“
Things could change, Gabe," Jonas went on. "Things could be different. I don't know how, but there must be some way for things to be different. There could be colors. And grandparents," he added, staring through the dimness toward the ceiling of his sleepingroom. "And everybody would have the memories."
"You know the memories," he whispered, turning toward the crib.
Garbriel's breathing was even and deep. Jonas liked having him there, though he felt guilty about the secret. Each night he gave memories to Gabriel: memories of boat rides and picnics in the sun; memories of soft rainfall against windowpanes; memories of dancing barefoot on a damp lawn.
"Gabe?"
The newchild stirred slightly in his sleep. Jonas looked over at him.
"There could be love," Jonas whispered.
”
”
Lois Lowry (The Giver (The Giver, #1))
“
Love me...with all the abandon
of a sudden wild rain.
”
”
Sanober Khan (A Thousand Flamingos)
“
It can happen like that. It can build slowly. It can come like a gentle rainfall, or it can slam into you like a tsunami. You are my tsunami, love.
”
”
Lora Leigh (Lion's Heat (Breeds, #15))
“
She fell into his arms like the rainfall over an ocean.
”
”
Akshay Vasu
“
I see now how things even up, how they are squared away, and how they balance under the law of love and justice. No year of life is emotionally, spiritually or even materially, all drought or all rainfall; nor is it all sun. The road turns a little every day, and one day there's a sudden twist we didn't dream was there, and for every loss there is somewhere a gain, for every grief a happiness, for every deprivation a giving.
”
”
Faith Baldwin (Many Windows, Seasons of the Heart)
“
You're my moon, my stars, you're my sunrises and sunsets. You're the crisp mountain air, the first layer of snow, and that steady rainfall after a humid day. You're just everything.
”
”
Will Darbyshire (This Modern Love)
“
true love had seemed like the grand prize, the one thing that could weather any storm, save you from both drudgery and fear, and writing about it had felt like the single most meaningful gift I could ever give.
And even if that part of my worldview was taking a brief sabbatical, it had to be true that sometimes, heartbroken women found their happy endings, their rain-falling, music-swelling moments of pure happiness.
”
”
Emily Henry (Beach Read)
“
This is how it feels in the split second you suddenly become aware that you’re falling in love with someone. The click of a jigsaw’s last piece, the rainfall of coins in a jackpot slot machine, the right song striking up and your being swept away by its opening bars. That conviction of making complete sense of the universe, in one moment. Of course. You’re where I should be. You’re here.
”
”
Mhairi McFarlane (Just Last Night)
“
The door is cracked
We used to meet
like water does land
no
not that
more like when skin touches skin
kissing fingertips
or when air escapes a lung
and is felt across the world
I've leapt over cracks in sidewalks
and swallowed away troublesome back pains
that could only be fixed with someone else's pills
We met by your house one stray day
and you drove me to the bay
where we sat and kissed like it was yesterday
And here you told me that you loved me
and that you always loved me
and that you would always love me
the wind blew and I held you
You rested your head on my shoulder
and the wind blew warm
Later, in your big red truck, we smoked some green
and I kissed you harder
and held your breasts, and felt between your legs
and with a gasp
you told me you were in love with me
And then you drove me back
and we promised it wouldn't be the end
not this time
The quill and inkwell on your foot
I'm a writer and you are my greatest art
I returned to my hell and dreamt of you once more
”
”
Dave Matthes (Strange Rainfall on the Rooftops of People Watchers: Poems and Stories)
“
LXVII
INDOORS the fire is kindled;
Beechwood is piled on the hearthstone;
Cold are the chattering oak-leaves;
And the ponds frost-bitten.
Softer than rainfall at twilight,
Bringing the fields benediction
And the hills quiet and greyness,
Are my long thoughts of thee.
How should thy friend fear the seasons?
They only perish of winter
Whom Love, audacious and tender,
Never hath visited.
”
”
Sappho (One Hundred Lyrics)
“
There are some who relish the quiet life. Free of the frantic and discord. I used to be one of them; until my life got loud and dramatic, down right unbearable at moments.
And now I love the volumes of my life. The adagio of my heart’s beating or the metronome of the rainfall. How can one expect to live without the welcome of the bird’s chirp in the morning or the night’s vehement winds pounding our window pane?
