“
When we are crushed like grapes, we cannot think of the wine we will become.
”
”
Henri J.M. Nouwen (Can You Drink the Cup?)
“
Transmutation:
• Grapes must be
crushed to make wine
• Diamonds form
under pressure
• Olives are pressed to
release oil
• Seeds grow in
darkness
Whenever you feel crushed, under pressure, pressed, or in darkness, you’re in a powerful place of transformation/transmutation.
”
”
Lalah Delia
“
I am a mess. Like that MargieMocha, I am spilled across a floor, but there's nobody to mop me up. I have only one thing to show for the day: Perry Delloplane. The sound of a name. It is a grape in my mouth. I roll it over and over on my tongue--perrydelloplaneperrydelloplaneperrydelloplaneperrydelloplane--but when I try to crush it with my teeth, it slips away.
”
”
Jerry Spinelli (Love, Stargirl (Stargirl, #2))
“
I am trapped inside this fragile body. I could be run off the road. I could be crushed by a van. I could choke on a grape. I could be allergic to bees; I am so impermanent that a measly bug could hop from a daisy to my arm, sting me, and I could be erased. Black. Nothing.
”
”
Emily Austin (Everyone in This Room Will Someday Be Dead)
“
In a story, you must always listen for the voice you cannot hear, the one that has been ignored or silenced. In that crushed voice, there is a strain of truth, as a crushed grape yields a drop of wine.
”
”
Patricia Storace
“
God does not humiliate the righteous. He may fire us in the kiln to make us vessels, crush us like grapes so we become wine--but He never humiliates. That is the game of little people.
”
”
Fr. Tim, from In the Company of Others by Jan Karon
“
If you press grapes, wine will pour out; if you crush roses, perfume will pour out; if you afflict the talented, genius will pour out.
”
”
Matshona Dhliwayo
“
Personal essay writing, dialectic discourse with the self, is a process of taking ideas and crushing them like grapes to create a homemade wine.
”
”
Kilroy J. Oldster (Dead Toad Scrolls)
“
The last clear definite function of man—muscles aching to work, minds aching to create beyond the single need—this is man....For man, unlike any other thing organic or inorganic in the universe, grows beyond his work, walks up the stairs of his concepts, emerges ahead of his accomplishments. This you may say of man—when theories change and crash, when schools, philosophies, when narrow dark alleys of thought, national, religious, economic, grow and disintegrate, man reaches, stumbles forward, painfully, mistakenly sometimes. Having stepped forward, he may slip back, but only half a step, never the full step back. This you may say and know it and know it. This you may know when the bombs plummet out of the black planes on the market place, when prisoners are stuck like pigs, when the crushed bodies drain filthily in the dust. You may know it in this way. If the step were not being taken, if the stumbling-forward ache were not alive, the bombs would not fall, the throats would not be cut. Fear the time when the bombs stop falling while the bombers live—for every bomb is proof that the spirit has not died. And fear the time when the strikes stop while the great owners live—for every little beaten strike is proof that the step is being taken. And this you can know—fear the time when Manself will not suffer and die for a concept, for this one quality is the foundation of Manself, and this one quality is man, distinctive in the universe.
”
”
John Steinbeck (The Grapes of Wrath)
“
You have crushed the grapes against your palate. Nothing has been hidden from you. And it has all been to you no more than the sound of music. It has not marred you.
”
”
Oscar Wilde (The Picture of Dorian Gray)
“
You can only get wine from grapes by crushing them.
”
”
Matshona Dhliwayo
“
Why did Our Blessed Lord use bread and wine as the elements of this Memorial? First of all, because no two substances in nature better symbolize unity than bread and wine. As bread is made from a multiplicity of grains of wheat, and wine is made from a multiplicity of grapes, so the many who believe are one in Christ. Second, no two substances in nature have to suffer more to become what they are than bread and wine. Wheat has to pass through the rigors of winter, be ground beneath the Calvary of a mill, and then subjected to purging fire before it can become bread. Grapes in their turn must be subjected to the Gethsemane of a wine press and have their life crushed from them to become wine. Thus, do they symbolize the Passion and Sufferings of Christ, and the condition of Salvation, for Our Lord said unless we die to ourselves we cannot live in Him. A third reason is that there are no two substances in nature which have more traditionally nourished man than bread and wine. In bringing these elements to the altar, men are equivalently bringing themselves. When bread and wine are taken or consumed, they are changed into man's body and blood. But when He took bread and wine, He changed them into Himself.
”
”
Fulton J. Sheen (Life of Christ)
“
On every side was the silence, pressing upon them with a tangible presence. It affected their minds as the many atmospheres of deep water affect the body of the diver. It crushed them with the weight of unending vastness and unalterable decree. It crushed them into the remotest recesses of their own minds, pressing out of them, like juices from the grape, all the false ardours and exaltations and undue self-values of the human soul, until they perceived themselves finite and small, specks and motes, moving with weak cunning and little wisdom amidst the play and inter-play of the great blind elements and forces.
”
”
Jack London (White Fang)
“
When You Return
Fallen leaves will climb back into trees.
Shards of the shattered vase will rise
and reassemble on the table.
Plastic raincoats will refold
into their flat envelopes. The egg,
bald yolk and its transparent halo,
slide back in the thin, calcium shell.
Curses will pour back into mouths,
letters un-write themselves, words
siphoned up into the pen. My gray hair
will darken and become the feathers
of a black swan. Bullets will snap
back into their chambers, the powder
tamped tight in brass casings. Borders
will disappear from maps. Rust
revert to oxygen and time. The fire
return to the log, the log to the tree,
the white root curled up
in the un-split seed. Birdsong will fly
into the lark’s lungs, answers
become questions again.
When you return, sweaters will unravel
and wool grow on the sheep.
Rock will go home to mountain, gold
to vein. Wine crushed into the grape,
oil pressed into the olive. Silk reeled in
to the spider’s belly. Night moths
tucked close into cocoons, ink drained
from the indigo tattoo. Diamonds
will be returned to coal, coal
to rotting ferns, rain to clouds, light
to stars sucked back and back
into one timeless point, the way it was
before the world was born,
that fresh, that whole, nothing
broken, nothing torn apart.
”
”
Ellen Bass (Like a Beggar)
“
He smelled the odor of the pine boughs under him, the piney smell of the crushed needles and the sharper odor of the resinous sap from the cut limbs. ... This is the smell I love. This and fresh-cut clover, the crushed sage as you ride after cattle, wood-smoke and the burning leaves of autumn. That must be the odor of nostalgia, the smell of the smoke from the piles of raked leaves burning in the streets in the fall in Missoula. Which would you rather smell? Sweet grass the Indians used in their baskets? Smoked leather? The odor of the ground in the spring after rain? The smell of the sea as you walk through the gorse on a headland in Galicia? Or the wind from the land as you come in toward Cuba in the dark? That was the odor of cactus flowers, mimosa and the sea-grape shrubs. Or would you rather smell frying bacon in the morning when you are hungry? Or coffee in the morning? Or a Jonathan apple as you bit into it? Or a cider mill in the grinding, or bread fresh from the oven?
