Mark Amend Love Quotes

Our love must be stronger than their hate.

We conclude this joyous ceremony with the traditional breaking of the glass. The fragility of this glass suggests the frailty of human relationships. The glass is broken to protect this marriage with prayer . . . May your bond of love be as difficult to break as it would be to put together the pieces of this glass.

My wish for the world is for all teenagers to suddenly become as bright and as sensible as ours, don’t you agree, honey?”  “Amen, my love. Amen. Let’s see if we can persuade someone to let us see our son.” “Persuasion is my specialty,” Zack smirks.

I. My first thought was, he lied in every word, That hoary cripple, with malicious eye Askance to watch the workings of his lie On mine, and mouth scarce able to afford Suppression of the glee, that pursed and scored Its edge, at one more victim gained thereby. II. What else should he be set for, with his staff? What, save to waylay with his lies, ensnare All travellers who might find him posted there, And ask the road? I guessed what skull-like laugh Would break, what crutch 'gin write my epitaph For pastime in the dusty thoroughfare. III. If at his counsel I should turn aside Into that ominous tract which, all agree, Hides the Dark Tower. Yet acquiescingly I did turn as he pointed, neither pride Now hope rekindling at the end descried, So much as gladness that some end might be. IV. For, what with my whole world-wide wandering, What with my search drawn out through years, my hope Dwindled into a ghost not fit to cope With that obstreperous joy success would bring, I hardly tried now to rebuke the spring My heart made, finding failure in its scope. V. As when a sick man very near to death Seems dead indeed, and feels begin and end The tears and takes the farewell of each friend, And hears one bit the other go, draw breath Freelier outside, ('since all is o'er,' he saith And the blow fallen no grieving can amend;') VI. When some discuss if near the other graves be room enough for this, and when a day Suits best for carrying the corpse away, With care about the banners, scarves and staves And still the man hears all, and only craves He may not shame such tender love and stay. VII. Thus, I had so long suffered in this quest, Heard failure prophesied so oft, been writ So many times among 'The Band' to wit, The knights who to the Dark Tower's search addressed Their steps - that just to fail as they, seemed best, And all the doubt was now - should I be fit? VIII. So, quiet as despair I turned from him, That hateful cripple, out of his highway Into the path he pointed. All the day Had been a dreary one at best, and dim Was settling to its close, yet shot one grim Red leer to see the plain catch its estray. IX. For mark! No sooner was I fairly found Pledged to the plain, after a pace or two, Than, pausing to throw backwards a last view O'er the safe road, 'twas gone; grey plain all round; Nothing but plain to the horizon's bound. I might go on, naught else remained to do. X. So on I went. I think I never saw Such starved ignoble nature; nothing throve: For flowers - as well expect a cedar grove! But cockle, spurge, according to their law Might propagate their kind with none to awe, You'd think; a burr had been a treasure trove. XI. No! penury, inertness and grimace, In some strange sort, were the land's portion. 'See Or shut your eyes,' said Nature peevishly, It nothing skills: I cannot help my case: Tis the Last Judgement's fire must cure this place Calcine its clods and set my prisoners free.

To our children, specifically, I say: In America, you are never alone. Your family, your neighbors, your fellow citizens all over these United States are with you, love you, and will do whatever is necessary to comfort and protect you. Turn to your family, teachers, clergymen, or police officers for help. Answer cruelty and hate with love and kindness. Work to create a culture where the sanctity of life is sacrosanct, and the blessings of friendships and families will help to begin the healing process.

I think the shooter is Kevin Burns. I know him pretty well. Maybe I can talk him down." "Are you nuts? He’s crazy. Everyone knows he’s a lunatic. No one can talk him down. Get out of there!" "I can’t sit around and do nothing. I have to do something. Remember what Mom and Dad told us after Father Gerry? If you have a chance to save or protect innocent people, you have to make that sacrifice. I won’t let another predator get the best of me." "That’s not what they meant, you idiot! Get the hell out of there and let the police handle it. I’m sure they’re on their way!" "If anything happens to me, I want you to know you’re the best little brother a guy could hope for, squirt. Take care. I love you." "I love you too. Please don’t do anything stupid." "We’re going to get out of this together. Understand? We’re best brothers, forever." "Forever, bro . . .