The sound of joy, heartbreak, ecstasy. It is all for the fine tuning of our soul. We learn to calibrate the sounds of life. No more sensitivity, but making it all music. Go ahead, appreciate the soundtrack of your life. It makes for good dancing too.
”
”
Emmanuella Raphaelle
“
Listen carefully. Listen and you'll hear everything you need to know.
a nightmare is a different case entirely, it's a box of black shadows and vicious red stars, something to keep carefully closed, lest the ground below be broken in two
now it's a time like any other, long minutes, tedious seconds, nothing more than flat time moving forward, like it or not
it is impossible to stop some things, rainfall, for instance, and love at first sight, and the slow and steady path of sorrow
the cruel and desperate variety that always accompanies yearning for someone you're bound to lose
when you lose somebody you think you've lost the whole world as well, but that's not the way things turn out in the end. eventually, you pick yourself up and look out the window, and once you do you see everything that was there before the world ended is out there still. there are the same apple trees and the same songbirds, and over our heads, the very same sky that shine like heaven, so far above us qw can never hope to reach such heights
sometimes those who love you best are the ones who leave you behind
hearts were made for being broken. there's really no way around it if you want to be a human being.
...consider what people are capable of going through in this world and how much courage it's possible to have
when someone kisses you with everything they feel, you don't stop thinking about it for a very long time.
you didn't think you were going to get married and live happily ever after did you? you're not that stupid...
a book of hope that has never been finished, a list of dreams left undone.
”
”
Alice Hoffman (Blue Diary)
“
Snowfall isn’t like rainfall. Rain is passion. It’s a scream. It’s my hair sticking to my face as I wrap my arms around him. It’s spontaneous, and it’s loud. Snowfall is like a secret. It’s whispers and firelight and searching for his warmth between the sheets at two a.m. when the rest of the house is asleep. It’s holding him tightly and loving him slowly.
”
”
Penelope Douglas (Credence)
“
I want you to know how perfect
your body looks after a shower.
Fresh.
Covered in little drops
of water.
Just like dewy grass after
a night of rainfall.
”
”
Sheri Rosa
“
The global aid community is mobilised into fighting drought in a district that gets 1,500 mm of rainfall annually. The reverse spiral begins. Donor governments love emergency relief. It forms a negligible part of their spending, but makes for great advertising. (Emergencies of many sorts do this, not just drought. You can run television footage of the Marines kissing babies in Somalia.) There are more serious issues between rich and poor nations—like unequal trade. Settling those would be of greater help to the latter. But for that, the ‘donors’ would have to part with something for real. No. They prefer emergency relief.
”
”
Palagummi Sainath (Everybody loves a good drought)
“
There was a scheduled rainfall in - I glanced at my watch - two minutes. I stepped out of the trolley and walked very slowly, on purpose. I've always loved, rain, and knowing that it isn't coming from clouds doesn't make me love it less.
”
”
Emily St. John Mandel (Sea of Tranquility)
“
Once my father told me: When a Jew prays, he is asking God a question that has no end.
Darkness fell. Rain fell.
I never asked: What question?
And now it's too late. Because I lost you, Tateh. One day, in the spring of 1938, on a rainy day that gave way to a break in the clouds, I lost you. You'd gone out to collect specimens for a theory you were hatching about rainfall, instinct, and butterflies. And then you were gone. We found you lying under a tree, your face splashed with mud. We knew you were free then, unbound by disappointing results. And we buried you in the cemetery where your father was buried, and his father, under the shade of the chestnut tree. Three years later, I lost Mameh. The last time I saw her she was wearing her yellow apron. She was stuffing things in a suitcase, the house was a wreck. She told me to go into the woods. She'd packed me food, and told me to wear my coat, even though it was July. "Go," she said. I was too old to listen, but like a child I listened. She told me she'd follow the next day. We chose a spot we both knew in the woods. The giant walnut tree you used to like, Tateh, because you said it had human qualities. I didn't bother to say goodbye. I chose to believe what was easier. I waited. But. She never came.
Since then I've lived with the guilt of understanding too late that she thought she would have been a burden to me. I lost Fitzy. He was studying in Vilna, Tateh—someone who knew someone told me he'd last been seen on a train. I lost Sari and Hanna to the dogs. I lost Herschel to the rain. I lost Josef to a crack in time. I lost the sound of laughter. I lost a pair of shoes, I'd taken them off to sleep, the shoes Herschel gave me, and when I woke they were gone, I walked barefoot for days and then I broke down and stole someone else's. I lost the only woman I ever wanted to love. I lost years. I lost books. I lost the house where I was born. And I lost Isaac. So who is to say that somewhere along the way, without my knowing it, I didn't also lose my mind?