”
”
Ernest Hemingway (For Whom the Bell Tolls)
“
The first bird I searched for was the nightjar, which used to nest in the valley. Its song is like the sound of a stream of wine spilling from a height into a deep and booming cask. It is an odorous sound, with a bouquet that rises to the quiet sky. In the glare of day it would seem thinner and drier, but dusk mellows it and gives it vintage. If a song could smell, this song would smell of crushed grapes and almonds and dark wood. The sound spills out, and none of it is lost. The whole wood brims with it.
”
”
J.A. Baker (The Peregrine)
“
The heart, like the grape, is prone to delivering its harvest in the same moment that it appears to be crushed.
”
”
Roger Housden
“
You work that you may keep pace with the earth and the soul of the earth.
For to be idle is to become a stranger unto the seasons,
and to step out of life's procession, that marches in majesty and proud submission towards the infinite.
When you work you are a flute through whose heart the whispering of the hours turns to music.
Which of you would be a reed, dumb and silent, when all else sings together in unison?
Always you have been told that work is a curse and labour a misfortune.
But I say to you that when you work you fulfil a part of earth's furthest dream, assigned to you when that dream was born,
And in keeping yourself with labour you are in truth loving life,
And to love life through labour is to be intimate with life's inmost secret.
But if you in your pain call birth an affliction and the support of the flesh a curse written upon your brow, then I answer that naught but the sweat of your brow shall wash away that which is written.
You have been told also that life is darkness, and in your weariness you echo what was said by the weary.
And I say that life is indeed darkness save when there is urge,
And all urge is blind save when there is knowledge,
And all knowledge is vain save when there is work,
And all work is empty save when there is love;
And when you work with love you bind yourself to yourself, and to one another, and to God.
And what is it to work with love?
It is to weave the cloth with threads drawn from your heart,
even as if your beloved were to wear that cloth.
It is to build a house with affection,
even as if your beloved were to dwell in that house.
It is to sow seeds with tenderness and reap the harvest with joy,
even as if your beloved were to eat the fruit.
It is to charge all things you fashion with a breath of your own spirit,
And to know that all the blessed dead
are standing about you and watching.
Often have I heard you say, as if speaking in sleep, "He who works in marble, and finds the shape of his own soul in the stone, is nobler than he who ploughs the soil.
And he who seizes the rainbow to lay it on a cloth in the likeness of man, is more than he who makes the sandals for our feet."
But I say, not in sleep but in the overwakefulness of noontide, that the wind speaks not more sweetly to the giant oaks than to the least of all the blades of grass;
And he alone is great who turns the voice of the wind into a song made sweeter by his own loving.
Work is love made visible.
And if you cannot work with love but only with distaste, it is better that you should leave your work and sit at the gate of the temple and take alms of those who work with joy.
For if you bake bread with indifference, you bake a bitter bread that feeds but half man's hunger.
And if you grudge the crushing of the grapes, your grudge distils a poison in the wine.
And if you sing though as angels, and love not the singing, you muffle man's ears to the voices of the day and the voices of the night.
”
”
Kahlil Gibran (The Prophet)
“
I got the feeling that if I moved the frames to the side, I'd see the artists watching me, as though through a two-way mirror, cracking their arthritic knuckles and rubbing their stubbled chins, wondering what I was wondering about them, if I saw their brilliance, or if their lives had been pointless, if only God could judge them after all. Did they want more? Was there more genius to be wrung out of the turpentine rags at their feet? Could they have painted better? Could they have painted more generously? More clearly? Could they have dropped more fruit from their windows? Did they know that glory was mundane? Did they wish they'd crushed those withered grapes between their fingers and spent their days walking through fields of grass or being in love or confessing their delusions to a priest or starving like the hungry souls they were, begging for alms in the city square with some honesty for once? Maybe they'd lived wrongly.
(...)
Or maybe not. Maybe, in the morning, they were aloof and happy to distract themselves with their brushes and oils, to mix their colors and smoke their pipes and go back to their fresh still lives without having to swat away any more flies.
”
”
Ottessa Moshfegh (My Year of Rest and Relaxation)
“
God
In his malodorous brain what slugs and mire,
Lanthorned in his oblique eyes, guttering burned!
His body lodged a rat where men nursed souls.
The world flashed grape-green eyes of a foiled cat
To him. On fragments of an old shrunk power,
On shy and maimed, on women wrung awry,
He lay, a bullying hulk, to crush them more.
But when one, fearless, turned and clawed like bronze,
Cringing was easy to blunt these stern paws,
And he would weigh the heavier on those after.
Who rests in God's mean flattery now? Your wealth
Is but his cunning to make death more hard.
Your iron sinews take more pain in breaking.
And he has made the market for your beauty
Too poor to buy, although you die to sell.
Only that he has never heard of sleep;
And when the cats come out the rats are sly.
Here we are safe till he slinks in at dawn
But he has gnawed a fibre from strange roots,
And in the morning some pale wonder ceases.
Things are not strange and strange things are forgetful.
Ah! if the day were arid, somehow lost
Out of us, but it is as hair of us,
And only in the hush no wind stirs it.
And in the light vague trouble lifts and breathes,
And restlessness still shadows the lost ways.
The fingers shut on voices that pass through,
Where blind farewells are taken easily ....
Ah! this miasma of a rotting God!
”
”
Isaac Rosenberg (The Poems and Plays of Isaac Rosenberg (|c OET |t Oxford English Texts))
“
Work is love made visible. And if you cannot work with love but only with distaste, it is better that you should leave your work and sit at the gate of the temple and take alms of those who work with joy. For if you bake bread with indifference, you bake a bitter bread that feeds but half man's hunger. And if you grudge the crushing of the grapes, your grudge distills a poison in the wine. And if you sing though as angels, and love not the singing, you muffle man's ears to the voices of the day and the voices of the night.
”
”
Kahlil Gibran (The Prophet)
“
Work is love made visible.
And if you cannot work with love but only with distaste, it is better that you should leave your work and sit at the gate of the temple and take alms of those who work with joy.
For if you bake bread with indifference, you bake a bitter bread that feeds but half man's hunger.
And if you grudge the crushing of the grapes, your grudge distils a poison in the wine.
And if you sing though as angels, and love not the singing, you muffle man's ears to the voices of the day and the voices of the night.
”
”
Kahlil Gibran
“
For the home winemaker at the crush stage, it's enough to shoot for 50 ppm (SO2) for reds and 70 ppm for whites, adjustable as the pH dictates from the optimums.
”
”
Jeff Cox (From Vines to Wines: The Complete Guide to Growing Grapes and Making Your Own Wine)
“
A brick could be used to crush grapes. If that sounds unnecessarily cruel, then I guess you wouldn’t like to pour you a glass of wine. It’s a shame, because I made it myself.
