Fertility Hope Quotes

Although it is very easy to marry a wife, it is very difficult to support her along with the children and the household. Accordingly, no one notices this faith of Jacob. Indeed, many hate fertility in a wife for the sole reason that the offspring must be supported and brought up. For this is what they commonly say: ‘Why should I marry a wife when I am a pauper and a beggar? I would rather bear the burden of poverty alone and not load myself with misery and want.’ But this blame is unjustly fastened on marriage and fruitfulness. Indeed, you are indicting your unbelief by distrusting God’s goodness, and you are bringing greater misery upon yourself by disparaging God’s blessing. For if you had trust in God’s grace and promises, you would undoubtedly be supported. But because you do not hope in the Lord, you will never prosper.

They're not that different from you, are they? Same haircuts. Full of hormones, just like you. Invincible, just like you feel. The world is their oyster. They believe they're destined for great things, just like many of you, their eyes are full of hope, just like you. Did they wait until it was too late to make from their lives even one iota of what they were capable? Because, you see gentlemen, these boys are now fertilizing daffodils. But if you listen real close, you can hear them whisper their legacy to you. Go on, lean in. Listen, you hear it? - - Carpe - - hear it? - - Carpe, carpe diem, seize the day boys, make your lives extraordinary.

You’re not doing well and finally I don’t have to pretend to be so interested in your on going tragedy, but I’ll rob the bank that gave you the impression that money is more fruitful than words, and I’ll cut holes in the ozone if it means you have one less day of rain. I’ll walk you to the hospital, I’ll wait in a white room that reeks of hand sanitizer and latex for the results from the MRI scan that tries to locate the malady that keeps your mind guessing, and I want to write you a poem every day until my hand breaks and assure you that you’ll find your place, it’s just the world has a funny way of hiding spots fertile enough for bodies like yours to grow roots. and I miss you like a dart hits the iris of a bullseye, or a train ticket screams 4:30 at 4:47, I wanted to tell you that it’s my birthday on Thursday and I would have wanted you to give me the gift of your guts on the floor, one last time, to see if you still had it in you. I hope our ghosts aren’t eating you alive. If I’m to speak for myself, I’ll tell you that the universe is twice as big as we think it is and you’re the only one that made that idea less devastating.

A crash of cymbals exploded in her ear. She opened her eyes to behold Driggs clanging them vigorously, a mischievous grin on his face and a large bruise surrounding his eye. "I hope, for the sake of your fertility, you're wearing a cup," she warned through clenched teeth." "Come on," he said, jumping onto to the mattress. "It's time for work." Lex moaned. "How are you so awake already?" "If you recall, I eat a lot of chocolate.

Before artificial nitrogen fertilizer became widely available, the world's population was around 2 billion. When we no longer have it - or if we ever decide to stop using it - that may be the number to which our own naturally gravitates.

Hope is a fertile soil where flowers blossoms.

Hardly anything is as exciting or as diverse, as strong a confirmation of life and hope and the universe's urge towards creativity, as a lively compost heap or the first draft of a novel.

Music is the fertilizer for heart to bloom the flower of love and peace.

I came. I saw the enormous possibilities and power of the human mind. It is the biggest plot of fertile land in the world. We just have to find the right see and the right technique of cultivation.

You see, Ama, it is for men to create. It is for men to decide. It is for men to speak. It is your place to listen, and follow, and gestate. And those are no small things! For without women to listen, how would the men’s words be heard? Without your fertile womb, how could my son hope to grow? You are important, Ama. Desperately important. But do not overreach.

The potatoes grew bigger as carbon dioxide increased. This was not a surprise. We also saw that these big potatoes were less nutritious, much lower in protein content, no matter how much fertilizer we gave them. This was a bit of a surprise. It is also bad news, because the poorest and hungriest nations of the world rely on sweet potatoes for a significant amount of dietary protein. It looks as if the bigger potatoes of the future might feed more people while nourishing them less. I don’t have an answer for that one. The

If farmer doesn't have a fertile land then there is no hope for cultivation, as a man if you don't have a sincere heart ,it would be worthless to gain a love by others heart.

Hope is like air if not built on a fertile ground. A ground that requires attention and nurturing. You cannot stop working on that ground even if the hope is sprouting higher into the sky.

One of the strangest things about life is that we are as much defined by our hopes as we are our secret fears. We are, for the most part, the product of what we think about the most. Our minds are fertile beds, like these flower boxes. What would happen if the gardener did not pull out the weeds?

After a few days of rain, the seedlings will push through the soil and unfold their tiny leaves. Two weeks later, if the rain is still good, we then carefully apply the first round of fertilizer, because each seedling requires love and attention like any living thing if it's going to grow up strong.

We need an engineering friend.” She points a finger at Carin. “Go back to Briar and hook up with an engineering student.” “Okay, but I’ll need to actually have sex with him beforehand, so I won’t be back until,” she pretends to check the time, “ten or so.” “We’re all college graduates,” I proclaim. “We can put this together ourselves.” Clapping my hands, I motion for everyone to get on the floor with me. After three tries of trying to lower myself to the ground and making Hope and Carin nearly pee their pants laughing in the process, D’Andre takes pity on all of us and helps me onto my knees. Which is where Tucker finds us. “Is this some new fertility ritual?” he drawls from the doorway, one shoulder propped against the frame. “Because she’s already pregnant, you know.” “Get yo ass in here, white boy, and put this thing together,” D’Andre snaps. “This is ridiculous.” “What’s ridiculous?” Tucker stops next to me, and I take the opportunity to lean against his legs. Even kneeling is hard when you’re toting around an extra thirty pounds. “We took it apart. How can you not know how to put it back together?” D’Andre repeats his earlier excuse. “I’m an accounting major.” Tucker rolls his eyes. “You got an Allen wrench?” “Are you mocking us right now?” I grumble. “I don’t have any wrenches, let alone ones with names.” He grins. “Leave this to me, darlin’. I’ll get it fixed up.” “I want to help,” Hope volunteers. “This is like surgery, except with wood and not people.” “Lord help us,” D’Andre mutters.

A large proportion of mankind, like pigeons and partridges, on reaching maturity, having passed through a period of playfulness or promiscuity, establish what they hope and expect will be a permanent and fertile mating relationship. This we call marriage.

What is clear is that societies that feature a low gender gap are also populated by women who give birth, on average, half as often as women who live in societies with a high gender gap. The average number of births per woman living in the “high gap” countries is close to four, while the number in the “low gap” countries is just under two. It makes sense that the most effective and long-lasting mechanism for curbing global population growth revolves around an elimination of gender inequality. These data also imply that closing the gender gap around the world would likely result in something near replacement-level fertility: that is, a stable global population that neither increases nor decreases.

I absolutely don't buy into the current mania for tidiness and decluttering. For a writer, piles of papers and notes are a fertile field. Keep all those books you read in college, or had certainly meant to read. Keep all those clothes that last fit during the Carter administration. Or give them away. It's for you to choose. You has value.

God says that His thoughts are higher than our thoughts. This means there's room for improvement when it comes to our thought life.

The cross-fertilization of different images, he hoped, might help to disperse the various ills he and the nation faced.

Make me a channel of Thy peace, that where there is hatred, let me sow love, or at least not fertilize the hate with my dainty bullshit.

Hope is that inner image you hold on to, the image generated by God's promises. When hope is lost, your faith no longer has a mission to accomplish. God's Word contains your reason to hope!

If I find a cow turd on my front steps, I’m not satisfied knowing that I’ll be mentally prepared to find some future cow turd. I want to shovel that turd onto my garden and hope the cow returns every week so I never have to buy fertilizer again.*

Tears fall like liquid leaves into the streams and full, autumn-coloured rivers of our blood And liquid leaves become crystal in our winter fortress before they flow shifting, changing rich red by grace of autumn and fertile in the spring

We love with all our heart, in every way that we can love but the heart is not burdened. We learn to keep it light and pliable. It has space. It breathes. It waits on Life to give instructions. It sings with sweetness when the winds are soft and warm. It stands with calm patience when the storm is brewing. It lets go when death and seeming endings have left their irrefutable mark. It moves. It heals. It hopes. It allows Life to be lived in the safe, fertile, and still inner space where it grows stronger and more compelling every day.

My only plea is that all artists have to range the full extent of their own lives freely. The rest of the world can censor and bury their private past. We cannot, and so have to remain partly green till the day we die… callow-green in the hope of becoming fertile-green.

Unlike the classical Greeks, for whom the fruit symbolized the inescapable cycle of bitter death, with a remorseful Persephone returning to the underworld for her six months of required winter, Marjan liked to believe the old stories of Persian soothsayers, who held a different vision of the tart fruit's purpose in life. She liked to remember that above all else, above all the unfortunate connotations of death and winter, the pomegranate was, and always would be, the fruit of hope. The flower of fertility, of new things and old seasons to be cradled.