”
”
Nicole Krauss (The History of Love)
“
She is soft, but knows when to stand her ground. Natural disasters aren't a mistake. They're not just a big ol' whoopsy that happened when Mother Nature and Source were planning their calendars out. Mother nature is intentional. Everything about her is intentional. Every rainfall, is intentional. Every sunny day, is intentional. Every storm, is intentional and every natural disaster is intentional. She will roar when she needs, when she needs us to take a closer look. That's what natural disasters are. She won't rob us of our opportunity to rise up together- that's our evolution and she's not gonna do our dirty (epic) work for us. But she will nudge us. And she does nudge us. Do you notice? If we don't do our best to take care of global warming, the tides will rise and beach side cities will be wiped. Perhaps our kids or our kids' kids won't ever see the glaciers of today. She's not gonna cover up for us, but she will love us on our journey and gives us clues and signs. It's up to us to pay attention.
”
”
Peta Kelly (Earth is Hiring: The New way to live, lead, earn and give for millennials and anyone who gives a sh*t)
“
Snowfall isn’t like rainfall. Rain is passion. It’s a scream. It’s my hair sticking to my face as I wrap my arms around him. It’s spontaneous, and it’s loud.
Snowfall is like a secret. It’s whispers and firelight and searching for his warmth between the sheets at two a.m. when the rest of the house is asleep.
It’s holding him tightly and loving him slowly.
”
”
Penelope Douglas (Credence)
“
We are living in a simulation, I told myself, as the trolley stopped a block from my apartment, but this fell so far short of, well, of the reality, for lack of a better word. I couldn’t convince myself. I didn’t believe it. There was a scheduled rainfall in—I glanced at my watch—two minutes. I stepped out of the trolley and walked very slowly, on purpose. I’ve always loved rain, and knowing that it isn’t coming from clouds doesn’t make me love it less.
”
”
Emily St. John Mandel (Sea of Tranquility)
“
Beauty isn’t an arrangement of features, even features as perfect as Finlay Hart’s, it’s a feeling. This is how it feels in the split second you suddenly become aware that you’re falling in love with someone. The click of a jigsaw’s last piece, the rainfall of coins in a jackpot slot machine, the right song striking up and your being swept away by its opening bars. That conviction of making complete sense of the universe, in one moment. Of course. You’re where I should be. You’re here.
”
”
Mhairi McFarlane (Just Last Night)
“
I do love Oregon." My gaze wanders over the quiet, natural beauty surrounding us, which isn't limited to just this garden. "Being near the river, and the ocean, and the rocky mountains, and all this nature ... the weather."
He chuckles. "I've never met anyone who actually loves rain. It's kind of weird. But cool, too," he adds quickly, as if afraid to offend me. "I just don't get it."
I shrug. "It's not so much that I love rain. I just have a healthy respect for what if does. People hate it, but the world needs rain. It washes away dirt, dilutes the toxins in the air, feeds drought. It keeps everything around us alive."
"Well, I have a healthy respect for what the sun does," he counters with a smile."
"I'd rather have the sun after a good, hard rainfall."
He just shakes his head at me but he's smiling. "The good with the bad?"
"Isn't that life?"
He frowns. "Why do I sense a metaphor behind that?"
"Maybe there is a metaphor behind that." One I can't very well explain to him without describing the kinds of things I see every day in my life. The underbelly of society - where twisted morals reign and predators lurk, preying on the lost, the broken, the weak, the innocent. Where a thirteen-year-old sells her body rather than live under the same roof as her abusive parents, where punks gang-rape a drunk girl and then post pictures of it all over the internet so the world can relive it with her. Where a junkie mom's drug addiction is readily fed while her children sit back and watch.
Where a father is murdered bacause he made the mistake of wanting a van for his family.
In that world, it seems like it's raining all the time. A cold, hard rain that seeps into clothes, chills bones, and makes people feel utterly wretched.
Many times, I see people on the worst day of their lives, when they feel like they're drowing. I don't enjoy seeing people suffer. I just know that if they make good choices, and accept the right help, they'll come out of it all the stronger for it.