”
”
Jarod Kintz (Brick)
“
As for describing the smell of a spaniel mixed with the smell of torches, laurels, incense, banners, wax candles and a garland of rose leaves crushed by a satin heel that has been laid up in camphor, perhaps Shakespeare, had he paused in the middle of writing Antony and Cleopatra — But Shakespeare did not pause. Confessing our inadequacy, then, we can but note that to Flush Italy, in these the fullest, the freest, the happiest years of his life, meant mainly a succession of smells. Love, it must be supposed, was gradually losing its appeal. Smell remained. Now that they were established in Casa Guidi again, all had their avocations. Mr. Browning wrote regularly in one room; Mrs. Browning wrote regularly in another. The baby played in the nursery. But Flush wandered off into the streets of Florence to enjoy the rapture of smell. He threaded his path through main streets and back streets, through squares and alleys, by smell. He nosed his way from smell to smell; the rough, the smooth, the dark, the golden. He went in and out, up and down, where they beat brass, where they bake bread, where the women sit combing their hair, where the bird-cages are piled high on the causeway, where the wine spills itself in dark red stains on the pavement, where leather smells and harness and garlic, where cloth is beaten, where vine leaves tremble, where men sit and drink and spit and dice — he ran in and out, always with his nose to the ground, drinking in the essence; or with his nose in the air vibrating with the aroma. He slept in this hot patch of sun — how sun made the stone reek! he sought that tunnel of shade — how acid shade made the stone smell! He devoured whole bunches of ripe grapes largely because of their purple smell; he chewed and spat out whatever tough relic of goat or macaroni the Italian housewife had thrown from the balcony — goat and macaroni were raucous smells, crimson smells. He followed the swooning sweetness of incense into the violet intricacies of dark cathedrals; and, sniffing, tried to lap the gold on the window- stained tomb. Nor was his sense of touch much less acute. He knew Florence in its marmoreal smoothness and in its gritty and cobbled roughness. Hoary folds of drapery, smooth fingers and feet of stone received the lick of his tongue, the quiver of his shivering snout. Upon the infinitely sensitive pads of his feet he took the clear stamp of proud Latin inscriptions. In short, he knew Florence as no human being has ever known it; as Ruskin never knew it or George Eliot either.
”
”
Virginia Woolf (Flush)
“
In a story, you must always listen for the voice that you cannot hear, the one that has been ignored or silenced. In that crushed voice, there is a strain of truth, as a crushed grape yields a drop of wine.... Speech denied will burst its dam and become a flood of song. Storied silenced on earth will catapult into Heaven, visible wherever we turn our faces, glittering irrevocably, forever.
”
”
Patricia Storace (The Book of Heaven)
“
You might feel weird telling Bob you eat lunch with at work that you love and appreciate him, but maybe you could give him half your sandwich and a handful of grapes. Platonic, reciprocal love grapes.
”
”
Lex Croucher (You're Crushing It: Positivity for living your REAL life)
“
In water so fine, a few minutes of bad memory all but disappear downstream, washed away by ten thousand belly busters, a million cannonballs. Paradise was never heaven-high when I was a boy but waist-deep, an oasis of cutoff blue jeans and raggedy Converse sneakers, sweating bottles of Nehi Grape and Orange Crush, and this stream. I remember the antidote of icy water against my blistered skin, and the taste of mushy tomato and mayonnaise sandwiches, unwrapped from twice-used aluminum foil. I saw my first water moccasin here, and my first real girl, and being a child of the foot washers I have sometimes wondered if this was my Eden, and my serpent. If it was, I didn't hold out any longer than that first poor fool did.
”
”
Rick Bragg
“
What an exquisite life you have had! You have drunk deeply of everything. You have crushed the grapes against your palate. Nothing has been hidden from you. And it has all been to you no more than the sound of music. It has not marred you. You are still the same.
”
”
Oscar Wilde (The Picture of Dorian Gray)
“
For man, unlike any other thing organic or inorganic in the universe, grows beyond his work, walks up the stairs of his concepts, emerges ahead of his accomplishments. This you may say of man when theories change and crash, when schools, philosophies, when narrow dark alleys of thought, national, religious, economic, grow and disintegrate, man reaches, stumbles forward, painfully, mistakenly sometimes. Having stepped forward, he may slip back, but only half a step, never the full step back. This you may say and know it and know it. This you may know when the bombs plummet out of the black planes on the market place, when prisoners are stuck like pigs, when the crushed bodies drain filthily in the dust. You may know it in this way. If the step were not being taken, if the stumbling-forward ache were not alive, the bombs would not fall, the throats would not be cut. Fear the time when the bombs stop falling while the bombers live- for every bomb is proof that the spirit has not died. And fear the time when the strikes stop while the great owners live- for every little beaten strike is proof that the step is being taken. And this you can know- fear the time when Manself will not suffer and die for a concept, for this one quality is the foundation of Manself, and this one quality is man, distinctive in the universe.
”
”
John Steinbeck (The Grapes of Wrath)
“
But it’s not unprocessed grain and grape that we find on the Communion table, it’s bread and wine. Grain and grape come from God’s good earth, but bread and wine are the result of human industry. Bread and wine come about through a cooperation of the human and the divine. And herein lies a beautiful mystery. If grain and grape made bread and wine can communicate the body and blood of Christ, this has enormous implications for all legitimate human labor and industry. The mystery of the Eucharist does nothing less than make all human labor sacred. For there to be the holy sacrament of Communion there must be grain and grape, wheat fields and vineyards, bakers and winemakers. Human labor becomes a sacrament, a farmer planting wheat, a vintner tending vines, a miller grinding wheat, a winemaker crushing grapes, a woman baking bread, a man making wine, a trucker hauling bread, a grocer selling wine. Who knows what bread or what wine might end up on the Communion table as the body and blood of Christ. This is where we discover the holy mystery that all labor necessary for human flourishing is sacred. A farmer plowing his field, a worker in a bakery, a trucker hauling goods, a grocer selling wares—all are engaged in work that is just as sacred as the priest or pastor serving Communion on Sunday. The Eucharist pulls back the curtain to reveal a sacramental world.
”
”
Brian Zahnd (Water To Wine: Some of My Story)
“
The Garden of Proserpine"
Here, where the world is quiet;
Here, where all trouble seems
Dead winds' and spent waves' riot
In doubtful dreams of dreams;
I watch the green field growing
For reaping folk and sowing,
For harvest-time and mowing,
A sleepy world of streams.
I am tired of tears and laughter,
And men that laugh and weep;
Of what may come hereafter
For men that sow to reap:
I am weary of days and hours,
Blown buds of barren flowers,
Desires and dreams and powers
And everything but sleep.
Here life has death for neighbour,
And far from eye or ear
Wan waves and wet winds labour,
Weak ships and spirits steer;
They drive adrift, and whither
They wot not who make thither;
But no such winds blow hither,
And no such things grow here.
No growth of moor or coppice,
No heather-flower or vine,
But bloomless buds of poppies,
Green grapes of Proserpine,
Pale beds of blowing rushes
Where no leaf blooms or blushes
Save this whereout she crushes
For dead men deadly wine.
Pale, without name or number,
In fruitless fields of corn,
They bow themselves and slumber
All night till light is born;
And like a soul belated,
In hell and heaven unmated,
By cloud and mist abated
Comes out of darkness morn.
Though one were strong as seven,
He too with death shall dwell,
Nor wake with wings in heaven,
Nor weep for pains in hell;
Though one were fair as roses,
His beauty clouds and closes;
And well though love reposes,
In the end it is not well.
Pale, beyond porch and portal,
Crowned with calm leaves, she stands
Who gathers all things mortal
With cold immortal hands;
Her languid lips are sweeter
Than love's who fears to greet her
To men that mix and meet her
From many times and lands.