Many of us sing songs about bringing revival to our cities, but how are we communicating this message and is it relevant? If we come with our own agenda and do not truly know the needs of the people we want to reach, we will never see the harvest. A good farmer has to know the seeds he is planting: how much water they need, how far apart to plant the seeds, and what fertilizers they need for growth. In much the same way, we need to know the people in our communities and their basic needs if we are to yield a harvest. If our intent is to love compassionately, than knowing the hearts of the people we hope to reach will be more important than “filling our quota.” God is not interested in people hearing the message as much as us “becoming the message,” as Jesus did. He spoke in parables that used relevant cultural references so that those who were searching would find truth.

All social orders command their members to imbibe in pipe dreams of posterity, the mirage of immortality, to keep them ahead of the extinction that would ensue in a few generations if the species did not replenish itself. This is the implicit, and most pestiferous, rationale for propagation: to become fully integrated into a society, one must offer it fresh blood. Naturally, the average set of parents does not conceive of their conception as a sacrificial act. These are civilized human beings we are talking about, and thus they are quite able to fill their heads with a panoply of less barbaric rationales for reproduction, among them being the consolidation of a spousal relationship; the expectation of new and enjoyable experiences in the parental role; the hope that one will pass the test as a mother or father; the pleasing of one’s own parents, not to forget their parents and possibly a great-grandparent still loitering about; the serenity of taking one’s place in the seemingly deathless lineage of a familial enterprise; the creation of individuals who will care for their paternal and maternal selves in their dotage; the quelling of a sense of guilt or selfishness for not having done their duty as human beings; and the squelching of that faint pathos that is associated with the childless. Such are some of the overpowering pressures upon those who would fertilize the future. These pressures build up in people throughout their lifetimes and must be released, just as everyone must evacuate their bowels or fall victim to a fecal impaction. And who, if they could help it, would suffer a building, painful fecal impaction? So we make bowel movements to relieve this pressure. Quite a few people make gardens because they cannot stand the pressure of not making a garden. Others commit murder because they cannot stand the pressure building up to kill someone, either a person known to them or a total stranger. Everything is like that. Our whole lives consist of metaphorical as well as actual bowel movements, one after the other. Releasing these pressures can have greater or lesser consequences in the scheme of our lives. But they are all pressures, all bowel movements of some kind. At a certain age, children are praised for making a bowel movement in the approved manner. Later on, the praise of others dies down for this achievement and our bowel movements become our own business, although we may continue to praise ourselves for them. But overpowering pressures go on governing our lives, and the release of these essentially bowel-movement pressures may once again come up for praise, congratulations, and huzzahs of all kinds.

contemplate the fertility I hope for in my fifties and beyond—the regeneration of my creativity, the refinement of my spirituality, a new relationship with my body, the rediscovery of my daughter, indeed an inner culmination I cannot fully articulate to myself—I realize it cannot be plotted, orchestrated, controlled, and forced to bloom.

We are not involved in this struggle only because we think that we will dismantle this system in the course of our life. We hope Cameroon changes tomorrow. But if it doesn’t, we will be happy to know that we made the ground fertile for the next generation that will end the rot in this country, and then establish the “NEW CAMEROON".” Dr. Samuel F. Tchwenko

In a 2007 cable about Nauru, made public by WikiLeaks, an unnamed U.S. official summed up his government’s analysis of what went wrong on the island: “Nauru simply spent extravagantly, never worrying about tomorrow.” Fair enough, but that diagnosis is hardly unique to Nauru; our entire culture is extravagantly drawing down finite resources, never worrying about tomorrow. For a couple of hundred years we have been telling ourselves that we can dig the midnight black remains of other life forms out of the bowels of the earth, burn them in massive quantities, and that the airborne particles and gases released into the atmosphere - because we can’t see them - will have no effect whatsoever. Or if they do, we humans, brilliant as we are, will just invent our way out of whatever mess we have made. And we tell ourselves all kinds of similarly implausible no-consequences stories all the time, about how we can ravage the world and suffer no adverse effects. Indeed we are always surprised when it works out otherwise. We extract and do not replenish and wonder why the fish have disappeared and the soil requires ever more “inputs” (like phosphate) to stay fertile. We occupy countries and arm their militias and then wonder why they hate us. We drive down wages, ship jobs overseas, destroy worker protections, hollow out local economies, then wonder why people can’t afford to shop as much as they used to. We offer those failed shoppers subprime mortgages instead of steady jobs and then wonder why no one foresaw that a system built on bad debts would collapse. At every stage our actions are marked by a lack of respect for the powers we are unleashing - a certainty, or at least a hope, that the nature we have turned to garbage, and the people we have treated like garbage, will not come back to haunt us.

This is the secret of accompaniment. I will hold a mirror to you and show you your value, bear witness to your suffering, and to your light. And over time, you will do the same for me, for within the relationship lies the promise of our shared dignity and the mutual encouragement needed to do the hard things. Whatever you aim to do, whatever problem you hope to address, remember to accompany those who are struggling, those who are left out, who lack the capabilities needed to solve their own problems. We are each other’s destiny. Beneath the hard skills and firm strategic priorities needed to resolve our greatest challenges lies the soft, fertile ground of our shared humanity. In that place of hard and soft is sustenance enough to nourish the entire human family.

Teddy was reminded of Paterson, but that polyglot population had appeared healthier, more hopeful, the American mood more fertile then in its promises, and the streets of Silk City with their little yards holding a fuchsia bush or a blue-robed plaster statue of the Virgin more livable than these stacked, stinking, ill-lit dens. He had been a part of the population then, a schoolboy immersed in its details of competition and expectation and childish collusion and hierarchy, alive in its struggle and too absorbed to judge or pity, whereas now he came upon it from outside, from above, as an agent of power and ownership, an enforcer and avenger, the representative of the system which squeezed the lowly by the same iron laws whereby it generation profits for the lucky and strong.

Sure, I told him to fuck himself and yes, I paid for it dearly (ruptured spleen). But after my recovery and given the time to reflect, I have a better understanding of who I am penning this for. Not just for the parole board. Not just for wronged Chinese people, not for racist whites, not for my prison therapy group, not for Manny or Jaynuss, not for Momma, not for my once-again estranged father, not even for Lene (though I hope and, in weaker moments, pray she will read this one day), but for others, like myself. Those who lack foresight. Those often overwhelmed by the present. Those ignorant of and indifferent to the past. Those whose worst qualities come to the surface when tested. Those who are fertile ground for dubious moral judgment. Those who feel, in some mysterious but common sense, unmoored.

Sink white fangs in the throat of Life, Lap up the red that gushes In the cold dark gloom of the bare black stones, In the gorge where the black wind rushes. Slink where the titan boulders poise And the chasms grind thereunder, Over the mountains black and bare In the teeth of the brooding thunder. Why should we wish for the fertile fields, Valley and crystal fountain? This is our doom--the hunger-trail, The wolf and the storm-stalked mountain. Over us stalk the bellowing gods Where the dusk and the twilight sever; Under their iron goatish hoofs They crunch our skulls forever. Mercy and hope and pity--all, Bubbles the black crags sunder; Hunger is all the gods have left And the death that lurks thereunder. Glut mad fangs in the blood of Life To slake the thirst past sating, Before the blind worms mouth our bones And the vulture's beak is grating.

My hope, for all future generations, is that they will have (in addition to sunshine, fresh air, clean water, and fertile soil) a somewhat slower pace of life, with plenty of time to pause, in quiet places . . . haunted places—everyday, accessible places, open to the public—places that are not too radically transformed over time—places susceptible of cultivation, where people can express their caring, and nature can respond—places with tough, gnarled roots and tangled stalks, with digging mammals and noisy birds—places of common remembrance and hopeful guidance—places of unexpected encounters—places that breed solidarity across difference—places where children can walk in the footsteps of those who have gone before—places that are perpetually up for adoption—places that have been humanized but not conquered or commodified—places that foster a kind of connectedness both mournful and celebratory.

There is one itty-bitty ray of hope in the coming global fertilizer—and from that, food—shortage: most studies by most agricultural scientists suggest that most farmers have been overfertilizing for decades, especially when it comes to potassium fertilizers. This would suggest that at present most farms in most places have a potassium surplus baked into the soil. This would further suggest that most farmers can reduce their inputs of fertilizer without sacrificing yields by all that much. The question is, for how long?