What I do enjoy comes after. Three months later, when I see that thirteen-year-old former prostitute pushing a mower across the front lawn of her foster home, a quiet smile on her face. Eight months later, when I see the girl who was raped walking home from school with a guy who wants nothing from her but to make her laugh. Two years later, when I see the junkie mom clean and sober and loading a shopping cart for the kids that the State finally gave back to her.
Those people have seen the sun again after the harshest rain, and they appreciate it so much more.
”
”
K.A. Tucker (Becoming Rain (Burying Water, #2))
“
After every rainfall there's a rainbow because rainbows are a promise. A promise that there will always be a light in the darkness. That's why they are too beautiful to overlook.' His hand crept along my cheek, brushing away the fallen strands of my hair. The same strange look came over him, as if he wasn't present at all, but somewhere else, in a strange memory. "You, Norah, are our light."
I swallowed hard. "Where's the darkness?"
His eyes were trained, like he was under a spell, unable to move away or stop looking at me. "Where you aren't.
”
”
Angela Parkhurst (The Forgotten Fairytales (Forgotten Fairytales, #1))
“
You know, when it comes down to it, life is basically about two things: love and fear," she said, and then continued. “Once I’m gone, when you get over the fear, all that will be left for you to do is to love with everything you’ve got. Loving every day that remains, relentlessly. I want you to promise me that, because that’s the only eternal truth of which I’m certain. And if you ever fight with the girl who comes after me, you can think of me, and you’ll know I’m watching over you, and that if you don’t kiss and make up right away, I’ll drown you in rainfall. Because believe me, I’m pretty sure I’ll have that power.
”
”
Marc Levy (Hope)
“
In Seattle, warm temperatures, associated with moist, Pineapple Express air, have already produced a rainfall of two inches between 7 PM yesterday and 7 AM this morning. I am now going out on a limb and projecting that this flow will stagnate over Puget Sound and the deluge will continue for hours. We are in the midst of a most notable weather show. * See, that’s what I mean about loving Cliff Mass. Because, basically, all he’s saying is it’s going to rain. * From: Ollie-O To: Prospective Parent Brunch Committee REAL-TIME FLASH! The day of the PPB has come. Unfortunately, our biggest get, the sun, is going to be a no-show. Ha-ha. That was my idea of a joke.
”
”
Maria Semple (Where'd You Go, Bernadette)
“
Honor He Wrote Sonnet 22
You don't know love, till you've known heartbreak,
You won't know sight, till you've known blindness.
You don't know courage, till you've felt helpless,
You won't know light, till you've been in darkness.
Darkest clouds herald the brightest sunshine,
Direst circumstances make the bravest of character.
Heavier the rainfall, more breathtaking the rainbow,
Steeper the hill to climb, sweeter the summit vista.
Once your back is against the wall, only way is through,
You won't know integrity, till you are left in pieces.
Lose all identity, only then you'll know to be human,
You won't know wholeness, till you've felt nothingness.
More ominous the night, more spectacular the daybreak.
Till we're wiped out for a purpose, there’s no upliftment.
”
”
Abhijit Naskar (Honor He Wrote: 100 Sonnets For Humans Not Vegetables)
“
Summer days and junior year, you are my sunshine that brightens up my full moon; we are going to soar together, we will not need to wish upon a star because our dreams will, at last, become true. There may be dark clouds overhead, and times of rain. This may be there showering upon us, but love still grows, we will not care, we will be there looking at that view that goes on for miles. Sometimes we will have to cope with the rainfall that wants to keep us apart. Sometimes I think that I am going to lose my way to you. While the gray storms end up taking our joyful colors away once more.
Upon the clear, we stand together at last… arm in arm, and hand and hand, we are laced, and we embrace one another. The colors of red, blue, and pink are the sky once more. Plus, all along you were there, this time we share. The colors begin setting the mood and light ones more. All the vivid gold sights with the feelings of being united and that will be us as a pair. The many stars shine bright because we are going to be there all night, holding on to what we had that night.
I used to bite my lips, thinking about that gold band, and the sparkly rock on top. You can make me feel like royalty; yes, I will be your queen ruler. Maybe someday all this will not be a fantasy and the dreams will come true when we look at a different view, just me and you.
”
”
Marcel Ray Duriez (Nevaeh The Lusting Sapphire Blue Eyes)
“
Love is better known by a person who eagerly waits for monsoon,
not by the one who keeps on selling and buying umbrella before the rainfall.