She waits for each and other,
She waits for all men born;
Forgets the earth her mother,
The life of fruits and corn;
And spring and seed and swallow
Take wing for her and follow
Where summer song rings hollow
And flowers are put to scorn.
There go the loves that wither,
The old loves with wearier wings;
And all dead years draw thither,
And all disastrous things;
Dead dreams of days forsaken,
Blind buds that snows have shaken,
Wild leaves that winds have taken,
Red strays of ruined springs.
We are not sure of sorrow,
And joy was never sure;
To-day will die to-morrow;
Time stoops to no man's lure;
And love, grown faint and fretful,
With lips but half regretful
Sighs, and with eyes forgetful
Weeps that no loves endure.
From too much love of living,
From hope and fear set free,
We thank with brief thanksgiving
Whatever gods may be
That no life lives for ever;
That dead men rise up never;
That even the weariest river
Winds somewhere safe to sea.
Then star nor sun shall waken,
Nor any change of light:
Nor sound of waters shaken,
Nor any sound or sight:
Nor wintry leaves nor vernal,
Nor days nor things diurnal;
Only the sleep eternal
In an eternal night.
”
”
Algernon Charles Swinburne (Poems and Ballads & Atalanta in Calydon)
“
It is not so much what people suffer that makes the world mysterious; it is rather how much they miss when they suffer. They seem to forget that even as children they made obstacles in their games in order to have something to overcome. Why, then, when they grow into man’s estate, should there not be prizes won by effort and struggle? Cannot the spirit of man rise with adversity as the bird rises against the resistance of the wind? Do not the game fish swim upstream? Must not the chisel cut away the marble to bring out the form? Must not the seed falling to the ground die before it can spring forth into life? Must not grapes be crushed that there may be wine to drink, and wheat ground that there may be bread to eat? Why then cannot pain be made redemption? Why under the alchemy of Divine Love cannot crosses be turned into crucifixes? Why cannot chastisements be regarded as penances? Why cannot we use a cross to become God-like? We cannot become like Him in His Power; we cannot become like Him in His Knowledge. There is only one way we can become like Him, and that is in the way He bore His sorrows and His Cross. And that way was with love. It is love that makes pain bearable.
”
”
Fulton J. Sheen
“
Blood is the price we pay for access to God, and it comes at great expense. God has invited us to His winepress so that He can do with us that which is necessary to reconnect something temporal to its eternal source. Don’t be surprised and begin to despair at the onset of the crushing you will endure. Don’t run from it; run to it, because you’re not being crushed simply for crushing’s sake. ... Your pain is not going to last and, like the labor pains of an expectant mother, will produce new life.
The crushing is meant to do two things: get out of you what’s in you, and get the true you out of the thin skin that encases you. The crushing of the grape not only expresses the juice from the flesh, but it also separates the unusable parts of the grape from the juice.
Crushing requires purification. Do you know anyone who would purify something they do not intend to use? ... Your crushing cannot be the end, because God would never purify you if He didn’t intend to use you. Your crushing is nothing more than the beginning of a glorious transformation process that will reveal to the world and you who and what you really are. Just like the grapes being trampled comes first, so does your crushing. There is more to come—so much more.
”
”
T.D. Jakes (Crushing: God Turns Pressure into Power)
“
many ratty Kmart bras I needed to replace with ones that could actually hold my tits up; so many albums with actual liner notes to replace the ones my friends had dubbed for me. Finally, I could read the lyrics to all those Portishead songs I was kind of making up in my head! I wish I could say that I bought some fly shit and a fancy ride, but really I just bought a lot of Gap shirts and name-brand sodas. I’ma assume some broke people are reading this and you know what I mean. I was making it rain dollar bills as I worked my way through the aisles at the Jewel, filling my cart with grape Crush and DiGiorno pizzas and CINNAMON TOAST MOTHERFUCKING CRUNCH.
”
”
Samantha Irby (We Are Never Meeting in Real Life.)
“
Stuck on the pane two flies buzzed, stuck.
Glowing wine on his palate lingered swallowed. Crushing in the winepress grapes of Burgundy. Sun’s heat it is. Seems to a secret touch telling me memory. Touched his sense moistened remembered. Hidden under wild ferns on Howth below us bay sleeping: sky. No sound. The sky. The bay purple by the Lion’s head. Green by Drumleck. Yellowgreen towards Sutton. Fields of undersea, the lines faint brown in grass, buried cities. Pillowed on my coat she had her hair, earwigs in the heather scrub my hand under her nape, you’ll toss me all. O wonder! Coolsoft with ointments her hand touched me, caressed: her eyes upon me did not turn away. Ravished over her I lay, full lips full open, kissed her mouth. Yum. Softly she gave me in my mouth the seedcake warm and chewed. Mawkish pulp her mouth had mumbled sweetsour of her spittle. Joy: I ate it: joy. Young life, her lips that gave me pouting. Soft warm sticky gumjelly lips. Flowers her eyes were, take me, willing eyes. Pebbles fell. She lay still. A goat. No-one. High on Ben Howth rhododendrons a nannygoat walking surefooted, dropping currants. Screened under ferns she laughed warmfolded. Wildly I lay on her, kissed her: eyes, her lips, her stretched neck beating, woman’s breasts full in her blouse of nun’s veiling, fat nipples upright. Hot I tongued her. She kissed me. I was kissed. All yielding she tossed my hair. Kissed, she kissed me.
Me. And me now.
Stuck, the flies buzzed.
”
”
James Joyce (Ulysses)
“
Someone has described a drinking fountain in Germany, where, every morning or noon, the villagers throng to enjoy the flowing water as it pours through numerous statues, the figures representing all the forms of human life. The farmer drinks from the fountain adorned with figures of waving grain, from which are traced the words, "I am the bread of life" (John 6:35). The shepherd comes up and drinks from the outstretched hands of a shepherd holding a lamb in his bosom, and exclaims, "I am the good shepherd" (John 10:11). The traveler sees a guide holding a lamp in his hand, as he cries, "I am the light of the world" (John 8:12). The gardener drinks from a fountain where the waters seem to be crushed from the clusters of the grapes that hang above it in the stone, almost hiding the letters, "I am the true vine" (John 15:1).
”
”
A.B. Simpson (Christ in the Bible Commentary: The Complete New Testament)
“
Well, what you ding this kind of work for--against your own people?"
"Three dollars a day. I got damn sick of creeping for my dinner--and not getting it. I got a wife and kids. We got to eat. Three dollars a day and it comes every day."
"But for your three dollars a day fifteen or twenty families can't eat at all. Nearly a hundred people have to go and wander on the roads for your three dollars a day. Is that right?"
"Can't think of that. Got to think of my own kids."
***
"Nearly a hundred people on the road for your three dollars. Where will we go?"
"And that reminds me, you better get out soon. I'm going through the dooryard after dinner...I got orders wherever there's a family not moved out--if I have an accident--you know, get too close and cave in the house a little--well, I might get a couple of dollars. And my youngest kid never had no shoes yet."
"I built this with my hands...It's mine. I built it. You bump it down--I'll be in the window with a rifle..."
"It's not me. There's nothing I can do. I'll lose my job if I don't do it. And look--suppose you kill me? They'll just hang you, but not long before you're hung there'll be another guy on the tractor, and he'll bump the house down. You're not killing the right guy."