What do we mean by the lived truth of creation? We have to mean the world as it appears to men in a condition of relative unrepression; that is, as it would appear to creatures who assessed their true puniness in the face of the overwhelmingness and majesty of the universe, of the unspeakable miracle of even the single created object; as it probably appeared to the earliest men on the planet and to those extrasensitive types who have filled the roles of shaman, prophet, saint, poet, and artist. What is unique about their perception of reality is that it is alive to the panic inherent in creation: Sylvia Plath somewhere named God "King Panic." And Panic is fittingly King of the Grotesque. What are we to make of a creation in which the routine activity is for organisms to be tearing others apart with teeth of all types-biting, grinding flesh, plant stalks, bones between molars, pushing the pulp greedily down the gullet with delight, incorporating its essence into one's own organization, and then excreting with foul stench and gasses the residue. Everyone reaching out to incorporate others who are edible to him. The mosquitoes bloating themselves on blood, the maggots, the killerbees attacking with a fury and demonism, sharks continuing to tear and swallow while their own innards are being torn out-not to mention the daily dismemberment and slaughter in "natural" accidents of all types: the earthquake buries alive 70 thousand bodies in Peru, automobiles make a pyramid heap of over 50 thousand a year in the U.S. alone, a tidal wave washes over a quarter of a million in the Indian Ocean. Creation is a nightmare spectacular taking place on a planet that has been soaked for hundreds of millions of years in the blood of all its creatures. The soberest conclusion that we could make about what has actually been taking place on the planet for about three billion years is that it is being turned into a vast pit of fertilizer. But the sun distracts our attention, always baking the blood dry, making things grow over it, and with its warmth giving the hope that comes with the organism's comfort and expansiveness. "Questo sol m'arde, e questo m'innamore," as Michelangelo put it.

Well, at least you are going to do the right thing and stand by the marriage." "Which isn't even a legal one," Richard pointed out, and then his eyes widened. "What if she is with child from last night's tumblings? Technically, the child would be illegitimate." Daniel grimaced at the thought, but tried to soothe him. "Well, one time isn't likely to bring about a child." "True,but it wasn't one time," Richard muttered. "Well even two..." Daniel began, but then noted his expression and instead asked, "Three?" Richard stared back silently. "Four?" he asked with disbelief. Richard remained silent. "Oh." Daniel sat back in his seat, somewhat impressed, but mostly envious as he imagined having Suzette five times or more, each time in different places and positions and...Giving his head a shake, he muttered, "Well, she must be very...er...inspiring. We must just hope she is not equally fertile." When Richard's shoulders slumped, he added, "Or you could marry her to ensure everything was legal." "We are already supposed to be married. How the devil do I explain the need to marry again?" Richard asked with disgust.

...the habitants, dressed in their brightest colors and wearing their shoes, lined the Route de Rivière, waving and shouting, “Bon jour, Monsieur Reneau. Congratulations on your marriage." Once he passed however, they whispered to each other. “Poor Monsieur Reneau. Certainly he is a fertile man, two wives, sixteen daughters, yet no son." "The Reneau seed is cursed," some surmised but others held out hope for their Seigneur. “Perhaps this third wife will give him a healthy boy, eh?” Zacharie, third Lord of Paradise. The Last Lord of Paradise––Generation Three

Imagine a single survivor, a lonely fugitive at large on mainland Mauritius at the end of the seventeenth century. Imagine this fugitive as a female. She would have been bulky and flightless and befuddled—but resourceful enough to have escaped and endured when the other birds didn’t. Or else she was lucky. Maybe she had spent all her years in the Bambous Mountains along the southeastern coast, where the various forms of human-brought menace were slow to penetrate. Or she might have lurked in a creek drainage of the Black River Gorges. Time and trouble had finally caught up with her. Imagine that her last hatchling had been snarfed by a [invasive] feral pig. That her last fertile egg had been eaten by a [invasive] monkey. That her mate was dead, clubbed by a hungry Dutch sailor, and that she had no hope of finding another. During the past halfdozen years, longer than a bird could remember, she had not even set eyes on a member of her own species. Raphus cucullatus had become rare unto death. But this one flesh-and-blood individual still lived. Imagine that she was thirty years old, or thirty-five, an ancient age for most sorts of bird but not impossible for a member of such a large-bodied species. She no longer ran, she waddled. Lately she was going blind. Her digestive system was balky. In the dark of an early morning in 1667, say, during a rainstorm, she took cover beneath a cold stone ledge at the base of one of the Black River cliffs. She drew her head down against her body, fluffed her feathers for warmth, squinted in patient misery. She waited. She didn't know it, nor did anyone else, but she was the only dodo on Earth. When the storm passed, she never opened her eyes. This is extinction.

Christianity invented or blessed the invention of the technological Machine. The bulk of people in the Third World today have experienced Christianity not as separate from technology but almost as a part of it. Throngs of people went to school to learn to be modern — that is, to be Christian. Many ended up serving the administrative machinery of Christianity, hoping for a taste of greater modernism. It was a team of Christians who came into my village over twelve years ago to ask those who went to church on Sunday to grow cotton so that they could buy it from them. The naive villagers saw in it an immense opportunity to become modern — that is, to acquire bicycles, short-wave radios and clothes. What they did not see was that these white Christians had their own separate agenda. Because they were in control, they laid out what they wanted the villagers to do. It included using fertilizer and pesticides that were banned in France. No one had the money, but everyone bought on credit. They were barely able to pay their debts out of their sales. With bitterness, the villagers returned to their traditional farming, but the land was angry. Tortured by foreign chemicals, it “went into a coma.” Technology

Caleb was a hero, there is no doubt of it. He ventured forth from one world to another with an explorer’s courage, armored by the hope that he could serve his people. He stood shoulder to shoulder with the most learned of his day, ready to take his place with them as a man of affairs. He won the respect of those who had been swiftest to dismiss him. All that is true and certain. But what I do not know is this: which home welcomed him, at the end. Whichever it was—the celestial English heaven of seraphim, cherubim and ophanim, or Kietan’s warm and fertile place away in the southwest, I believe that his song was powerful enough for Joel to hear and to follow him there. X They pulled the Indian College down.

Many are still making a similar mistake. In selecting a home they look more to the temporal advantages they may gain than to the moral and social influences that will surround themselves and their families. They choose a beautiful and fertile country, or remove to some flourishing city, in the hope of securing greater [169] prosperity; but their children are surrounded by temptation, and too often they form associations that are unfavorable to the development of piety and the formation of a right character. The atmosphere of lax morality, of unbelief, of indifference to religious things, has a tendency to counteract the influence of the parents. Examples of rebellion against parental and divine authority are ever before the youth; many form attachments for infidels and unbelievers, and cast in their lot with the enemies of God. In choosing a home, God would have us consider, first of all, the moral and religious influences that will surround us and our families. We may be placed in trying positions, for many cannot have their surroundings what they would; and whenever duty calls us, God will enable us to stand uncorrupted, if we watch and pray, trusting in the grace of Christ. But we should not needlessly expose ourselves to influences that are unfavorable to the formation of Christian character. When we voluntarily place ourselves in an atmosphere of worldliness and unbelief, we displease God and drive holy angels from our homes.

We had been growing sweet potatoes under the greenhouse gas levels predicted for the next several hundred years, the levels that we’re likely to see if we, as a society, do nothing about carbon emissions. The potatoes grew bigger as carbon dioxide increased. This was not a surprise. We also saw that these big potatoes were less nutritious, much lower in protein content, no matter how much fertilizer we gave them. This was a bit of a surprise. It is also bad news, because the poorest and hungriest nations of the world rely on sweet potatoes for a significant amount of dietary protein. It looks as if the bigger potatoes of the future might feed more people while nourishing them less. I don’t have an answer for that one. The

1496: La Conceptión Sacrilege Bartholomew Columbus, Christopher’s brother and lieutenant, attends an incineration of human flesh. Six men play the leads in the grand opening of Haiti’s incinerator. The smoke makes everyone cough. The six are burning as a punishment and as a lesson: They have buried the images of Christ and the Virgin that Fray Ramon Pane left with them for protection and consolation. Fray Ramon taught them to pray on their knees, to say the Ave Maria and Paternoster and to invoke the name of Jesus in the face of temptation, injury, and death. No one has asked them why they buried the images. They were hoping that the new gods would fertilize their fields of corn, cassava, boniato, and beans. The fire adds warmth to the humid, sticky heat that foreshadows heavy rain. (103)

I planted a lawn last year. I went to a garden shop and bought long rolls of grass that I laid out like a carpet over a bare patch of ground. Six months later, around two-thirds of my newly planted lawn had started to grow, but the remainder was parched and brown despite regular watering, fertilizer, and lawn pellets. Nearly twelve months later, the healthy parts of the lawn were thriving and slowly creeping across the areas where the new grass had previously refused to grow. I will never lay another lawn: gardening, it turns out, is not one of my talents. But the lawn is a good metaphor for the way in which the brain compensates for damaged cells. Eventually (perhaps in years to come), the healthy parts of the lawn will be so hardy that no one will notice the bald patches of dead grass. After my chance meeting in the park, that was my new hope for my brain.

The amiable relationship between West and Kathleen was immediately obvious upon their return to Eversby Priory. Kathleen came to the entrance hall while the butler was still collecting their hats and coats, and propped her hands on her hips as she viewed West with mock suspicion. “Have you brought back any farm animals?” she asked. “Not this time.” West smiled and went to kiss her forehead. To Devon’s surprise, Kathleen accepted the affectionate gesture without protest. “Did you learn as much as you’d hoped?” she asked. “Ten times more,” West said promptly. “On the subject of fertilizer alone, I could regale you for hours.” Kathleen laughed, but her expression became remote as she turned to Devon. “My lord.” Annoyed by the stilted acknowledgement, Devon nodded in return. It appeared that she had decided to hold him at arm's length and pretend the kiss had never happened.