On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous" i Tell me it was for the hunger & nothing less. For hunger is to give the body what it knows it cannot keep. That this amber light whittled down by another war is all that pins my hand to your chest. i You, drowning                         between my arms — stay. You, pushing your body                          into the river only to be left                          with yourself — stay. i I’ll tell you how we’re wrong enough to be forgiven. How one night, after backhanding mother, then taking a chainsaw to the kitchen table, my father went to kneel in the bathroom until we heard his muffled cries through the walls. And so I learned that a man, in climax, was the closest thing to surrender. i Say surrender. Say alabaster. Switchblade.                    Honeysuckle. Goldenrod. Say autumn. Say autumn despite the green                    in your eyes. Beauty despite daylight. Say you’d kill for it. Unbreakable dawn                    mounting in your throat. My thrashing beneath you                    like a sparrow stunned with falling. i Dusk: a blade of honey between our shadows, draining. i I wanted to disappear — so I opened the door to a stranger’s car. He was divorced. He was still alive. He was sobbing into his hands (hands that tasted like rust). The pink breast cancer ribbon on his keychain swayed in the ignition. Don’t we touch each other just to prove we are still here? I was still here once. The moon, distant & flickering, trapped itself in beads of sweat on my neck. I let the fog spill through the cracked window & cover my fangs. When I left, the Buick kept sitting there, a dumb bull in pasture, its eyes searing my shadow onto the side of suburban houses. At home, I threw myself on the bed like a torch & watched the flames gnaw through my mother’s house until the sky appeared, bloodshot & massive. How I wanted to be that sky — to hold every flying & falling at once. i Say amen. Say amend. Say yes. Say yes anyway. i In the shower, sweating under cold water, I scrubbed & scrubbed. i In the life before this one, you could tell two people were in love because when they drove the pickup over the bridge, their wings would grow back just in time. Some days I am still inside the pickup. Some days I keep waiting. i It’s not too late. Our heads haloed             with gnats & summer too early to leave any marks.             Your hand under my shirt as static intensifies on the radio.             Your other hand pointing your daddy’s revolver             to the sky. Stars falling one by one in the cross hairs.             This means I won’t be afraid if we’re already             here. Already more than skin can hold. That a body             beside a body must ma

Healing Ourselves In this world, hate never yet dispelled hate. Only love dispels hate. This is the law, ancient and inexhaustible. —BUDDHA One of the most difficult things about healing from being hurt by others is how to put wounds to rest when those who have hurt us will not give air to the wound, will not admit to their part in causing the pain. I have struggled with this deeply. Time and again, I find myself confusing the want for justice with the need for a witness of the wound. Physical wounds are hard to miss, but emotional wounds are seldom visible. This is why they must be looked at and acknowledged if we are ever to heal. Yet so often, our pain is compounded by the very human fact that we may never agree on the nature of what happened. If we do, we may never admit it to each other. Or the amends we feel we so deserve may go with the hurtful one to the grave. As with so many other crucial negotiations of life, what's required is to honor what lives within us. We must bear witness to ourselves, for there is no power as embracing or forgiving as the authority of that portion of God that lives in each of us.

Make peace with others. The only thing you can change about the past is the damage you may have done to relationships. You may need to make amends with some people and say sorry. Sometimes it feels like we have unfinished business if we leave something in a state of tension. Break the ice, admit you were wrong, and then you and the other person can let go of any bitterness and move on. Sometimes God won't let us rest with ourselves and be at peace unless we take care of certain things. The Bible says in Matthew 5, "Therefore if you are presenting your offering at the altar, and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your offering there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother, and then come and present your offering." Another good verse that is related to this is in Mark 11, "Whenever you stand praying, forgive, if you have anything against anyone, so that your Father who is in heaven will also forgive you your transgressions. But if you do not forgive, neither will your Father who is in heaven forgive your transgressions." So we need to forgive others and we need to ask for their forgiveness if we have done them wrong. When Jesus was asked how many times we have to forgive others He said 70 times 7, as in, countless times. Joyce Meyer says, "Do yourself a favor and forgive," because you will never truly have peace until you forgive everyone and anyone who has done you wrong. Amen.