***
Across the dooryard the tractor cut, and the hard, foot-beaten ground was seeded field, and the tractor cut through again; the uncut space was ten feet wide. And back he came. The iron guard bit into the house-corner, crumbled the wall and wrenched the house from its foundation so that it fell sideways,crushed like a bug...The tenant man stared after [the tractor], his rifle in his hand. His wife beside him, and the quiet children behind. And all of them stared after the tractor.
”
”
John Steinbeck (The Grapes of Wrath)
“
I believe that sake and wine are the only drinks in the world that have achieved the level of being forms of art.
Wine is made from grapes. Grapes have a lot of sugar in them to start with.
Although it's a gross simplification, if you crushed the grapes and put them in a barrel they'd naturally ferment and turn into wine.
But that's not the case with sake. In order for fermentation to occur, the starch in the rice has to be converted into sugar.
And that involves a far more complex and difficult process than what's involved in making wine.
In the entire world, no other country has developed such a refined drink out of cereal grains.
What you usually get out of cereal grains is something like beer, which has a low proof...
... or a distilled liquor like whiskey, which has a high one.
I want you to understand what a wonderful and unique thing sake is...
... and to appreciate the amazing skill it takes to create a drink that is practically an art form out of plain rice.
”
”
Tetsu Kariya (Sake)
“
…Wondering what I was wondering about them, if I saw their brilliance, or if their lives had been pointless, if only God could judge them after all. Did they want more? Was there more genius to be wrung out of the turpentine rags at their feet? Could they have painted better? Could they have painted more generously? More clearly? Could they have dropped more fruit from their windows? Did they know that glory was mundane? Did they wish they’d crushed those withered grapes between their fingers and spent their days walking through fields of grass or being in love or confessing their delusions to a priest or starving like the hungry souls they were, begging for alms in the city square with some honesty for once? Maybe they’d lived wrongly. Their greatness might have poisoned them. Did they wonder about things like that? Maybe they couldn’t sleep at night. Were they plagued by nightmares? Maybe they understood, in fact, that beauty and meaning had nothing to do with one another.
”
”
Ottessa Moshfegh (My Year of Rest and Relaxation)
“
Amazing Grace” Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, That saved a wretch like me! I once was lost, but now am found; Was blind, but now I see. ’Twas grace that taught my heart to fear, And grace my fears relieved; How precious did that grace appear, The hour I first believed. Through many dangers, toils and snares, I have already come; ’Tis grace hath brought me safe thus far, And grace will lead me home. The Lord has promised good to me, His Word my hope secures; He will my Shield and Portion be, As long as life endures. Yea, when this flesh and heart shall fail, And mortal life shall cease, I shall possess, within the veil, A life of joy and peace. The earth shall soon dissolve like snow, The sun forbear to shine; But God, who called me here below, Will be forever mine. When we’ve been there ten thousand years, Bright shining as the sun, We’ve no less days to sing God’s praise, Than when we’d first begun. Lyrics by John Newton, 1779 “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot” (Chorus) Swing low, sweet chariot, Coming for to carry me home. Swing low, sweet chariot, Coming for to carry me home. I looked over Jordan, and what did I see? (Coming for to carry me home) A band of angels coming after me. (Coming for to carry me home) (Chorus) If you get there before I do, (Coming for to carry me home) Tell all of my friends, that I'm coming there too. (Coming for to carry me home) (Chorus) Traditional lyrics Wallis Willis, circa 1865 “Battle Hymn of the Republic” Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord; He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored; He hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword: His truth is marching on. (Chorus) Glory, Glory, hallelujah! Glory, glory, hallelujah! Glory, glory, hallelujah! His truth is marching on. I have seen Him in the watch-fires of a hundred circling camps, They have builded Him an altar in the evening dews and damps; I can read His righteous sentence in the dim and flaring lamps: His day is marching on. (Chorus) I have read a fiery gospel writ in burnished rows of steel: "As ye deal with my contemners, so with you my grace shall deal"; Let the Hero, born of woman, crush the serpent with his heel, Since God is marching on. (Chorus) He has sounded forth the trumpet that shall never call retreat; He is sifting out the hearts of men before His judgment-seat; Oh, be swift, my soul, to answer Him! Be jubilant, my feet! Our God is marching on. (Chorus) In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea, With a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me. As He died to make men holy, let us die to make men free, While God is marching on. Lyrics by Julia Ward Howe, 1861
”
”
Dyrk Ashton (Wrath of Gods (The Paternus Trilogy, #2))
“
She lay quiet, looking at the ceiling. 'I wish the peace to come back,' she said.
'He himself is the peace. He comes if we invite him, and stays, if we ask. It's ourselves who wander away.'
'Why do we wander away?'
'Its the old free-will business—we're charmed by the self, by our own pointless self-seeking.'
'What does he want from us?'
'He wants us to ask him into our lives, to give everything over to him, once and for all.'
'I can't imagine.'
'I couldn't either. I heard it preached and talked about all my life. I exegeted Romans and memorized vast amounts of scripture before I was twelve years old, but somehow it went in one ear and out the other—I got the bone, but not the marrow. Long after becoming a priest, I remained terrified of surrendering anything, much less everything. And then one day I did.'
'Why?'
'Because I could no longer bear the separation from him.'
She licked her dry lips. 'You said there would be nothing to lose.'
'And everything to gain.'
'I don't wish to be humiliated.'
'By God?' He took the lid from the balm and moistened the swab.
'By anyone, and especially God.'
'God does not humiliate the righteous. He may fire us in the kiln to make us vessels, crush us like grapes so we become wine—but he never humiliates. That is the game of little people.'
'I have always depended on my own resources.'
'God gives us everything, including resources. But without him in our lives, even our resources fail.' He applied the balm.
'Tell me again why the peace comes—and then goes away.'
'His job is to stick with us, no matter what, and it's our job to stay close to him. Draw nigh to me, he says, and I will draw nigh to you. When we wander away, all we need to do is cry out to him, and he draws us back—into his peace, his love, his grace. He doesn't wander, we do.'
'Why must it come to this? Why must our lives be shackled to some so-called being who can't even be seen?'
'But he can be seen. We see him in each other every day. I see him in you.'
She closed her eyes, A long breath from her, as if she'd been holding it back.
'I've hurt many people,' she said
'Despair can be passed like a wafer to everyone around us, especially to those close to us. Into the bloodstream it goes, and down along the family line . . . .'
'Such an emptiness,' she said.
'Blaise Pascal . . . said, There's a God-shaped vacuum in the heart of every person, and it can't be filled by any created thing. It can only be filled by God, made know through Jesus Christ.'
'I don't wish to go on . . . without the peace . . . .'
It was his own surrender he saw in her.
”
”
Jan Karon (In the Company of Others (Mitford Years, #11))
“
This is a young wine from the Beaujolais, France region, which is produced through carbonic maceration. The grape variety used is Gamay, are known for their fruity fresh taste with very low tannins. Carbonic maceration is the vinification process through which the whole grape is crushed by its own weight, causing the grapes at the bottom of the vessel to begin the fermentation process without actually deliberately intervening in the process. The Beaujolais Nouveau is a marketing phenomenon, which on every year begins to sell on the same date worldwide, this being the third Thursday of November.