Jack coughed slightly and offered his hand. “Hi, uh. I’m Jack.” Kim took it. “Jack what?” “Huh?” “Your last name, silly.” “Jackson.” She blinked at him. “Your name is Jack Jackson?” He blushed. “No, uh, my first name’s Rhett, but I hate it, so…” He gestured to the chair and she sat. Her dress rode up several inches, exposing pleasing long lines of creamy skin. “Well, Jack, what’s your field of study?” “Biological Engineering, Genetics, and Microbiology. Post-doc. I’m working on a research project at the institute.” “Really? Oh, uh, my apple martini’s getting a little low.” “I’ve got that, one second.” He scurried to the bar and bought her a fresh one. She sipped and managed to make it look not only seductive but graceful as well. “What do you want to do after you’re done with the project?” Kim continued. “Depends on what I find.” She sent him a simmering smile. “What are you looking for?” Immediately, Jack’s eyes lit up and his posture straightened. “I started the project with the intention of learning how to increase the reproduction of certain endangered species. I had interest in the idea of cloning, but it proved too difficult based on the research I compiled, so I went into animal genetics and cellular biology. It turns out the animals with the best potential to combine genes were reptiles because their ability to lay eggs was a smoother transition into combining the cells to create a new species, or one with a similar ancestry that could hopefully lead to rebuilding extinct animals via surrogate birth or in-vitro fertilization. We’re on the edge of breaking that code, and if we do, it would mean that we could engineer all kinds of life and reverse what damage we’ve done to the planet’s ecosystem.” Kim stared. “Right. Would you excuse me for a second?” She wiggled off back to her pack of friends by the bar. Judging by the sniggering and the disgusted glances he was getting, she wasn’t coming back. Jack sighed and finished off his beer, massaging his forehead. “Yes, brilliant move. You blinded her with science. Genius, Jack.” He ordered a second one and finished it before he felt smallish hands on his shoulders and a pair of soft lips on his cheek. He turned to find Kamala had returned, her smile unnaturally bright in the black lights glowing over the room. “So…how did it go with Kim?” He shot her a flat look. “You notice the chair is empty.” Kamala groaned. “You talked about the research project, didn’t you?” “No!” She glared at him. “…maybe…” “You’re so useless, Jack.” She paused and then tousled his hair a bit. “Cheer up. The night’s still young. I’m not giving up on you.” He smiled in spite of himself. “Yet.” Her brown eyes flashed. “Never.

Sindari sprang close and roared at the the kobold, The kobold, eyes widening even further, stopped screaming… and wet himself. I groaned and held him out at arm’s length. “Gross, Sindari.” My apologies. I didn’t anticipate that result. “What usually happens when you roar at people?” Stupefied acquiescence. “This probably qualifies. He got my hip. ” Perhaps you can roll in the fertilizer on the way out. I don’t see how that would help. It would mask the odor. So I’d smell like blood and fish instead? Yes. Those are far more appealing scents. If you say so. What’s the plan? Sindari asked as the kobold scurried away. We’re going to optimistically hope for the best. I marched resolutely through the grass. Sindari glided past me to take the lead. An interesting stance from someone with pee on her hip. I’m not sure I believe that you didn’t anticipate that result. His look back was not convincingly innocent.

The arrival of cotton growers in most cases displaced the indigenous inhabitants. In the antebellum decades, native peoples who had inhabited the cotton-growing territories of Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi had been pushed farther west. Now pressure resumed. In October 1865, the Kiowa and Comanche were forced to give up land in central Texas, west Kansas, and eastern New Mexico—land that was turned, among other things, into cotton plantations. Shortly thereafter, many of the Texas plains Indians were pushed into reservations in Oklahoma, and so were the last southwestern Indians during the Red River War of 1874 and 1875, thereby freeing up further land for cotton growing.28 Yet Oklahoma ultimately provided little protection for these Native Americans. By the 1880s, the old Oklahoma and Indian territories came under pressure from white settlers who hoped to displace the native population from the most fertile lands.

Such is the lot of the knight that even though my patrimony were ample and adequate for my support, nevertheless here are the disturbances which give me no quiet. We live in fields, forests, and fortresses. Those by whose labors we exist are poverty-stricken peasants, to whom we lease our fields, vineyards, pastures, and woods. The return is exceedingly sparse in proportion to the labor expended. Nevertheless the utmost effort is put forth that it may be bountiful and plentiful, for we must be diligent stewards. I must attach myself to some prince in the hope of protection. Otherwise every one will look upon me as fair plunder. But even if I do make such an attachment hope is beclouded by danger and daily anxiety. If I go away from home I am in peril lest I fall in with those who are at war or feud with my overlord, no matter who he is, and for that reason fall upon me and carry me away. If fortune is adverse, the half of my estates will be forfeit as ransom. Where I looked for protection I was ensnared. We cannot go unarmed beyond to yokes of land. On that account, we must have a large equipage of horses, arms, and followers, and all at great expense. We cannot visit a neighboring village or go hunting or fishing save in iron. Then there are frequently quarrels between our retainers and others, and scarcely a day passes but some squabble is referred to us which we must compose as discreetly as possible, for if I push my claim to uncompromisingly war arises, but if I am too yielding I am immediately the subject of extortion. One concession unlooses a clamor of demands. And among whom does all this take place? Not among strangers, my friend, but among neighbors, relatives, and those of the same household, even brothers. These are our rural delights, our peace and tranquility. The castle, whether on plain or mountain, must be not fair but firm, surrounded by moat and wall, narrow within, crowded with stalls for the cattle, and arsenals for guns, pitch, and powder. Then there are dogs and their dung, a sweet savor I assure you. The horsemen come and go, among them robbers, thieves, and bandits. Our doors are open to practically all comers, either because we do not know who they are or do not make too diligent inquiry. One hears the bleating of sheep, the lowing of cattle, the barking of dogs, the shouts of men working in the fields, the squeaks or barrows and wagons, yes, and even the howling of wolves from nearby woods. The day is full of thought for the morrow, constant disturbance, continual storms. The fields must be ploughed and spaded, the vines tended, trees planted, meadows irrigated. There is harrowing, sowing, fertilizing, reaping, threshing: harvest and vintage. If the harvest fails in any year, then follow dire poverty, unrest, and turbulence.

Like a seed buried underground, my heart was dormant, surrounded by darkness, waiting for the nourishment of love. Then you came along, like water, quenching my thirst, and bringing warmth to my soul. With every moment we share, I feel the warmth spreading, awakening my heart, and giving me the strength to break through the soil of doubt and fear. In the midst of my heart, a garden of love began to bloom, and with every petal that unfurls, I feel myself rising above the ground, reaching for the sun, and radiating the beauty that was hidden within me. You are the sunshine that illuminates my path, the gentle rain that soothes my soul, and the fertile soil that allows me to grow. With you by my side, I am no longer the seed buried in darkness, but a radiant flower, blooming with love, hope, and joy. Together, let us tend to this garden of our hearts, nurturing it with kindness, compassion, and understanding, and watch as our love continues to flourish.

April. It teaches us everything. The coldest and nastiest days of the year can happen in April. It won’t matter. It’s April. The English word for the month comes from the Roman Aprilis, the Latin aperire: to open, to uncover, to make accessible, or to remove whatever stops something from being accessible. It maybe also partly comes from the name of Aphrodite, Greek goddess of love, whose happy fickleness with various gods mirrors the month’s own showery-sunny fickleness. Month of sacrifice and month of playfulness. Month of restoration, of fertility-festivity. Month when the earth and the buds are already open, the creatures asleep for the winter have woken and are already breeding, the birds have already built their nests, birds that this time last year didn’t exist, busy bringing to life the birds that’ll replace them this time next year. Spring-cuckoo month, grass-month. In Gaelic its name means the month that fools mistake for May. April Fool’s Day also probably marks what was the old end of the new year celebrations. Winter has Epiphany. Spring’s gifts are different. Month of dead deities coming back to life. In the French revolutionary calendar, along with the last days of March, it becomes Germinal, the month of return to the source, to the seed, to the germ of things, which is maybe why Zola gave the novel he wrote about hopeless hope this revolutionary title. April the anarchic, the final month, of spring the great connective.

