“
You can burn the house to the ground if you want, beautiful, I’ll happily rebuild it brick by brick when you’re done with me.
”
”
Caroline Peckham (Fated Throne (Zodiac Academy, #6))
“
you are sad now.
you are not sad forever.
there are no paved roads
to healing.
you must build one
brick by brick.
there will be backtracks before breakthroughs but-
you must collapse
into yourself
before rebuilding.
you must unearth
every wound
before learning the power of salt.
you will build that yellow brick road-
in your own time and
on your own terms.
- the grit of healing.
”
”
Amanda Lovelace (The Mermaid's Voice Returns in This One (Women Are Some Kind of Magic, #3))
“
YOU WILL DRINK THE COFFEE UNTIL I CAN SEE MY FACE IN THE BOTTOM OF THE CUP!” I did not mean to roar. “But it’s a clay cup.” “I DO NOT CARE!” He finished the coffee. “You did not have to finish it,” I said, because I could perceive that he was rebuilding the Great Wall of China with shit bricks.
”
”
Jonathan Safran Foer (Everything is Illuminated)
“
Slowly she began to reach for some conclusion, some philosophy with which to rebuild her shattered hopes. The world hadn't collapsed about her. She hadn't been buried under brick and rubble, falling plaster and caved-in sidewalks. Yet that was how she had felt ...
The trouble was with her. She had built up a fantastic structure made from the soft, nebulous, cloudy stuff of dreams. There hadn't been a solid, practical brick in it, not even a foundation. She had built it up of air and vapor and moved right in. So of course it had collapsed. It had never existed anywhere but her own mind.
”
”
Ann Petry (The Street)
“
I never wanted to see her ruined pink sweater again. I’d buy her a new one. A dozen new ones. I’d rebuild her library brick by brick, book by book. And I would never let her face danger alone again.
”
”
Lucy Score (Things We Left Behind (Knockemout, #3))
“
Nicholas said, ‘I hear he’s ordered two million bricks for rebuilding that crumbling old family place of his in Wiltshire – what’s it called, Wolf’s Hole?’ ‘Wolf Hall. All paid for by the public purse, empty though it is.
”
”
C.J. Sansom (Tombland (Matthew Shardlake, #7))
“
Whenever my colleagues and I encounter a boy who acts "normal"—not explosively violent, not oppositional to every word, not obsessed with killing and dying, not focused on sexual objectification—we are overjoyed with his potential. Here is one who has a stronger foundation on which to build, one who will not knock down his every success like a child with a brick castle to see if the adults will keep helping him rebuild.
”
”
Thomm Quackenbush (Juvenile Justice: A Reference Handbook, 2nd Edition (Contemporary World Issues (eBook)))
“
The idea that everyone should have a house of his own is based on an ancient custom of the Japanese race, Shinto superstition ordaining that every dwelling should be evacuated on the death of its chief occupant. Perhaps there may have been some unrealized sanitary reason for this practice. Another early custom was that a newly built house should be provided for each couple that married. It is on account of such customs that we find the Imperial capitals so frequently removed from one site to another in ancient days. The rebuilding, every twenty years, of Ise Temple, the supreme shrine of the Sun-Goddess, is an example of one of these ancient rites which still obtain at the present day. The observance of these customs was only possible with some form of construction as that furnished by our system of wooden architecture, easily pulled down, easily built up. A more lasting style, employing brick and stone, would have rendered migrations impracticable, as indeed they became when the more stable and massive wooden construction of China was adopted by us after the Nara period.
”
”
Kakuzō Okakura (The Book of Tea)
“
The Three Times You Rebuilt Your House-shaped Heart
The first time your house-shaped
heart is wrecked
you are too young to realise
love can be a wolf.
They call it puppy love
but there is something
deeply violent in this,
too violent to be that innocent.
Slowly, you rebuild it.
With confidence
you make it out of straw,
sturdier than no protection.
And again, it is wrecked.
Huffed and puffed into nothingness
by this dangerous thing
no one wants to call a wolf.