”
”
mahatma Sanny
“
Imagine the love you feel for your child, and then multiply that by a thousand. Imagine what you felt the first time you gazed upon her, and knew that God had given you the most perfect gift to complete your life, and multiply that again. That is what you are to me. That is what I felt the first moment I saw you. Unlike humans, Breeds live for the small gifts, the little kindnesses fate would hand to us. We search for them. We cherish them. The moment I saw you, the animal inside me roared in triumph, the man melted in the face of the woman who stared back at him.
"That was love, Rachel. It was acceptance, the knowledge that what I feared the most, what I ached for the most, was now standing before me, and reaching out for it, claiming it, could destroy everything I am."
She shook her head desperately. "Love doesn't happen like that. It takes time. It builds."
He nodded slowly. "It can happen like that. It can build slowly. It can come like a gentle rainfall, or it can slam into you like a tsunami. You are my tsunami, love.
”
”
Lora Leigh (Lion's Heat (Breeds, #15))
“
She danced in the shower of my words & I fell softly: Upon her.
”
”
Curtis Tyrone Jones
“
Ooh, look." Birdie swerved out of line to a bushy plant full of purple flowers. She plucked a few delightedly. "Lilacs." She thrust them toward Leeda's face, and Leeda smiled, sniffing. Birdie could make something exciting out of anything on the orchard. She knew all the flowers, the species of birds, how much rainfall they could expect, where moss was likely to grow, which mushrooms were edible, and how long many of the trees had been in the ground. To walk across the property with Birdie was never just to walk through unnoticed space.
”
”
Jodi Lynn Anderson (Love and Peaches (Peaches, #3))
“
All these years, nothing changed, my heart kept bleeding like rainfall.
”
”
Daniel Jeremiah
“
I love how the garden brightens after getting drenched by rain.
”
”
Michael Bassey Johnson (Night of a Thousand Thoughts)
“
Every drought is a rainfall somewhere else..for the eyes that cry, laughter blooms somewhere else. For every flower that goes to sleep, a bud opens somewhere else...
”
”
Jayita Bhattacharjee
“
For years I painted a beautiful picture of my homeland. I smudged the bigotry, ostracism, and narrow-mindedness of the Bible Belt and brightened it with colorful glasses of sweet tea, fresh, country hillsides, and southern hospitality. I erased the whiskey, the vitamin force-feeding, and the screaming fights that sent me crying and fleeing. I replaced them with sketches of a loving daddy who charitably tolerated me. I plastered tough love atop emotional indifference and neglect. I painted Mom with the unconditional nurturing that would wash away with the first light rainfall.
”
”
Maggie Georgiana Young (Just Another Number)
“
NAKED AND WARM
We lay together naked and warm. The light from the outside becomes more overcast with rain starting to trickle on the roof with the sound of a restful peace that draws us even closer. We lie together listening to the sounds of rainfall as a calm comfort cloaks our minds from all else. At times the sounds from the outside seem to perish into the distance as we lay in awe of each other, too in love to let go, she watching me as I quietly study her and the way that she exists when she is with me. I stare deep into her beautiful eyes with our limbs intertwined, answering her with my gentle traveling touch. Her small hands reach up and run across the bottom of my face and neck as my hands move gradually through her hair. I fall for her each time she looks at me, each time kissing her as if it were the first time. I open her mouth with mine as I seek to give all of myself to her again, time having for once become meaningless.
”
”
Luccini Shurod
“
Black Roads
Black roads have nothing to tell, they are embarrassing day by day, yet they smell awesome after the chaste heavy rainfall, even in the abject condition.
Black roads burn madly in the detrimental sunlight during the whole day, yet welcome the God of sun everyday.
Black roads always offer us a cool, bright strange place to introspect ourselves, to walk on it's burned skin everyday, yet it teaches us a new lesson everyday.
Don't disparagement the roads for its daily serving to us, as
Black roads are hard, still lenient to offer us a leisure walk on it.
How are black roads feel much helpless while providing a loneliest path to a strange girl.
Who says, there were no evidence. The falter black roads were the only evidence of the sight, when a girl raped or teased.
These strange roads feeble each and everyday after watching this disheartened, excruciating act. They want a perfect strange road, on which everyone can walk independently, without thinking about the passing immortal time and the culprit people.