Just like the mountains, all jumbled together when you view them from a distance, had Beth's impulses and emotions already begun to be in their extraordinary complexity at this period; and even more like the mountains where you are close to them, for then, losing sight of the whole, you become aware of the details, and are surprised at their wonderful diversity, at the heights and hollows, the barren wastes, fertile valleys, gentle slopes, and giddy precipices- heights and hollows of hope and despair, barren wastes of mis-spent time, fertile valleys of intellectual accomplishment, gentle slopes of aspiration undefined, and giddy precipices of passionate impulse and desperate revolt. Genius is sympathetic insight made perfect; and it must have this diversity if it is ever to be effectual- must touch on every human experience, must suffer, and must also enjoy; great, therefore, are its compensations. It feels the sorrows of all mankind, and is elevated by them; whereas the pain of an individual bereavement is rather acute than prolonged. Genius is spared the continuous gnawing ache of the grief which stultifies; instead of an ever-present wearing sense of loss that would dim its power, it retains only those hallowed memories, those vivid recollections, which foster the joy of a great yearning tenderness; and all its pains are transmuted into something subtle, mysterious, invisible, neither to be named nor ignored- a fertilizing essence which is the source of its own heaven, and may also contain the salvation of earth. So genius has no lasting griefs.

The great danger of lying is not that lies are untruths, and thus unreal, but that they become real in other people's minds. They escape the liar's grip like seeds let loose in the wind, sprouting a life of their own in the least expected places, until one day the liar finds himself contemplating a lonely but nonetheless healthy tree, grown off the side of a barren cliff. It has the capacity to sadden him as much as it does to amaze. How could that tree have got there? How does it manage to live? It is extraordinarily beautiful in its loneliness, built on a barren untruth, yet green and very much alive. Many years have passed since I sowed the lies, and thus lives, of which I am speaking. Yet more than ever, I shall have to sort the branches out carefully, determine which ones stemmed from truth, which from falsehood. Will it be possible to saw off the misleading branches without mutilating the tree beyond hope? Perhaps I should rather uproot the tree, replant it in flat, fertile soil. But the risk is great. My tree has adapted in a hundred and one ways to its untruth, learned to bend with the wind, live with little water. It leans so far it is horizontal, a green enigma halfway up and perpendicular to a tall, lifeless cliff. Yet it is not lying on the ground, its leaves rotting in dew as it would if I replanted it. Curved trunks cannot stand up, any more than I can straighten my posture to return to my twenty-year-old self. A milder environment, after so long a harsh one, would surely prove fatal. I have found the solution. If I simply tell the truth, the cliff will erode chip by chip, stone by stone. And the destiny of my tree? I hold my fist to the sky and let loose my prayers. Wherever they go, I hope my tree will land there.

What did you hope to get out of killing Win’s doctor?” “Enjoyment.” “No doubt you would have. Win didn’t seem to be enjoying it, however.” “Why is Harrow here?” Kev asked fiercely. “I can answer that one,” Leo said, leaning a shoulder against the wall with casual ease. “Harrow wants to become better acquainted with the Hathaways. Because he and my sister are … close.” Kev abruptly felt a sickening weight in his stomach, as if he’d swallowed a handful of river stones. “What do you mean?” he asked, even though he knew. No man could be exposed to Win and not fall in love with her. “Harrow is a widower,” Leo said. “A decent enough fellow. More attached to his clinic and patients than anything else. But he’s a sophisticated man, widely traveled, and wealthy as the devil. And he’s a collector of beautiful objects. A connoisseur of fine things.” Neither of the other men missed the implication. Win would indeed be an exquisite addition to a collection of fine things. It was difficult to ask the next question, but Kev forced himself to. “Does Win care for him?” “I don’t believe Win knows how much of what she feels for him is gratitude, and how much is true affection.” Leo gave Kev a pointed glance. “And there are still a few unresolved questions she has to answer for herself.” “I’ll talk to her.” “I wouldn’t, if I were you. Not until she cools a bit. She’s rather incensed with you.” “Why?” Kev asked, wondering if she had confided to her brother about the events of the previous night. “Why?” Leo’s mouth twisted. “There’s such a dazzling array of choices, I find myself in a quandary about which one to start with. Putting the subject of this morning aside, what about the fact that you never wrote to her?” “I did,” Kev said indignantly. “One letter,” Leo allowed. “The farm report. She showed it to me, actually. How could one forget the soaring prose you wrote about fertilizing the field near the east gate? I’ll tell you, the part about sheep dung nearly brought a tear to my eye, it was so sentimental and—” “What did she expect me to write about?” Kev demanded. “Don’t bother to explain, my lord,” Cam interceded as Leo opened his mouth. “It’s not the way of the Rom to put our private thoughts on paper.

In the second instance God is the subject and Eve is the indirect object. This time Eve acknowledges that God appointed another offspring. She names this son Seth, meaning “substitute,” which is also an apparent wordplay on the Hebrew verb shith for “placing” or “appointing.” The contrast in the type of birth is expressed in the names of Eve’s sons. Cain is the result of Eve’s own act of getting a man, whereas Seth is God’s provision of an appointed offspring. In her effort, Eve bears sinful progeny of violence and ultimate death. But God provides through her another offspring that ultimately brings life and hope. The theme of offspring as a special provision of God is a recurring one throughout the book of Genesis. It is a theme that reinforces a fundamental difference between the God of the Old Testament and fertility deities popular among Israel’s ancient Near Eastern neighbors.10 Unlike the gods of other Semitic traditions, the God of Israel has no female consort and is not worshiped by means of cultic prostitution. Most importantly, the God of Israel is not manipulated by human beings as in the case of other fertility-oriented religions, where, through the worship and sacrifices of human beings, the gods were stimulated to replenish the earth. But from the first generation of humankind, Genesis emphasizes by contrast that it is God alone who provides the appointed offspring.

The persistence of racism in America—individual and societal—is altogether overwhelming. It doesn’t lay the best fertilizer for hope to grow.

As Tomiko and I sank to our knees on floor pillows, her mother filled our sake cups with an amber-green liquid. Called toso, it was a traditional New Year's elixir made from sweet rice wine seasoned with a Chinese herbal-medicine mixture called tososan. Meant to ward off the evil spirits, the drink was honeyed, warm, and laced with cinnamon and peppery sansho. To display the contents of the lacquer boxes, Tomiko's mother had arranged the various layers in the center of the table. The top layer always contains the traditional sweet dishes and hors d'oeuvres, while the second layer holds steamed, boiled, and vinegared offerings. The third box consists of foods that have been grilled or fried. Since not everything fit into the lacquer boxes, Tomiko's mother had placed a long rectangular dish at everyone's place holding three different nibbles. The first one was a small bowl of herring eggs to represent fertility. Waxy yellow in color, they had a plastic pop and mild saline flavor. Next came a miniature stack of sugar- and soy-braised burdock root cut like penne pasta and tossed with a rich nutty cream made from pounded sesame seeds. Called tataki gobo (pounded burdock root), the dish is so named because the gobo (root) symbolizes the hope for a stable, deeply rooted life, while the homonym for tataki (pounded) also means "joy aplenty." The third item consisted of a tiny clump of intensely flavored soy-caramelized sardines that tasted like ocean candy. Called tazukuri, meaning "paddy-tilling," the sticky fish symbolized hopes for a good harvest, since in ancient times, farmers used chopped sardines along with ash for fertilizer.

[The South's] obsession was to maintain a government, an economy, an arrangement of the sexes, a relationship of the races, and a social system that had never existed...except in the fertile imagination of those who would not confront either the reality that existed or the change that would bring them closer to reality.

As Red Buffalo disappeared into the darkness, Hunter’s hand, which was riding Loretta’s thickened waist, tightened. He glanced down, his brows lifting in question. With a wondrous expression on his face, he placed his other palm on her slightly swollen abdomen. “Blue Eyes, what is this?” Loretta looked up at him through tears. “Our child, Hunter.” His warm fingers flexed and curled protectively. A slow smile spread across his mouth. “A child…” The words were a reverent whisper. “Our child.” Loretta placed her hand over his, so filled with love for him that she felt she might die of it. The future was filled with uncertainty. The way ahead might be fraught with danger. And they would be completely alone. Two people, against a world of hostility. None of that really frightened her, though. Theirs was no ordinary love, and she knew the course of their lives would have a far greater purpose than that of simply being together. They would find their way west, just as the prophecy had foretold. She knew they would. The Comanche nation was doomed. There was no stopping the tide of white settlers that washed over their land. An entire race of people would eventually be conquered and all but destroyed. She and Hunter were like a seed floating on the wind. Somehow, somewhere, they would find a fertile place, where they could put down roots and grow strong. Through them, the People would live on. The gods had sent her and Hunter a sign to help them believe, to give them faith, and she no longer had a single doubt that all the words of Hunter’s song would somehow come to pass. Within her grew a child, both tosi tivo and Comanche, the child of the great warrior with indigo eyes and his honey-haired maiden. A child who brought new hope for the People and tomorrow.

They would find their way west, just as the prophecy had foretold. She knew they would. The Comanche nation was doomed. There was no stopping the tide of white settlers that washed over their land. An entire race of people would eventually be conquered and all but destroyed. She and Hunter were like a seed floating on the wind. Somehow, somewhere, they would find a fertile place, where they could put down roots and grow strong. Through them, the People would live on. The gods had sent her and Hunter a sign to help them believe, to give them faith, and she no longer had a single doubt that all the words of Hunter’s song would somehow come to pass. Within her grew a child, both tosi tivo and Comanche, the child of the great warrior with indigo eyes and his honey-haired maiden. A child who brought new hope for the People and tomorrow.