”
”
Miro Popić (The Wine Handbook)
“
All morning Sirine winds the bread dough in and out of itself, spins cabbage leaves, fat and silky, around rice and currants. She puts new ingredients in a salad, a frill of nuts, fresh herbs, dried fruit. Um-Nadia samples her salad, which tastes of ocean and beach grass, and she seems startled. "It's so good," she murmurs.
Sirine hums and stirs. She sifts through bags of wild rice. While Victor rushes around, assembling the usual plates of hummus and tabbouleh, she makes a mustard out of crushed grapes, a cake with lashings of cinnamon and pepper.
”
”
Diana Abu-Jaber (Crescent)
“
Why are you so into Pinot?” 2 Maya asks. In the next 60 seconds of the movie, the character of Miles Raymond tells a story which would set off a boom in sales of Pinot Noir. It’s a hard grape to grow. It’s thin-skinned, temperamental, ripens early. It’s not a survivor like Cabernet, which can just grow anywhere and thrive even when it’s neglected. No, Pinot needs constant care and attention. In fact it can only grow in these really specific, tucked away corners of the world. And only the most patient and nurturing of growers can do it, really. Only somebody who really takes the time to understand Pinot’s potential can coax it into its fullest expression. Its flavors are the most haunting and brilliant and thrilling and subtle and ancient on the planet. Miles is describing himself in the dialogue and using Pinot as a metaphor for his personality. In this one scene moviegoers projected themselves on the character, feeling his longing and his quest to be understood. Sideways was a hit and won an Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay. It also launched a movement, turning the misunderstood Pinot Noir into the must-have wine of the year. In less than one year after the movie’s 2004 fall release date, sales of Pinot Noir had risen 18 percent. Winemakers began to grow more of the grape to meet demand. In California alone 70,000 tons of Pinot Noir grapes were harvested and crushed in 2004. Within two years the volume had topped 100,000 tons. Today California wine growers crush more than 250,000 tons of Pinot Noir each year. Interestingly, the Japanese version of the movie did not have the same “Sideways Effect” on wine sales. One reason is that the featured grape is Cabernet, a varietal already popular in Japan. But even more critical and relevant to the discussion on storytelling is that Japanese audiences didn’t see the “porch scene” because there wasn’t one. The scene was not included in the movie. No story, no emotional attachment to a particular varietal. You see, the movie Sideways didn’t launch a movement in Pinot Noir; the story that Miles told triggered the boom. In 60 seconds Maya fell in love with Miles and millions of Americans fell in love with an expensive wine they knew little about.
”
”
Carmine Gallo (The Storyteller's Secret: From TED Speakers to Business Legends, Why Some Ideas Catch On and Others Don't)
“
Excerpt from "Work"
And if you cannot work
with love
but only with distaste,
it is better that you should leave
your work and sit at
the gate of the temple
and take alms
of those who work with joy.
For if you bake bread
with indifference, you bake
a bitter bread,
that feeds but half man’s hunger.
And if you grudge the crushing
of the grapes,
your grudge distills
a poison
in the wine.
And if you sing though as angels,
and love not the singing,
you muffle man’s ears
to the voices of the day
and the voices
of the night.
”
”
Kahlil Gibran
“
Red wine and Hennessy
She fell out of her bottle when she fell into love, cup running over, overflowing emotions in glass- red stained palet, on a pallet on the grass, to a quilt on the floor -affixed between lips and red lipstick on a shirt that he wore.
A familiar place, she know she's been here before
Reminiscent of the evening
On his shirt that she tore
............
Drop by drop, puddle in glass getting lower- impressions in her gut, rim of her glass, hour glass figure moves counter clockwise - while absorbing the contents of merlot.
Hard liquor and fine wine
.............
Red Wine and Hennessy
A wicked twist on some champagne tips
French nails, manicures over grapes
Whoever said wine and liquor don't mix?
Last night I had six
Bottle caps, corks, bedazzled juice
Merlot was her name - slim waist - good taste slinger neck, red lace. Long stem, pedestal - hands embraced her face
.............
room temperature, her body temperature ... personality of two, she's mellow and chill...
aged to perfection- pop the seal- watch the erection ... splatters on the floor- covers the rug,
Residue of red lipstick-
Merlot stained lips match the kiss on his neck
............
Chasing fantasy through the Red Sea
While chasing that with a white BC
How much will she pour- how much will she drink
How much more before her ship sinks
...........
A full body lush, blackberry crush
Medium sized Bordeaux
Intense velvety plum
I asked her where she's from
She said she's international
She's longer thinking rational
..........
Sips in sync with blinking eyes
She sips too much to realize
Every time you pour into me, my bottle gets more empty-
Glass falling to the floor
She staggers to the door
Glass shatters her feet
She stumbles to her seat
She's still asking for more
But she falls to the floor
Red lipstick in the mud
She covers up the blood
............
She lays in her wine
She forgot about the time
Clock on the wall
Footsteps in the hall
Pounding in her head
She rushes to the bed
.........
She lays motionless ... but her head is racing
Her heart is pacing
Her lungs are gasping - air, she needs air
Rolls to her side, brings her self to sit up
She gags and gags until She throws it all up-
...........
Wakes up the next morning
Dazed and confused
She's laying in a bed
That she's not used to
She moves slowly, where did everyone go?
She checks the time- it's a quarter pass 4
sounds on the other side of the door
Are Muffled by the sound of a knock at the door
...........
Looks around for her little red dress
Notices a blotch - a red stain on her breast
Lipstick smeared an accessory to her mess
She reached for her clothes and saw a note on the desk.
..........
Dearly beloved,
I want to see you again
I'd love to have to back
I think we make a great blend
I tried to wake you
Because I had to go
And
Oh by the way, my name is merlot
"Little Black Bird
”
”
Niedria Dionne Kenny (Love, Lust and Regrets: While the lights were off)
“
The Diverted Imperium by Stewart Stafford
Welcome to my lush vineyard,
As we crush poison grapes,
Forcing that last vinegar sip,
Of this “first citizen’s” foul wine.
In spite of meeting in night's shade,
It is not the taint of shame's veil,
But a new dawning concealed,
Our hand to reveal in due course.
Fellow senators, my brethren!
Men of honour, and, you, Brutus;
The noblest of all at our gathering,
But your eyes are on yonder hill.
Our dreamer’s conference tonight:
Seeks sacrifice, not bloodlust;
A fly caught in Necessity’s web,
And, is no more, for that is Nature.
Stakes of the bear pit arranged,
A swift consumption of power,
Nipping retaliation in the bud,
Smoothing our ascendancy.
A patriot in a traitor's pall?
Liberty's stars in alignment
Or noose of the ill-omened?
History’s verdict in absentia.
The hand beneath the cloak
Shakes the dagger mightily,
Mercy’s coup de grâce stills,
Bloody tip to inked treaties.
Once the bloodshed has passed,
Martial backing shall follow,
And our regime commences,
The Imperium by right diverted.
© Stewart Stafford, 2023. All rights reserved.
”
”
Stewart Stafford
“
I don't know why human life seems to require suffering for growth to take place, or why things have to be taken away from us if we are to expand. The pattern branded on the human heart seems to be that only pain brings lasting change, that we must learn how to grieve if we want to truly celebrate, that we have to get lost in order to be found again. The lesson of the grape seems to apply here: in order to get the life out, something has to be crushed.