"No worries in life, is simply a perfect destination for us"
~Sometimes, non living things teach us the best lessons.
The words of black roads~
"I always take the help of those poor human being to prove my sacredness in front on the whole world. I don't want a heavy dauntless rain to remove the blood stains and scars of tears, instead i need the drizzle to wash the dust of love spread by everyone carelessly. I am pity helpless, yet great than this artificial human being who are creating a road full of violence"
"The stains of the blood and the scars of the deadliest tears burns on my black skin everyday"
© Deepak Gupta
”
”
Deepak Gupta (Inspiring Life: Motivational Quotes That Can Change Your Life)
“
Rain falls equally on those who seek inner peace and those who choose inertia. One finds enlightenment in its rhythm, while the other succumbs to its lull.
”
”
Shree Shambav (Life Changing Journey - 365 Inspirational Quotes - Series - I)
“
This is how it feels in the split second you suddenly become aware that you’re falling in love with someone. The click of a jigsaw’s last piece, the rainfall of coins in a jackpot slot machine, the right song striking up and your being swept away by its opening bars. That conviction of making complete sense of the universe, in one moment.
”
”
Mhairi McFarlane (Just Last Night)
“
The only way I could describe it was like the gentle bloom from Winter into Spring. Kissing Theo, properly kissing Theo, felt like the welcoming sensation of that first warm breeze after the cold, the soft rhythmic rainfall that helped plants to grow from the earth and helped the restless to finally rest. It felt like being welcomed home.
”
”
Orlagh Birt (This one goes out to the one I love)
“
What was the point of having a massive rainfall shower with a handy bench seat if we didn’t fuck in it at least once a week?
”
”
Ana Huang (Twisted Love (Twisted, #1))
“
I wouldn’t say
“Do not reach for the sky”,
Just don’t weep like rainfall,
When it reaches back.
”
”
Jenim Dibie
“
For a sad soul like him, she was like heavy rainfall on dry desert and her flowery perfume- it removed all chances of sensibility
”
”
Prerana Lal (THE BIOTECHNOLOGIST!: Love between two Biotechnology engineering students.)
“
But sure enough, there was a new message from David on my phone waiting for me under my pillow like a bright, shining pound coin from the tooth fairy.
'You woke me up at about five this morning,' it read.
'What do you mean?' I replied. He sent me a recording of the sound of rainfall, hard and then soft, on the window of his bedroom.
'Am I the rain?' I asked, suspending my well-worn cynicism in a way that would become a fixture of our interactions.
'Yeah, you are,' he replied. 'I felt you come closer.
”
”
Dolly Alderton (Everything I Know About Love)
“
Life does not owe you its justification; rather, you have given life the justification to exist. If no one notices you, love a plant. Nurture it, protect it from storms, protect it from wild creatures and birds, shield it from harsh sunlight, and safeguard it from excessive rainfall. Raise it, let butterflies perch on it. Even if someone else enjoys its fruits, it shouldn't be a cause for concern.
Your efforts will never go in vain. You will be granted the justification and reward for staying alive. If nothing else can be done, polish a stone, nurture it, work hard on it, and it will become a mirror of stone. Inside the mirror, the justification of life will be inscribed.
”
”
Wasif Ali Wasif (The Truth Unveiled: Harf Harf Haqeeqat)
“
Two men were traveling from one town to another. They came to a stream that had risen due to heavy rainfall. Just when they were about to cross the water, they noticed a young, beautiful woman standing there all alone, in need of help. One of the men immediately went to her side. He picked the woman up and carried her in his arms across the stream. Then he dropped her there, waved good-bye, and the two men went their way. During the rest of the trip, the second traveler was unusually silent and sullen, not responding to his friend’s questions. After several hours of sulking, unable to keep silent anymore, he said, “Why did you touch that woman? She could have seduced you! Men and women cannot come into contact like that!” The first man responded calmly, “My friend, I carried the woman across the stream, and that is where I left her. It is you who have been carrying her ever since.
”
”
Elif Shafak (The Forty Rules of Love)
“
She shook her hair in the cool breeze and inhaled, the scents of lavender and rose and jasmine sweet in the lucent air. They passed fields where delicately scented rosa centifolia bushes grew. "How was the rose crop this year?"