Again, you collect
from the wreckage,
promise yourself stronger,
make a wooden shelter.
But even this proves
futile, for the dark thing
that relishes destroying
your soft, wanting heart.
It takes you so much longer
to feel and trust again,
you build walls made of brick.
You think, Not this time.
This time it will not find
a way to destroy me,
I have built stronger walls
than it can possibly handle.
Still the wolf comes.
Still the house-heart,
sturdy as you make it,
finds a way to crumble.
”
”
Nikita Gill (Fierce Fairytales: Poems and Stories to Stir Your Soul)
“
The Devlin Butchers were bringing all the prejudice and fear back to the forefront, rebuilding a wall we’d successfully torn down, brick by slow brick.
”
”
Juliette Cross (Waking the Dragon (Vale of Stars, #1))
“
As cadets, we constantly hammered, scraped and wire brushed rusting steel, before applying red lead paint. Most of the paint we used was Navy surplus or a concoction made up of fish oil, lampblack and china dryer. We found that by mixing all different color paints, we would wind up with a paint we called “Sh-t Grindle Brown.” Inventiveness was key as we repaired, replaced, and painted the State of Maine from stem to stern. This work, being in addition to our studies, consumed all of our time. How we managed to fit all of this into the time we had, is still a mystery. The conversion of the ship was labor intensive and expensive, but the U.S. Maritime Commission contributed to the Academy’s financial needs where possible. The mounting expenses remained a challenge but we didn’t give up. We never did finish the entire conversion prior to our first cruise, but one thing we managed to do was paint over the name “USS Comfort” and hand letter in her new name “State of Maine.” If you looked carefully, you could still see her previous name outlined by a welded bead, but this was a minor detail that would eventually be taken care of. Perhaps because of my experience with the letters on the front of “Richardson Hall,” the task of lettering her name and her new homeport on the stern became mine. Much of the ship’s superstructure was still covered with a sticky preservative made up of paint and crank case oil, which never really dried and indelibly got onto our working uniforms. However, from a distance, you couldn’t tell the difference and it looked all right, but more importantly it prevented further rusting. One bulkhead at a time, using a mixture of gasoline and paint remover, we scraped the gunk off and repainted it. The engineers had been busy rebuilding the pumps and generators, as well as repacking steam pipes with asbestos wrapping. We finally got the ship to where we could sail her to Portland under her own power. The twin Babcock and Wilcox heater-type boilers had to be repaired and re-bricked there. After this, we would continue on to the dry dock in Boston for additional work and the hull inspection that was required below the water line.
”
”
Hank Bracker
“
You can burn the house to the ground if you want, beautiful, I’ll happily rebuild it brick by brick when you’re done with me.” He captured my chin, yanking me back to look at him and my breathing faltered as I fell into the endless depths of his eyes. The truth sat on my tongue, weighing it down as heavily as lead. That I’d never be done with him. I loved him too completely. In every minute of every hour, right down to the space between seconds.
”
”
Caroline Peckham (Fated Throne (Zodiac Academy, #6))
“
But like all revolutions, change isn't just about tearing down, it's about rebuilding. A real revolution isn't just throwing "bricks"; it's about telling the story after, and building the space to hear it.
”
”
Sasha Velour
“
The bricks have fallen, but we will rebuild with hewn stone; the sycamores have been cut down, but we will plant cedars in their place.
”
”
Jonathan Cahn (The Mystery of the Shemitah: The 3,000-Year-Old Mystery That Holds the Secret of America's Future, the World's Future, and Your Future!)