”
”
Adam McHugh
“
Seeds pour out oil when pressed.
Grapes pour out wine when squeezed.
Herbs pour out medicine when pounded.
Flowers pour out perfume when crushed.
The gifted pour out excellence when tested.
”
”
Matshona Dhliwayo
“
If we are ever going to be made into wine, we will have to be crushed—you cannot drink grapes. Grapes become wine only when they have been squeezed. I wonder what finger and thumb God has been using to squeeze you?
”
”
Oswald Chambers (My Utmost for His Highest)
“
Work is love made visible. And if you cannot work with love but only with distaste, it is better that you should leave your work and sit at the gate of the temple and take alms of those who work with joy. For if you bake bread with indifference, you bake a bitter bread that feeds but half man’s hunger. And if you grudge the crushing of the grapes, your grudge distills a poison in the wine. And if you sing though as angels, and love not the singing, you muffle man’s ears to the voices of the day and the voices of the night. All work is empty save when there is love; and when you work with love you bind yourself to yourself, and to one another, and to God. —Kahlil
”
”
Dan Miller (48 Days to the Work You Love: Preparing for the New Normal)
“
After picking, grapes were crushed with bare feet. The must, or grape juice, was then poured into giant vats, followed by a process called pigeage, in which naked workers plunged themselves into the frothy liquid. Holding tightly to chains that had been fastened to overhead beams, the workers would then raise and lower themselves over and over again, stirring the must with their entire bodies so as to aerate the mixture and enhance the fermentation.
”
”
Don Kladstrup (Wine and War: The French, the Nazis, and the Battle for France's Greatest Treasure)
“
Grapes are crushed to form wine, and seeds only grow when in darkness.
”
”
Sheridan Anne (Darkest Sin)
“
The closest communion with God comes, I believe, through the sacrament of tears. Just as grapes are crushed to make wine and grain to make bread, so the elements of this sacrament come from the crushing experiences of life. —Ken Gire, Windows of the Soul
”
”
Sharon Jaynes (When You Don't Like Your Story: What If Your Worst Chapters Could Become Your Greatest Victories?)
“
The key here, as with any form of discipline, is that we always want to keep in mind a child’s profound need for connection. Often, misbehavior is a result of a child getting overtaxed emotionally, so that the expression of a need or a big feeling comes out in ways that are aggressive or disrespectful or uncooperative. She may be hungry or tired, or maybe there’s some other reason she’s incapable in that moment of self-control and making a good decision. Maybe the explanation is simply that she’s three, and her brain isn’t mature enough to understand and calmly express her feelings. So instead, doing her best to convey her crushing disappointment and anger that there’s no grape juice left, she begins throwing toys at you. It’s during these times that a child most needs our comfort and calm presence, and our discipline needs to communicate that presence. When handled correctly in the appropriate, research-proven manner, time-outs can absolutely help accomplish that goal. But angrily forcing the child to go off and sit by herself for a long time can feel like abandonment to a child, especially if she’s feeling out of control already. It may even send the subtle message that when she isn’t perfect, you don’t want to be near her. You don’t want to send the message that you’ll be in relationship with her when she’s “good,” or “happy,” but withhold your love and affection when she’s not. Would you want to stay in that kind of a relationship? Wouldn’t we advise our teenagers to avoid friends or partners who treat them like that when they’ve made a mistake?
”
”
Daniel J. Siegel (No-Drama Discipline: The Whole-Brain Way to Calm the Chaos and Nurture Your Child's Developing Mind)
“
Work is love made visible. And if you cannot work with love but only with distaste, it is better that you should leave your work and sit at the gate of the temple and take alms of those who work with joy. For if you bake bread with indifference, you bake a bitter bread that feeds but half man’s hunger. And if you grudge the crushing of the grapes, your grudge distills a poison in the wine.
”
”
Kahlil Gibran (The Prophet (Macmillan Collector's Library))
“
Who crushed The grapes of joy And dripped their juice On you?
”
”
Langston Hughes (The Weary Blues: A Collection of Poems)
“
We are all crushed grapes, and crushed beautiful rose petals, in the streets of memories, where once youth and hope wandered. Everything has a price in life, and the price we pay is either we are happy or sad, that's the only currency life issues.
”
”
Kenan Hudaverdi (Emotional Rhapsody)
“
For example, he interprets sounds as if they could be seen or tasted. In The Peregrine he writes of the crepuscular churring of the nightjar: Its song is like the sound of a stream of wine spilling from a height into a deep and booming cask. It is an odorous sound, with a bouquet that rises to the quiet sky. In the glare of day it would seem thinner and drier, but dusk mellows it and gives it vintage. If a song could smell, this song would smell of crushed grapes and almonds and dark wood. The sound spills out and none of it is lost.
”
”
J.A. Baker (The Peregrine)
“
I heard Chuck Swindoll share another refreshing thought on one of his broadcasts. He said that Christians can be like a sack of marbles—unfeeling, unloving, just clacking against each other as they go through life. Or, they can be caring people—like a sack of grapes pressing together to provide a soft, loving place to cushion and comfort each other from the hard crushes of life.
”
”
Barbara Johnson (Stick a Geranium in Your Hat and Be Happy)
“
and even occasionally helping out with the crushing of grapes for winemaking.
”
”
Hourly History (Marcus Aurelius: A Life From Beginning to End (Roman Emperors))
“
Our cup is often so full of pain that joy seems completely unreachable. When we are crushed like grapes, we cannot think of the wine we will become.
”
”
Henri J.M. Nouwen
“
For if you bake bread with indifference, you bake a bitter bread that feeds but half man’s hunger. And if you grudge the crushing of the grapes, your grudge distills a poison in the wine. And if you sing though as angels, and love not the singing, you muffle man’s ears to the voices of the day and the voices of the night.
”
”
Kahlil Gibran (The Prophet (Macmillan Collector's Library))
“
The landscape had a bucolic feel, a reminder that at the end of the day, despite the pretensions often served with each bottle, everything in this business depends on grapes that must be grown, picked, and crushed.
”
”
Bianca Bosker (Cork Dork: A Wine-Fueled Adventure Among the Obsessive Sommeliers, Big Bottle Hunters, and Rogue Scientists Who Taught Me to Live for Taste)
“
Rummaging through these old, yellowing picture postcards, I find that everything has suddenly become confused, everything is in chaos. Ever since my father vanished from the story, from the novel, everything has come loose, fallen apart. His mighty figure, his authority, even his very name, were sufficient to hold the plot within fixed limits, the story that ferments like grapes in barrels, the story in which fruit slowly rots, trampled underfoot, crushed by the press of memories, weighted down by its own juices and by the sun. And now that the barrel has burst, the wine of the story has spilled out, the soul of the grape, and no divine skill can put it back inside the wineskin, compress it into a short tale, mold it into a glass of crystal. Oh, golden-pink liquid, oh, fairy tale, oh, alcoholic vapor, oh, fate! I don't want to curse God, I don't want to complain about life. So I'll gather together all those picture postcards in a heap, this era full of old-fashioned splendor and romanticism, I'll shuffle my cards, deal them as in a game of solitaire for readers who are fond of solitaire and intoxicating fragrances, of bright colors and vertigo.