27. To Get, You Have First To Give A lot of advice in this book comes from my parents, and I am always grateful for having been raised by two wonderful and smart people. So here’s another gem from my mum: If you want to receive, you must first look around for something to give. As a kid, this was usually a pretty simple equation - she would only buy me a new toy if I selected an old one to give to the charity shop. (Quite annoying, I seem to remember!) But as I got older I realized that giving to get is actually one of the universe’s hidden rules. You want someone to help you? Guess what: if you’ve helped them in the past, they are far more likely to come to your rescue. You want to get a bumper crop from your veg patch? Guess what, the more water, fertilizer and attention you give your seedlings, the more bountiful harvests they will produce. But the inexplicable thing about my mum’s rule is that it works in the wilderness, too. There have been many times when I’ve been lost, exhausted, hungry, and I’ve felt my strength and my ability to keep going draining away. In these situations, it’s human nature to shrink back and give up. Yet my mother’s wisdom has been proved to me time and time again - to ‘get’ good results, you have to ‘give out’ something good or positive first. So when I am tired, I commit to working even harder. When I feel downcast, I decide to be upbeat. You see, no matter how low your optimism or strength feels, if you can ‘force’ yourself to put out the good vibes, the good attitudes, the hopeful thoughts (even if you don’t feel them or believe them right at that moment), then you will be rewarded. Try it some time when you are dog-tired. Get off that couch and start moving energetically. You will soon feel invigorated. Or when you are knee-deep in paperwork, slowing to a crawl, try just picking up the pace and focus, get ripping through it, giving it your all - and your body and mind will respond. To get, first you have to give.

But Paul somehow managed to be ‘immersed in tears and yet always filled with deep joy’ (2 Corinthians 6:10 MSG). How did that happen?” “I planted real hope deep in Paul’s heart, the kind of hope that I wired him to long for more than any other kind. ‘With this kind of hope to excite us,’ Paul wrote, ‘nothing holds us back’ (2 Corinthians 3:12 MSG).” “Father, what is that kind of hope? Plant it in me!” “If you were discussing with C. S. Lewis what that kind of hope is and if you wondered out loud how you could become fertile soil in which My Spirit could plant that hope, you would have heard him reply in these words that he once wrote: ‘Christianity tells people to repent and promises them forgiveness. It therefore has nothing (as far as I know) to say to people who do not know that they have anything to repent of and who do not feel that they need forgiveness. It is after you have realized that there is a real Moral Law, and a Power behind that law, and that you have broken that law and put yourself wrong with that Power—it is after all this, and not a moment sooner, that Christianity begins to talk.’ “My Spirit is telling My story to your psychological culture, a culture that actually believes woundedness—how others treat you— is a more serious problem than selfishness—how you treat others. Wounded people need healing, so the culture says, and a nicer group of people to hang out with. But according to the story I’m telling, selfish people need forgiveness, and they need the power to love those by whom they have been most wounded.

A recent study by scientists in New Mexico counted up the tips made by lap dancers at local strip clubs and correlated this with the menstrual cycles of the dancers.31 During peak fertility, dancers raked in an average of $68 an hour. When they were menstruating, they earned only about $35. In between, they averaged $52. Although these women were presumably acting in a high capacity of flirtation throughout the month, their change in fertility was broadcast to hopeful customers by changes in body odor, skin, waist-to-hip ratio, and likely their own confidence as well. Interestingly, strippers on birth control did not show any clear peak in performance, and earned only a monthly average of $37 per hour (versus an average of $53 per hour for strippers not on birth control). Presumably they earned less because the pill leads to hormonal changes (and cues) indicative of early pregnancy, and the dancers were thus less interesting to Casanovas in the gentlemen’s clubs.

While talents displayed in one’s early life may have been carried over from another existence, one’s waking reality offers a supreme opportunity to expand upon them. Meanwhile, there are other, latent talents awaiting sufficient stimulus to awaken them. They lay just beyond the boundaries of one’s Outer-Ego/Reasoning Consciousness as deeply-held impulses that can, in the blink of an eye, reveal themselves like stems bursting forth from fertile soil.

they're not different than any of you, are they? hope in their eyes, just like yours. they believe themselves destined for wonderful things, just like many of you. well, where are those smiles now, boys? what of the hope? did most of them not wait until it was too late before making their lives into even one iota of what they were capable? in chasing the almighty deity of success, did they not squander their boyhood dreams? most of those gentlemen are fertilizing daffodils now! however if you get very close, boys, you can hear them whisper. go ahead,'' he urged, ''lean in. go on. hear it? can you?'' the boys were quiet, some of them leaned hesitantly towawd the phoograps. ''carpe diem,'' keating whispered loudly. ''seize the day. make your lives extraordinary.

they're not different than any of you, are they? hope in their eyes, just like yours. they believe themselves destined for wonderful things, just like many of you. well, where are those smiles now, boys? what of the hope? did most of them not wait until it was too late before making their lives into even one iota of what they were capable? in chasing the almighty deity of success, did they not squander their boyhood dreams? most of those gentlemen are fertilizing daffodils now! however if you get very close, boys, you can hear them whisper. go ahead,'' he urged, ''lean in. go on. hear it? can you?'' the boys were quiet, some of them leaned hesitantly towawd the phoograps. ''carpe diem,'' keating whispered loudly. ''seize the day. make your lives extraordinary.

In the midst of infertility, it feels all-consuming and endless, but there is a light at the end of the tunnel. Infertility will end. Sometimes fertility treatment ends in success. Sometimes it doesn't. Other times it ends with the acceptance that having children is not going to happen, but that a rich a meaningful life is still possible, even if the outcome wasn't what was originally pictured or hoped for.

Oh, it’s mysterious lamplit evenings, here in the galaxy, one after the other. It’s one of those nights when I wander from window to window, looking for a sign. But I can’t see. Terror and a beauty insoluble are a ribband of blue woven into the fringes of garments of things both great and small. No culture explains, no bivouac offers real haven or rest. But it could be that we are not seeing something. Galileo thought that comets were an optical illusion. This is fertile ground: since we are certain that they’re not, we can look at what scientists are saying with fresh hope. What if there are really gleaming castellated cities hung upside-down over the desert sand? What limpid lakes and cool date palms have our caravans passed untried? Until, one by one, by the blindest of leaps, we light on the road to these places, we must stumble in darkness and hunger.

The fertile land yields its fruits in the sacred time.

I believe you can’t be in authority unless you are under authority, and being under authority takes humility. Humility is the fertile ground in which a person’s character grows.

It seemed outrageous to hope that fertility, resources, time, desire, and love could all come together in the right way, and yet most women did eventually walk that path.

And we tell ourselves all kinds of similarly implausible no-consequences stories all the time, about how we can ravage the world and suffer no adverse effects. Indeed we are always surprised when it works out otherwise. We extract and we do not replenish and we wonder why the fish have disappeared and the soil requires ever more "inputs" to stay fertile. We drive down wages, ship jobs overseas...then wonder why people can't afford to shop as much as they used to...At every stage our actions are marked by a lack of respect for the powers we are unleashing - a certainty, or at least a hope, that the nature we have turned to garbage, and the people we have treated like garbage, will not come back to haunt us.

A widely quoted study from the Oxford Martin School predicts that technology threatens to replace 47 percent of all US jobs within 20 years. One of Pew experts even foresees the advent of “robotic sex partners.’’ The world’s oldest profession may be no more. When all this happens, what, exactly, will people do? Half of those in the Pew report are relatively unconcerned, believing — as has happened in the past — that even as technology destroys jobs, it creates more new ones. But half are deeply worried, fearing burgeoning unemployment, a growing schism between the highly educated and everyone else, and potentially massive social dislocation. (The fact that Pew’s experts are evenly split also exposes one of the truths of prognostication: A coin flip might work just as well.) Much of this debate over more or fewer jobs misses a key element, one brought up by some of those surveyed by Pew: These are primarily political issues; what happens is up to us. If lower-skilled jobs are no more, the solution, quite obviously, is training and education. Moreover, the coming world of increasingly ubiquitous robotics has the potential for significant increases in productivity. Picture, for instance, an entirely automated farm, with self-replicating and self-repairing machines planting, fertilizing, harvesting, and delivering. Food wouldn’t be free, but it could become so cheap that, like water (Detroit excepted), it’s essentially available to everyone for an almost nominal cost. It’s a welfare state, of course, but at some point, with machines able to produce the basic necessities of life, why not? We’d have a world of less drudgery and more leisure. People would spend more time doing what they want to do rather than what they have to do. It might even cause us to rethink what it means to be human. Robots will allow us to use our “intelligence in new ways, freeing us up from menial tasks,’’ says Tiffany Shlain, host of AOL’s “The Future Starts Here.’’ Just as Lennon hoped and Star Trek predicted.