“
The International Herald Tribune reported on April 21, 2006, that the “crumbling mud-brick buildings” in the area Hussein was trying to re-build in Babylon, “look like smashed sandcastles at the beach. The newspaper observed that Babylon had been “ransacked, looted, torn up, paved over, neglected and roughly occupied…soldiers had even used soil thick with priceless artifacts to stuff sandbags”. The Mayor of a nearby village, Hilla, told the newspaper that he still had hopes that Babylon could someday have “restaurants, gift shops, long parking lots…and maybe even a Holiday Inn.” Iraqi officials are quoted as saying they would still like to turn Babylon into “a cultural center and possibly even an Iraqi theme park.” In spite of this, one Bible commentator wrote recently, that it was “enormously significant” that the U.S. had agreed to invest $700,000 (that’s thousands, not millions or billions – enough to buy a couple of nice houses) into re-building Babylon as a ‘tourist attraction.’ He wrote that ancient Babylon would become “the wealthiest and most powerful city on the face of the planet.” In arriving at this conclusion he has interpreted the Bible’s Daughter of Babylon verses as applying to the site of ancient Babylon.
”
”
John Price (The End of America: The Role of Islam in the End Times and Biblical Warnings to Flee America)
“
To replace bricks with bricks is restoration,” he said. “But to replace bricks with hewn stone is defiance. To rebuild what was destroyed is restoration, but to boast of rebuilding stronger and greater than before is defiance.
”
”
Jonathan Cahn (The Harbinger: The Ancient Mystery that Holds the Secret of America's Future)
“
Isaiah 9:10: “The bricks have fallen, But we will rebuild with hewn stone; The sycamores have been cut down, But we will plant cedars in their place.1 “Now, Isaiah 9:11: “Therefore the LORD shall set up The adversaries of Rezin against him, And spur his enemies on.
”
”
Jonathan Cahn (The Harbinger: The Ancient Mystery that Holds the Secret of America's Future)
“
So, in other words, Israel’s real problem was a spiritual one—its separation from God. Everything else was just a symptom, or manifestation, of the underlying problem. So the vow to rebuild is like a gardener attempting to remove a weed by cutting off its leaves.” “Exactly. The ultimate problem wasn’t national security or defense or the Assyrians or even the attack. If a nation’s underlying problem is spiritual, then all the political, economic, or military solutions will do nothing to remove it. Such things can only treat symptoms—the bricks and the sycamores. A spiritual problem can only be solved by a spiritual solution. Apart from that, every solution will end up producing another crisis.” “So the only solution is to return to God.
”
”
Jonathan Cahn (The Harbinger: The Ancient Mystery that Holds the Secret of America's Future)
“
You can burn the house to the ground if you want, beautiful, I’ll happily rebuild it brick by brick when you’re done with me.” He captured my chin, yanking me back to look at him and my breathing faltered as I fell into the endless depths of his eyes.
”
”
Caroline Peckham (Fated Throne (Zodiac Academy, #6))
“
As you recall, collagen plays the same role in your joints as bricks that make up a house’s walls.
”
”
Scott H Hogan (Built from Broken: A Science-Based Guide to Healing Painful Joints, Preventing Injuries, and Rebuilding Your Body)
“
Collagen biosynthesis can be likened to making clay into bricks, which will eventually be used to construct a wall.
”
”
Scott H Hogan (Built from Broken: A Science-Based Guide to Healing Painful Joints, Preventing Injuries, and Rebuilding Your Body)
“
We’re taking a bath,” I said, removing my underwear and socks and adding them to the pile of clothing I was going to throw away at my earliest convenience. I never wanted to see her ruined pink sweater again. I’d buy her a new one. A dozen new ones. I’d rebuild her library brick by brick, book by book. And I would never let her face danger alone again. Something loosened in my chest. Something old and rusted. Like an ancient lock finally forced open. Fresh air swept inside, blowing aside the cobwebs, lighting the hearth. She’d always been mine. I was just now accepting that fact. Once something was mine, I never gave it up.
”
”
Lucy Score (Things We Left Behind (Knockemout, #3))
“
During the crash of ’29, Stanley’s deli did not go bankrupt. This simple financial fact infuriated white Memphis. They could not understand that smart planning and the sheer fact that humans will always need bread were the reasons Stanley’s did not have to shutter. It did not matter; the Klan shuttered it for him. Set fire to the building one night. The next day, all of Douglass, thousands of Black hands, came out to help Stanley rebuild, brick by brick. Even Hazel, just eight years old then, had swept ash from the foundation.
