of water shuddering to vapour heaven knows can all of a sudden bring on such celestial yearnings. Or perhaps after, seated. While she stirred sugar into her tea and I herded cake crumbs about the tea plate on my knee with the small engrossed pad of my middle finger. She said it one day while we were both sat waiting for pudding in the living room of my aunt’s house near the brook and my aunt came flying in from the kitchen holding up a large steaming spoon and said very crossly, “Mum! Don’t say things like that in front of her.” But I didn’t mind, I didn’t mind one bit. In fact I rather liked it when she said that and said it myself later on when I got home and was sitting on the edge of my bed. I am not long for this world. I am not long for this world. I was already experiencing the sensation by this time that I was outside of the world, looking in, and the feelings that sense mostly gave rise to were ones of forlornness and anguish. Sat on the edge of my rosebud-patterned bed, repeating my grandmother’s mantra, however, I felt noble, mysterious, and independent. As if I were only visiting this world in any case and had somewhere a million times better to return to. I am not long for this world. I am not long for this world.

Life is a risky business, and if one shuts out risks one shuts out life itself.