”
”
Danilo Kiš (Garden, Ashes)
“
ruby comes from the rock being crushed for millions of years, fine leather from the harshness of tanning, and fine wine from the crushing and fermentation of the grapes, so we might regard the sufferings of our life as refinements that are tanning us, fermenting us, transforming and deepening us. Brought into consciousness with acceptance rather than resentment, the ill treatment that we suffer at our own and others’ hands is transformed into divine pressure that is molding and shaping the Godself within.
”
”
Jean Houston (Mystical Dogs: Animals as Guides to Our Inner Life)
“
The air had borrowed wind from the wildernesses of our hills. It had stolen the fragrance from the jasmines and was blowing it around as its own. It carried the scent of crushed grapes from the surrounding grapevines and released it in occasional whiffs. The saffron fields were in full bloom, it was spring.
”
”
Mukta Singh-Zocchi (Game of Big Numbers)
“
The big man glanced at him, a friendly look. Across the hogan, Leaphorn noticed, two of the women were smiling at him. He was a stranger, a policeman who had arrested one of them, a man from another clan, perhaps even a witch, but he was accepted with the natural hospitality of the Dinee. He felt a fierce pride in his people, and in this celebration of womanhood. The Dinee had always respected the female equally with the male — giving her equality in property, in metaphysics and in clan — recognizing the mother’s role in the footsteps of Changing Woman as the preserver of the Navajo Way. Leaphorn remembered what his mother had told him when he had asked how Changing Woman could have prescribed a Kinaalda cake “a shovel handle wide” and garnished with raisins when the Dinee had neither shovels nor grapes. “When you are a man,” she had said, “you will understand that she was teaching us to stay in harmony with time.” Thus, while the Kiowas were crushed, the Utes reduced to hopeless poverty, and the Hopis withdrawn into the secret of their kivas, the eternal Navajo adapted and endured.
”
”
Tony Hillerman (Listening Woman (Leaphorn & Chee, #3))
“
remembering so acutely Jamie’s flesh and weight and ardor, and so urgently wanted him to be Jamie that I had succeeded for an instant in thinking that he was, only to be crushed like a grape at the realization that he wasn’t, all my soft insides spurting out. Had he felt or thought the same things, waking to find me there beside him?
”
”
Diana Gabaldon (The Fiery Cross / A Breath of Snow and Ashes / An Echo in the Bone / Written in My Own Heart's Blood (Outlander #5-8))
“
Portrait of the Author"
The birches are mad with green points
the wood's edge is burning with their green,
burning, seething—No, no, no.
The birches are opening their leaves one
by one. Their delicate leaves unfold cold
and separate, one by one. Slender tassels
hang swaying from the delicate branch tips—
Oh, I cannot say it. There is no word.
Black is split at once into flowers. In
every bog and ditch, flares of
small fire, white flowers!—Agh,
the birches are mad, mad with their green.
The world is gone, torn into shreds
with this blessing. What have I left undone
that I should have undertaken?
O my brother, you redfaced, living man
ignorant, stupid whose feet are upon
this same dirt that I touch—and eat.
We are alone in this terror, alone,
face to face on this road, you and I,
wrapped by this flame!
Let the polished plows stay idle,
their gloss already on the black soil.
But that face of yours—!
Answer me. I will clutch you. I
will hug you, grip you. I will poke my face
into your face and force you to see me.
Take me in your arms, tell me the commonest
thing that is in your mind to say,
say anything. I will understand you—!
It is the madness of the birch leaves opening
cold, one by one.
My rooms will receive me. But my rooms
are no longer sweet spaces where comfort
is ready to wait on me with its crumbs.
A darkness has brushed them. The mass
of yellow tulips in the bowl is shrunken.
Every familiar object is changed and dwarfed.
I am shaken, broken against a might
that splits comfort, blows apart
my careful partitions, crushes my house
and leaves me—with shrinking heart
and startled, empty eyes—peering out
into a cold world.
In the spring I would be drunk! In the spring
I would be drunk and lie forgetting all things.
Your face! Give me your face, Yang Kue Fei!
your hands, your lips to drink!
Give me your wrists to drink—
I drag you, I am drowned in you, you
overwhelm me! Drink!
Save me! The shad bush is in the edge
of the clearing. The yards in a fury
of lilac blossoms are driving me mad with terror.
Drink and lie forgetting the world.
And coldly the birch leaves are opening one by one.
Coldly I observe them and wait for the end.
And it ends.
”
”
William Carlos Williams (Sour Grapes)
“
lived with crushing regrets my whole life because I wasn’t brave enough to claim what I truly wanted. If you can learn one thing from an old woman, ma petite mademoiselle, learn that.
”
”
Laura Bradbury (My Grape Paris (The Grape Series, #4))
“
I lived with crushing regrets my whole life because I wasn’t brave enough to claim what I truly wanted. If you can learn one thing from an old woman, ma petite mademoiselle, learn that.
”
”
Laura Bradbury (My Grape Paris (The Grape Series, #4))
“
You, His fruit, having descended into the depths like Christ after being crushed, experienced the Inner Court fermentation. Now, however, that grape no longer exists. Something else has taken its place. The grape is now wine, having risen with new life in a new form like Christ. As a result, the veil that has always stood between the Vintner and the grapes no longer exists between the King and His wine.
”
”
T.D. Jakes (Crushing: God Turns Pressure into Power)
“
Someone Knocks on a Door in the State Where I Was Born
Take me back where hag moths feed
on sweet gums, threshers crushing
wild grapes. Where fields curb
the slaughterhouse, tractors weighted
with wheat. Take me where cars
feed turnpikes, and bones break
down in their graves. Where roads pass
smokestacks; steel pipes scored on the lathe.
Apricots sleep inside branches
as the hunters slip deep into spring.
And a hog drowns in the culvert.
And the muskrat gives over its skin.
Where dirt calls to the ash roots,
the screech owl calling to rain.
Where a boy leans on a headstone,
pretending not to hear his name.
”
”
Bruce Snider (Paradise, Indiana)
“
Even the humans knew all about the kings of Obitraes, the land of vampires. After all, vampire rulers had centuries to build their palaces of grand myth, forged from the flames of their bloody acts. In the human nations, they had been whispered of like monsters. In Obitraes, they were talked about like gods. I’d heard all the stories over the years. Vincent, Oraya’s father and former King of the Nightborn, had been the drawn blade, a killer cold as the night itself. Dante, King of the Bloodborn, had been the beast larger than life, more teeth and claws than man. One day, the whispers would make legends of Raihn and Oraya, too, and I looked forward to hearing them. Raoul, King of the House of Shadow, might have dwarfed them all. He was the oldest of the vampire kings, and the one who had managed to cling to power the longest. Like most vampire rulers, he’d plucked his crown off the severed head of his predecessor, his mother, before even bothering to wipe his blade. Two centuries ago, he’d nearly destroyed the House of Blood without a single battle, relying on torture and spies instead of warriors. They said he could pick thoughts from your head like grapes from the vine and crush them just as easily. They said that he could enslave you without a single chain.
”
”
Carissa Broadbent (The Songbird & the Heart of Stone (Crowns of Nyaxia, #3))