”
”
Tara M. Stringfellow (Memphis)
“
In 2019 I tried to commit suicide and obviously failed. I wrote Day Return to Cocoa Yard during the rebuilding of my life, and quite honestly it was an integral course of bricks.
”
”
Mark Bickerton
“
Sticky bun with your brew?’ Alice laughed. Sadie’s observations were probably right. ‘Oh yes please. I’ll find us a place to sit.’ She grabbed a table by the window that four girls were just vacating and sat down, looking out at the street below where some workmen were carrying hods of bricks and others, standing on scaffolding, were throwing chunks of damaged masonry down to the area of pavement that was fenced off from public use. It was such a shame. The damage to the store was so extensive, it might have been easier to demolish the lot and rebuild from scratch. But at least they had jobs and that was something to be thankful for. Many women who had held things together while the men were away fighting had since found themselves out of work, losing the jobs they’d loved to the returning male workforce. ‘No sticky buns so I got a couple of scones,’ Sadie said as she came to the table with a tray. ‘Hope that’s okay?’ ‘Fine by me,’ Alice said. ‘I’m starving.’ She
”
”
Pam Howes (The Shop Girls of Lark Lane (Lark Lane, #2))
“
I know I belabor this analogy, but I have come to see these teenage years as a construction project. I tell my young patients, and my own children, that this is not their life. Not yet. What they are doing now is building a house. It is a house they will have to live in for the rest of their lives, so they’d better get it right. They will be able to remodel, redecorate, and repair. But they can never rebuild. Everything they put into this house, every emotional scar from a bad relationship, every sexual perversion they give in to, every opportunity they secure for themselves, every drug they allow to interrupt the maturing of their growing brains, will be forever in the foundation of that house. The neuroscientists keep moving their conclusion, but the human brain winds down its developing around age twenty-five. What happens between puberty and the midtwenties in the brain, while it is finishing its development—its hardwiring—involves increased risk taking and peer influence. The reward center is trying to sort out what behaviors lead to rewards so it can lay down some wires, some bricks. Those bricks become part of the foundation, and they are there to stay. If those bricks tell you to like alcohol or cocaine or deviant sex acts, you will be fighting those cravings for the rest of your life. And of course, a child who blows off her grades and winds up at a subpar college will have to move to the back of the line when it comes to finding a job. It all matters.
”
”
Wendy Walker (All Is Not Forgotten)
“
Our bodies are built entirely of food. Eating is the process of transforming and assimilating matter from the external world into our own form. Every day, food breaks down into different types of “bricks” in our gut, and then those bricks get absorbed into our bloodstream to be used to continually rebuild the next iteration of our body. When we provide the body with the right “bricks,” we build the right structures, and we get health.
”
”
Casey Means (Good Energy: The Surprising Connection Between Metabolism and Limitless Health)
“
I like many have suffered the effects born of betrayal's poison. However, it's the effects born of having suffered narcissistic abuse, that are especially malignant, malevolent, debilitating, insidious, devious and damaging. I loved a narcissist so deeply, that I became lost in the fog of that love I felt for her, due to the fact that narcissists aren't capable of love. They have no idea what love is, and this in essence rendered our "love," a symbol without substance.
Now that I am healing and fighting my way back to "me," I understand that she's not just a narcissist, but too, she's a Succubus. A Succubus whose wicked gift to me is - she will always remind me of how close I came to danger.
Excerpt: "Brick by Brick. Rebuilding, Surviving and Thriving After Narcissistic Abuse" by Mekael Shane © 2025
”
”
Mekael Shane
“
I'd learned that her deflections and projections, were actually her confessions.
Excerpt: "Rebuilding Brick by Brick. Surviving and Thriving After Narcissistic Abuse" by Mekael Shane © 2025
”
”
Mekael Shane