It was probably only a few intervals, though it seemed longer with Ryzven lurking and radiating impatience. At last Beryl and Kurr returned, markedly cleaner and fresher, and he heard Beryl telling the Greenspirit about the garden. His human hurried toward him, though her steps slowed when she spotted Ryzven nearby. Snaps squirmed in Zylar’s arms, so he set him down after checking the cord looped around his neck. Beryl reached for the leash as she eyed Ryzven, but she didn’t address him. Instead, she knelt and spoke nonsense words to the fur-person while rubbing him all over with her grabbers. Kurr filled the awkward silence with a stiff, formal greeting. “Honor to your kith and kin, renowned Ryzven. I am Kurr.” “A pleasure! Everyone who has been following the Choosing knows who you are, esteemed Greenspirit.” While Zylar would be pleased if Ryzven forgot his business with Beryl while dallying with Kurr, he doubted he’d be so lucky. And as Beryl rose, Ryzven turned to her, making sure she got the full impact of his rare colors. He even puffed out his thorax a little, and Beryl let out a breath, a sound Zylar identified as annoyance. She said something the translator couldn’t process. “I came to congratulate you on your—” Before Ryzven could finish his pompous sentence, Snaps ambled forward, lifted a leg, and eliminated on him. “I don’t like him,” Snaps said. “Beryl doesn’t like him. Let’s go!” “So sorry about that,” Beryl said in a flat tone. “Snaps is nervous around strangers.” Zylar had heard sincerity from her many times before, and on this occasion, she wasn’t remotely apologetic. In fact, her eyes were twinkling and she seemed to be having a hard time restraining herself from making the battle face, which she’d said indicated amusement or enjoyment. “You should clean that up,” he told Ryzven, who was sputtering incoherent outrage. Most likely, he would live to regret all of this, but it felt so good to get the best of his arrogant nest-mate for once that he didn’t even look back when Beryl grabbed his claw and led him toward the exit. It occurred to him that she was leading him like Snaps, only by the limb instead of using a cord, but it would have lessened the impact of their departure if he mentioned as much. Once they reached the public corridors, Kurr finally said, “I hope we have not given serious offense. I am…fearful.” The Greenspirit must know Ryzven’s reputation well. He wouldn’t accept such a humiliation without striking back. “Do not let it lessen your satisfaction in what you’ve achieved today. I will apologize more fully another time.” “Why would you apologize for something Snaps did?” Beryl cut in. “If anyone’s going to make amends, it should be me. Though for the record, I said ‘sorry’ already.” “It was insincere,” Kurr noted. Beryl stared for a long moment, then said, “That’s fair.” She took a step closer to the two of them and added in a whisper, “So when I apologize sincerely, I probably shouldn’t let on that I told Snaps to pee on him? I mean, theoretically.” The Greenspirit emitted a shocked rustling sound while Zylar simply could not contain his glee. He churred louder than he ever had in his life. “Truly? That’s what you said that the translator could not comprehend?” Then Beryl did show her fearsome aspect, displaying all her teeth. “I will neither confirm nor deny those allegations.” “Confirmed,” said Snaps. “I was promised extra snacks.” Still delighted with his intended, Zylar led the way to the garden, wondering how he should reward Beryl for improving his life in every conceivable way. 

O paradise, to lie in the hammock with one’s book and drink, not hearing the murmur of consternation as it moves progressively up the decibel scale. Yet I see you are uncertain where to locate me: here I am. And I’ve done more thinking about you than you perhaps realize, yes, a sight more than you’ve done about me. Which reminds me: when are we going to get together? I mean really—not just for a drink and a smoke, but really invade each other’s privacy in a significant way that will make sense and later amends to both of us for having done so, for I am short of the mark despite my bluster and my swaggering, have no real home and no one to inhabit it except you whom I am in danger of losing permanently as a bluefish slips off the deck of a ship, as a tuna flounders, but say, you know all that. What kind of a chump do you think I am, anyway? I would like your attention, not just your eyes and face. I would like to tell you how much I love you. I’m a sap for trying, but down deep in the bowels of the ship we hear something, don’t you agree, that tells us where we went off course and what we must do to get back on it only now it’s too late

In drawing up its regulations, we hope to set down nothing harsh, nothing burdensome. The good of all concerned, however, may prompt us to a little strictness in order to amend faults and to safeguard love. Do not be daunted immediately by fear and run away from the road that leads to salvation. It is bound to be narrow at the outset. But as we progress in this way of life and in faith, we shall run on the path of God’s commandments, our hearts overflowing with the inexpressible delight of love.

In closing, I offer you this from the prologue to The Rule of St. Benedict, the Rule that started it all, dating to the sixth century: In drawing up its regulations, we hope to set down nothing harsh, nothing burdensome. The good of all concerned, however, may prompt us to a little strictness in order to amend faults and to safeguard love. Do not be daunted immediately by fear and run away from the road that leads to salvation. It is bound to be narrow at the outset. But as we progress in this way of life and in faith, we shall run on the path of God’s commandments, our hearts overflowing with the inexpressible delight of love.[72]

Pissed off by the lies, misrepresentations, and outright horseshit, I decided it was time to strike back. It was time to reclaim the Constitution. Besides, if the Righties were wrong about everything else—like health care, climate change, and the corporate tax rate—they had to be wrong about the Constitution. First, I did my homework. I read the Constitution and the amendments; perused The FederalistV and Madison’s notes taken during the Constitutional Convention; surveyed the lives of the Founders and FramersVI; looked over the Supreme Court opinions of Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas; and even tried to digest Glenn Beck’s The Original Argument, Mark Levin’s The Liberty Amendments, and Dr. Ben Carson’s A More Perfect Union—three of the best over-the-counter sleep aids on the market. To find out how the mind of a strict constructionist works, I also dipped into Ted Cruz’s autobiography, A Time for Truth, a faith-based romance novel in which the hero falls in love with himself at an early age.

I like this man. He is honorable, he loves his daughter and his family, and, besides, he probably voted for Goodman. My kind of guy . . .

We travel to sporting events, to work, to school, and we feel safe doing so, because people we don’t know are working under our radar, keeping us safe. All of these unseen, unknown, under-appreciated law enforcement officers deserve the Medal of Valor. They place the public safety ahead of their own safety, loving their neighbors more than themselves.

A horrible year in which faith was tested and justice was betrayed transitioned into a new year, one filled with the joyful and tangible rebirth of love, justice, faith, and, as Allah willed it, salaam. Peace.