"Excellent. We had a mild spring and a generous rainfall. Twenty to twenty-five blossoms on every branch. Our rose was indeed the 'queen of the flowers' this year, to quote the Greek poet Sappho." He lifted his chin and peered at her down his nose. "Our rose de mai is expensive, Danieeele, but far superior to others."
Laughter bubbled in her throat. "Your Gallic pride is showing, Philippe."
He expressed a puff of air between pursed lips. "Bulgaria? Morocco? You can't tell me their roses are better than mine."
"Just different," she said with patience. "Moroccan roses have a rich perfume, and Bulgaria's Valley of the Roses produces lovely damascena roses scented with a brilliant tinge of pear.
”
”
Jan Moran (Scent of Triumph)
“
Sunshine and rainfall, friendship and love,
When you have these things you have more than enough.
”
”
Daniel Joseph de Cruz (The Cruces Crises)
“
The rain-filled potholes, set in naked rock are usually devoid of visible plant life but not of animal life. In addition to the inevitable microscopic creatures there may be certain amphibians like the spadefoot toad. This little animal lives through dry spells in a state of estivation under the dried-up sediment in the bottom of a hole. When the rain comes, if it comes, he emerges from the mud singing madly in his fashion, mates with the handiest female and fills the pool with a swarm of tadpoles, most of them doomed to a most ephemeral existence. But a few survive, mature, become real toads, and when the pool dries up they dig into the sediment as their parents did before, making burrows which they seal with mucus in order to preserve that moisture necessary to life. There they wait, day after day, week after week, in patient spadefoot torpor, perhaps listening - we can imagine - for the sounds of raindrops pattering at last on the earthen crust above their heads. If it comes in time the glorious cycle is repeated; if not, this particular colony of Bufonidae is reduced eventually to dust, a burden on the wind.
Rain and puddles bring out other amphibia, even in the desert. It's a strange, stirring, but not uncommon thing to come on a pool at night, after an evening of thunder and lightning and a bit of rainfall, and see the frogs clinging to the edge of their impermanent pond, bodies immersed in water but heads out, all croaking away in tricky counterpoint. They are windbags: with each croak the pouch under the frog's chin swells like a bubble, then collapses.
Why do they sing? What do they have to sing about? Somewhat apart from one another, separated by roughly equal distances, facing outward from the water, they clank and croak all through the night with tireless perseverance. To human ears their music has a bleak, dismal, tragic quality, dirgelike rather than jubilant. It may nevertheless be the case that these small beings are singing not only to claim their stake in the pond, not only to attract a mate, but also out of spontaneous love and joy, a contrapuntal choral celebration of the coolness and wetness after weeks of desert fire, for love of their own existence, however brief it may be, and for the joy in the common life.
Has joy any survival value in the operations of evolution? I suspect that it does; I suspect that the morose and fearful are doomed to quick extinction. Where there is no joy there can be no courage; and without courage all other virtues are useless. Therefore the frogs, the toads, keep on singing even though we know, if they don't that the sound of their uproar must surely be luring all the snakes and ringtail cats and kitfoxes and coyotes and great horned owls toward the scene of their happiness.
What then? A few of the little amphibians will continue their metamorphosis by way of the nerves and tissues of one of the higher animals, in which process the joy of one becomes the contentment of the second. Nothing is lost except an individual consciousness here and there, a trivial perhaps even illusory phenomenon. The rest survive, mate, multiply, burrow, estivate, dream, and rise again. The rains will come, the potholes shall be filled. Again. And again. And again.
”
”
Edward Abbey (Desert Solitaire)
“
I stare at Finlay and he stares back. We’re both fixed on each other, and as seconds pass, I realize neither of us is trying to pretend it’s anything other than a heart-struck gaze of mutual longing. Everything about his face is so ridiculously, staggeringly lovely to me, in this moment, I’m unable to speak.
Beauty isn’t an arrangement of features, even features as perfect as Finlay Hart’s, it’s a feeling. This is how it feels in the split second you suddenly become aware that you’re falling in love with someone. The click of a jigsaw’s last piece, the rainfall of coins in a jackpot slot machine, the right song striking up and your being swept away by its opening bars. That conviction of making complete sense of the universe, in one moment. Of course. You’re where I should be. You’re here.
“How are you?” Fin says to me, eventually, and we both break into broad smiles at the ludicrousness of having declared our feelings without saying a word. I can’t wait to talk to him properly, after we leave here. I can’t wait, full stop.