Your thoughts are certain kinds of seeds in your life. You can water them and allow them to grow on fertile soil. Or, you can let them diminish and wither amongst the weeds. Be careful that your seeds are not contaminated as they begin to take root.

Farmer Ben disappeared into a nearby shed and came back carrying two buckets. Some of the cubs covered their noses. “It’s not the best-smelling stuff in the world,” said Ben, “but potatoes love it.” He handed one of the buckets to Ferdy. “Now, son, I want you to toss a bucketful of fertilizer over each half of this plot. Go to it.” Ferdy stood at the edge of the plot, facing east. But the rising sun was in his eyes. So he walked around to the other side and faced west, away from the sun. He got a good two-handed grip om the bucket and steadied himself. “Uh-oh,” the cubs heard Farmer Ben mutter. With all his strength, Ferdy flung the bucketful of fertilizer into the wind. And the wind flung it right back in his face. “Ar-r-r-gh!” cried Ferdy. Hope you had your mouth closed!” cracked Queenie as the other cubs laughed. No one laughed harder than Trudy. “Beginner’s mistake,” said Farmer Ben, handing Ferdy a rag to wipe his face with.

the town had been the arrival port for thousands of Yoeme people, deported from Sonora in the first years of the twentieth century, under the regime of Porfirio Díaz. People who had been forcibly removed from their homes and villages because of their resistance to the opening of their ancestral land — the largest, most fertile river valley in Mexico — to make way for Mexican and American venture capitalists.

Driving along the highway from the airport, they had passed mile upon mile of grain elevators, marking the most productive land in Mexico, but when they reached the place where Google Maps said the river should be, there was nothing but a dusty, toxic-looking trickle. The river — that great, fertile river that the first Spaniards had compared to the Nile — had been dammed long ago, diverted by a huge aqueduct to the factories in Hermosillo and Ciudad Obregón, and all that remained in the traditional villages was polluted, unsafe for irrigation or to drink.

He’s an orthopedic surgeon, well… was. He no longer performs actual surgeries that aren’t for his amusement. He rips the bones out of their bodies and saves them. He crafts out of them.” “The peony garden…” I trailed. Nodding, Bradley took a deep breath. “The peony garden is where they bury the bodies. They are convinced those women fertilize the soil and produce the most fragrant peonies. The perfume anyone wears in this house or the wine we are forced to drink all come mixed from the peonies that grow from the ground of death.” He rubbed his hand over his face before filling the space between us again. “Demi, this has been the way of the Ivory family for generations. I really hope you have a son first.” He brushed my hair from my face before tracing my lips with his thumb.

It is He Who doth show you the lightning, by way both of fear and of hope. It is He Who doth raise up the clouds, heavy with fertilizing rain.

It is He Who doth show you the lightning, by way both of fear and of hope. It is He Who doth raise up the clouds, heavy with fertilizing rain.

But what if our interruptions are in fact our opportunities, if they are challenges to an inner response by which growth takes place and through which we come to the fullness of being? What if the events of our history are molding us as a sculptor molds his clay, and if it is only in a careful obedience to these molding hands that we can discover our real vocation and become mature people? What if all the unexpected interruptions are in fact the invitations to give up old-fashioned and outmoded styles of living and are opening up new unexplored areas of experience? And finally: What if our history does not prove to be a blind impersonal sequence of events over which we have no control, but rather reveals to us a guiding hand pointing to a personal encounter in which all our hopes and aspirations will reach their fulfillment? Then our life would indeed be a different life because then fate becomes opportunity, wounds a warning and paralysis an invitation to search for deeper sources of vitality. Then we can look for hope in the middle of crying cities, burning hospitals and desperate parents and children. Then we can cast off the temptation of despair and speak about the fertile tree while witnessing the dying of the seed. Then indeed we can break out of the prison of an anonymous series of events and listen to the God of history who speaks to us in the center of our solitude and respond to his ever new call for conversion.

There was no lightbulb moment when somebody shouted: ‘Eureka! Let’s start planting crops!’ Though our ancestors had been aware for tens of thousands of years that you could plant things and harvest them, they also knew enough not to go down that road. ‘Why should we plant,’ exclaimed one !Kung tribesman to an anthropologist, ‘when there are so many mongongo nuts in the world?’39 The most logical explanation is that we fell into a trap. That trap was the fertile floodplain between the Tigris and the Euphrates, where crops grew without much effort. There we could sow in soil enriched by a soft layer of nutrient-rich sediment left behind each year by the receding waters. With nature doing most of the work, even the work-shy Homo puppy was willing to give farming a go.40 What our ancestors couldn’t have foreseen was how humankind would proliferate. As their settlements grew denser, the population of wild animals declined. To compensate, the amount of land under cultivation had to be extended to areas not blessed with fertile soil. Now farming was not nearly so effortless. We had to plough and sow from dawn to dusk. Not being built for this kind of work, our bodies developed all kinds of aches and pains. We had evolved to gather berries and chill out, and now our lives were filled with hard, heavy labour. So why didn’t we just go back to our freewheeling way of life? Because it was too late. Not only were there too many mouths to feed, but by this time we’d also lost the knack of foraging. And we couldn’t just pack up and head for greener pastures, because we were hemmed in by neighbouring settlements,

You won’t always wake up dreading the day ahead. There will come a time when the darkness within your chest will be replaced by the sunshine of a hopeful morning, the missing steps will align to guide you to a journey worth treading, your hands won’t be empty forever. The blessings you’ve yearned for will fill the empty spaces between your fingers, and the warmth of the love you’ve been seeking will melt the coldness of the trials you’ve endured. Old wounds will heal, and the scars will remind you of the Greatness of your Lord. They will serve as a map to lead you to Him every time you lose your way. You will find your blessings, and your blessings will find you, and you’ll come together, not as two halves becoming whole, but as gentle showers kiss the fertile earth to blossom flowers.

The paradox of volcanoes was that they were symbols of destruction but also life. Once the lava slows and cools, it solidifies and then breaks down over time to become soil - rich, fertile soil. She wasn't a black hole, she decided. She was a volcano. And like a volcano she couldn't run away from herself. She'd have to stay there and tend to that wasteland. She could plant a forest inside herself.

And we're cheerful, too. You can count on that.' Obligingly she smiled in a neighbourly way at him. 'It will be a relief to leave Earth with its repressive legislation. We were listening OH the FM to the news about the McPhearson Act.' 'We consider it dreadful,' the adult male said. 'I have to agree with you,' Chic said. 'But what can one do?' He looked around for the mail; as always it was lost somewhere in the mass of clutter. 'One can emigrate,' the adult male simulacrum pointed out. 'Um,' Chic said absently. He had found an unexpected heap of recent-looking bills from parts suppliers; with a feeling of gloom and even terror he began to bills from parts suppliers; with a feeling of gloom and even terror he began to sort through them. Had Maury seen these? Probably. Seen them and then pushed them away immediately, out of sight. Frauenzimmer Associates functioned better if it was not reminded of such facts of life. Like a regressed neurotic, it had to hide several aspects of reality from its percept system in order to function at all. This was hardly ideal, but what really was the alternative? To be realistic would be to give up, to die. Illusion, of an infantile nature was essential for the tiny firm's survival, or at least so it seemed to him and Maury. In any case both of them had adopted this attitude. Their simulacra -- the adult ones -- disapproved of this; their cold, logical appraisal of reality stood in sharp contrast, and Chic always felt a little naked, a little embarrassed, before the simulacra; he knew he should set a better example for them. 'If you bought a jalopy and emigrated to Mars,' the adult male said, 'We could be the famnexdo for you.' 'I wouldn't need any family next-door,' Chic said, 'if I emigrated to Mars. I'd go to get away from people. 'We'd make a very good family next-door to you,' the female said. 'Look,' Chic said, 'you don't have to lecture me about your virtues. I know more than you do yourselves.' And for good reason. Their presumption, their earnest sincerity, amused but also irked him. As next-door neighbours this group of sims would be something of a nuisance, he reflected. Still, that was what emigrants wanted, in fact needed, out in the sparsely-populated colonial regions. He could appreciate that; after all, it was Frauenzimmer Associates' business to understand. A man, when he emigrated, could buy neighbours, buy the simulated presence of life, the sound and motion of human activity -- or at least its ​mechanical nearsubstitute to bolster his morale in the new environment of unfamiliar stimuli and perhaps, god forbid, no stimuli at all. And in addition to this primary psychological gain there was a practical secondary advantage as well. The famnexdo group of simulacra developed the parcel of land, tilled it and planted it, irrigated it, made it fertile, highly productive. And the yield went to the it, irrigated it, made it fertile, highly productive. And the yield went to the human settler because the famnexdo group, legally speaking, occupied the peripheral portions of his land. The famnexdo were actually not next-door at all; they were part of their owner's entourage. Communication with them was in essence a circular dialogue with oneself; the famnexdo, it they were functioning properly, picked up the covert hopes and dreams of the settler and detailed them back in an articulated fashion. Therapeutically, this was helpful, although from a cultural standpoint it was a trifle sterile.