”
”
Mhairi McFarlane
“
Even in darkness, if you close your eyes and try to walk, a serenade of light guides you. And it is not just blank philosophy, it's absolutely true and something that we actually know in the deepest corner of our heart, if only our minds let us look deep enough. And at this time when the world is seeped in a cloud of uncertainty, a shade of darkness that is so dense that an unknown fear clutch us and we fall deep inside that pit of fire, I hope we do not forget that often fire is the most potent element in this Earth to purify us, and even from the ashes one can rise provided we hold on to that Hope, that is the very wings of Faith. This time, this quarantine as they call it, or this Solitude as I call it is making us realize so much and each time I come across a post breathing with life be it music, art, introspective words, I know that this time is letting some of us sink deep in the realm of spiritual growth, even if the outer countenance of that is limited to a shape. The paintings, the songs, the dance and act performances, the cooking dishes, the motivating words, the happiness of spending time with family, the mirth and laughter, even in the frugalities showing the battles of survival, and actually in every littlest post, all I can see is how everyone is getting hold of their inner light and delving into something that gives them the fuel to this light. Sometimes a wreck of clouds bring in a burst of rainfall that perhaps had been long due and yet a silver lining often lurks around as a surprising gift of that grey canopy of clouds. The rain might jolt on the fields of harvest but brings in the promise of a better harvest, and soothes the earth with the harmony of tranquil serenity. The sky shines with a rainbow that we embrace in our hearts through that belief in our abilities and the joy of love, the complete invincible love for ourselves with each and every particle of our soul, and there we rise in compassion and shine in gratitude. I believe, I always believe that anything that we practice often, again and again and yet again, becomes a part of us and sometimes all of us. And perhaps the best practice that we can all indulge in at the moment is the practice of mindfulness, of knowing what truly we want not what we are programmed to want but what lies deep dormant in the innermost vicinity of our hearts where we as souls reside because once we know that, we would know how silence speaks in the sharpest tongue beckoning us again and again onto the path of love, where a serenade of light leads us even through the darkest of gloom.
”
”
Debatrayee Banerjee
“
“Does your heart implode into an infinite care for your other?”
“Does it explode into a million stars?”
“Do you feel warm and hold the desire to harbor?”
“Would you fly the biggest plane into war?”
“Could you change the direction of the starboard?”
“If all you understood could immediately be over?”
“The dark blue sky is infinite and fast forward.”
“How much do you want to keep him safe from harm?”
“Would you cut the wires knowingly to disable a bomb?”
“To which or what does your sun revolve?”
“What do you call your world?”
“How many of its problems would you willingly solve?”
“How many flags of pride for him will you unfurl?”
“How big is your once broken vestige?”
“Can you heal from your fleshwounds?”
“To carry him on and on, even covered in scars?”
“To be shot for the only, To be the carrier and keep it going.”
“Even when the sound of every blackhole in space roars?”
“Can you question your unholy gods in the name of love?”
“Can you hold on even when you can see the reaper settling in?”
“Can you curse those who fly far up and above?”
“Would your golden soul settle to make due and amend?”
“The river of euphrates flows over the globe.”
“White clouds, rainfall coming down, droplets from the overdome.”
“Are you to agree that you can set fire and land in the aerodrome?”
“Even when the shooting rocks from millions of miles away decay your airspace?”
“Would you tense up your strings and hold an angry face.”
“One that circles around back to the care you have to display?”
“How much can you love one person?”
“How instantaneous, like spontaneous combustion.”
“Can you see why you care this much in their eyes?”
“Can you see the water fall from the skies?”
“Can you see the sun rising to revolve around them once more?”
“Can you see the falls from the cliff ledges and the birds?”
“Can you foresee what the future has in store?”
“Every story has only one narrator, Every view sought through two eyes.”
“Your care, your love for him is not a disguise.”
“It is a ground shaking thing to feel, you fly.”
“The tremors, the earth-shattering quakes under the plates.”
“You can only care anymore, no longer do you despise.”
“All the angry lines are gone from the sands of time.”
“Can you wonder, can you tell anyone or even explain why?”
“Can you hold true for the next million years, Right by his side?”
“Can you lose your fears to continue to try?”
“Jump a million worlds, fall a million skies.”
“Infinite voids, infinite times.”
“For one world’s sunrise.
”
”
Aʟʟ Mɪɢʜᴛ