We are not involved in this struggle only because we think that we will dismantle this system in the course of our life. We hope Cameroon changes tomorrow. But if it doesn’t, we will be happy to know that we made the ground fertile for the next generation that will end the rot in this country, and then establish the “NEW CAMEROON".” Dr. Samuel F. Tchwenko

twould appear that if Fred Lemish spent half as much time writing as he did hoping Dinky Adams would say “I love you,” he’d have a ten-foot shelf. And if Dinky Adams spent half as much time legitimately planting and fertilizing as he did scattering his seeds to the winds, he’d be New York’s leading gardener. Though, of course, as we shall continue to see, he already is.

In the eternal regions of consciousness, empty of space, at the same time filled with silence and animated by a fertile agitation, the Mother of all things lamented painfully. The world that she had generated to keep Chaos at a distance was convulsing, prey to passions, desires, extreme effervescence, without hope of ever finding serenity.

10 Common Reasons for IVF Failure  In-vitro fertilization or IVF provides a means towards parenthood to couples struggling with natural pregnancy. Although IVF is a successful, safe, and effective technique some couples may struggle with multiple IVF failures. According to Dr Vandana Narula, MBBS, MD (Obstetrics & Gynaecology), a lot of factors contribute to the success or failure of IVF. The best infertility specialist in sector 43 Chandigarh advises you to not lose hope and discuss the opportunities with your doctor. 10 Common Reasons for IVF Failure The infertility & IVF specialist in Mohali gives the following common reasons for IVF failure: 1. Poor Sperm Quality The quality of sperm determines the quality of the embryo. Men with certain medical conditions including azoospermia or diabetes may procedure poor quality and quantity of sperm. This can either hamper the development of the embryo or lead to an abnormal embryo. 2. Low Anti-Mullerian Hormone (AMH) Values AMH is a hormone secreted by cells in the egg. A good level of AMH in the woman’s blood indicates good ovarian reserve. Women with low AMH values may procedure unhealthy eggs that may not be implanted. 3. Implantation Failure Implantation failure is one of the common causes of IVF failures. It is usually caused by: A non-receptive uterus lining, thin lining, or lining affected by genital tuberculosis. Prevailing immunological conditions make the uterine environment hostile for the embryos. The endometrium has an inbuilt mechanism to reject poor-quality embryos. 4. Poor Quality of Eggs and Embryos The quality of eggs plays a significant role in IVF failure. The quality of eggs is directly related to the age of a woman and her health. The human egg consists of 23 chromosomes. If any of these chromosomes are missing or arranged incorrectly, they can produce abnormal embryos. A woman’s age also plays a key role in the egg quality. With advancing age, the eggs become less healthy and are prone to genetic abnormalities. This can make it difficult for them to be fertilized by sperm and lead to abnormal embryos.

5 Lifestyle Changes That Can Boost Your Fertility If you are hoping to get pregnant, you might wonder if you can improve it on your own. Dr Beena Muktesh, MBBS, MS-Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Fertility Specialist, considers improper lifestyle as the defining factor for infertility. Many of the patients suffering from infertility develop the condition gradually by not taking care of their health.

In longing and heartbreak, in devastating test results and failed fertility treatments, in miscarriage and ectopic pregnancy and recurrent los - through the worst of your waiting, God is with you and for you.

In longing and heartbreak, in devastating test results and failed fertility treatments, in miscarriage and ectopic pregnancy and recurrent loss - through the worst of your waiting, God is with you and for you.

Have you read about the Law of Attraction before? His believers say, that a person has what looks like broadcasting and receiving channels, and these channels transmit his thoughts to the universe, and his receivers receive the results and interact with him, he is part of it as everything else, affects and is affected, and the master here is the universe, and the reason is the person, they are his thoughts that decide the response of the universe to him, it will give him back what he thinks, and it will seek to implement it for him. If you are looking for an answer to a question that has puzzled you for a long time, all you have to do is think about it, and imagine that you will find the answer in some way, imagine that moment when you know it, and then leave it to the universe, it will come to you with the answer, as long as you broadcast the idea. Based on that, if you think about something that you hate to happen, if you think about it for a long time, it will inevitably happen to you, for the law does not differentiate between good and evil, what you want and what you hate, but rather what you think. In other words, the subconscious mind is fertile, uncultivated land, and the conscious mind or brain is a seed-sowing machine. What you think about is the kind of seeds that you will sow in your subconscious mind, and your harvest will be the result of what you sow, the more you think, you are like the one who waters and plows the land and nurtures it, and in the end, the universe will be the machine of the harvest, it will inevitably make your ideas a reality for you. This law has been strengthened in all religions and customs. In religion, God alerted us to the need to monitor our thoughts well, so he says in the honorable Prophetic hadith, “I am as my servant thinks of me,” meaning that if you think well of God, he will be with you as you think. If think that he will only send you all good, God will send it to you. In all religions you will find many texts saying like this, although this completely contradicts the law of determinism in religion, God has written everything in advance, and your belief in him will not change anything in your destiny, but even your thoughts themselves, including your good thinking of him It is something he already wrote to you. As for our ancestors, they said it from the reality of their inherited experiences, they said things like that the one who is afraid of something, it will happen to him. They summarized them in the form of popular examples, which you will find in various cultures. However, what if the believers in this law understand things from the perspective of the ancient human understanding of the sense of sight, we do not receive determinism, and the universe does not make it and does not respond to us with what we think, and we cannot change it with our thoughts, we have already drawn them in advance, and we have no escape today except for reaping what we sowed. An inevitability we managed at once, in one moment. He was silent for a moment, then added: Or perhaps, we are drawing the inevitable now, Ruslan, what if I did not exist in this world before you had a need for me? And somehow you made me, and gave me a whole life, with its memories, memories that make me feel like I have lived forty whole years, and make you feel this, you arranged them for me, and you created me, to answer all the questions I have always thought of. And while I feel like I am forty, in fact, it is one second, maybe a lot less. What if we had never met in Syria before, if you were not there, and you are still retreating in your hut on the hill, thinking about the empty, the unknown, and what happened next? It is nothing but an arrangement that you did, to transcend the authority of your mind, to get you to know the answers to everything that afflicts you, even if this life is a blank sheet of paper, you are the one who arrange it and draw it, step by step.

For me, Coates’s words contain relief in that they were spoken aloud, in public, with the forcefulness history demands. But talking about race in America is not usually a hopeful experience if you’re Black. It brings no pleasure to speak of the hatred inflicted on our souls, the stories of discrimination and pain and injustices large and small that populate our lives. At the same time, we are barraged by society’s reinforcement that we are less than. I may be grieving the murder of Trayvon Martin and at the same time dodging the inquisitive fingers of a white woman reaching to touch my hair. I may be angry over the events in Ferguson and in the same moment attempting to respond with dignity to a white man who treats me as his verbal punching bag. I may have just heard about the latest racist words spewed by a white talk-show host, actor, or politician on the same day when I’m trying to claim my space in the classroom or on my college campus. The persistence of racism in America—individual and societal—is altogether overwhelming. It doesn’t lay the best fertilizer for hope to grow. And so hope for me has died one thousand deaths. I hoped that friend would get it, but hope died. I hoped that person would be an ally for life, but hope died. I hoped that my organization really desired change, but hope died. I hoped I’d be treated with the full respect I deserve at my job, but hope died. I hoped that racist policies would change, and just policies would never be reversed, but hope died. I hoped the perpetrator in uniform would be brought to justice this time, but hope died. I hoped history would stop repeating itself, but hope died. I hoped things would be better for my children, but hope died.

Here’s a culture war strategy conservative Christians should get behind: have more children and disciple them like crazy. Strongly consider having more children than you think you can handle. You don’t have to be a fertility maximalist to recognize that children are always lauded as a blessing in the Bible… [I]n the not-too-distant future, the only couples replacing themselves in America will be religious couples. Although there are many good reasons to have a baby, at the end of the day, as Jonathan Last maintains, “there’s only one good reason to go through the trouble a second time: Because you believe, in some sense, that God wants you to.” The basic reason countries stop having children is because they’ve come to see offspring as a liability rather than a source of hope. As Christians, we know better. Do you want to rebel against the status quo? Do you want people to ask you for a reason for the hope that is in you (1 Peter 3:15)? Tote your brood of children through Target. There is almost nothing more counter-cultural than having more children. And once we have those children, there is almost nothing more important than catechizing them in the faith, developing their moral framework, and preparing them to be deeply compassionate lovers of God and lovers of people and relentlessly biblical lovers of truth... I understand that many couples will be unable to have all the children they want to have. We have to allow for God to work in mysterious ways that we would not have planned. And yet, in so far as we are able, let us welcome new life... Presidents and Supreme Court justices will come and go. A child’s soul will last forever. The future belongs to the fecund. It’s time for happy warriors who seek to “renew the city” and “win the culture war” by investing in their local church, focusing on the family, and bringing the kingdom to bear on the world, one baby at a time.