Tempe Quotes

There is no greater sorrow Than to recall a happy time When miserable.

Always try to keep a patch of sky above your life.

Happiness is beneficial for the body, but it is grief that develops the powers of the mind.

C'est le temps que tu a perdu pour ta rose qui fait ta rose si importante.

In his younger days a man dreams of possessing the heart of the woman whom he loves; later, the feeling that he possesses the heart of a woman may be enough to make him fall in love with her.

The thirst for something other than what we have…to bring something new, even if it is worse, some emotion, some sorrow; when our sensibility, which happiness has silenced like an idle harp, wants to resonate under some hand, even a rough one, and even if it might be broken by it.

Now are the woods all black, But still the sky is blue.

As the French poet says, Le temps d’apprendre à vivre il est déjà trop tard, by the time we learn to live, it’s already too late.

In the first place, [his eyes] never laughed when he laughed. Have you ever noticed this peculiarity some people have? It is either the sign of an evil nature or of a profound and lasting sorrow.

Kami menggoyangkan langit, menggempakan darat, dan menggelorakan samudera agar tidak jadi bangsa yang hidup hanya dari 2 ½ sen sehari. Bangsa yang kerja keras, bukan bangsa tempe, bukan bangsa kuli. Bangsa yang rela menderita demi pembelian cita-cita

The places we have known do not belong solely to the world of space in which we situate them for our greater convenience. They were only a thin slice among contiguous impressions which formed our life at that time; the memory of a certain image is but regret for a certain moment; and houses, roads, avenues are as fleeting, alas, as the years.

Something is wrong here. War, disease, death, destruction, hunger, filth, poverty, torture, crime, corruption, and the Ice Capades. Something is definitely wrong. This is not good work. If this is the best God can do, I am not impressed. Results like these do not belong on the résumé of a Supreme Being. This is the kind of shit you'd expect from an office temp with a bad attitude. And just between you and me, in any decently-run universe, this guy would've been out on his all-powerful ass a long time ago. And by the way, I say "this guy", because I firmly believe, looking at these results, that if there is a God, it has to be a man. No woman could or would ever fuck things up like this. So, if there is a God, I think most reasonable people might agree that he's at least incompetent, and maybe, just maybe, doesn't give a shit. Doesn't give a shit, which I admire in a person, and which would explain a lot of these bad results.

One cannot change, that is to say become a different person, while continuing to acquiesce to the feelings of the person one has ceased to be.

Il y a des beautés qui sautent aux yeux et d'autres qui sont écrites en hyéroglyphes: on met du temps à déchiffrer leur splendeur mais, quand elle est apparue, elle est plus belle que la beauté.

And then, gradually, the memory of her would fade away, I had forgotten the girl of my dream.

An unusual beginning must have an unusual end.

Even in the most insignificant details of our daily life, none of us can be said to constitute a material whole, which is identical for everyone, and need only be turned up like a page in an account-book or the record of a will; our social personality is created by the thoughts of other people.

Le plus clair de mon temps je le passe à l'obscurcir.

Et l'amour, où tout est facile, Où tout est donné dans l'instant; Il existe au milieu du temps La possibilité d'une île.

Ce qu'on appelle une raison de vivre est en même temps une excellente raison de mourir.

Le temps de lire, comme le temps d'aimer, dilate le temps de vivre

n'oublie pas, dit le renard, c'est le temps que tu as perdu pour ta rose qui fait ta rose si importante. -c'est le temps que j'ai perdu pour ma rose... fit le petit prince, afin de souvenir...

Nous, les Arabes, ne sommes pas paresseux. Nous prenons seulement le temps de vivre. Ce qui n'est pas le cas des Occidentaux. Pour eux, le temps, c'est de l'argent. Pour nous, le temps ça n'a pas de prix. Un verre de thé suffit à notre bonheur, alors qu'aucun bonheur ne leur suffit. Toute la différence est là.

... c'est peut-être ça la vie : beaucoup de désespoir mais aussi quelques moments de beauté où le temps n'est plus le même. C'est comme si les notes de musique faisaient un genre de parenthèses dans le temps, de supension, un ailleurs ici même, un toujours dans le jamais. Oui, c'est ça, un toujours dans le jamais.

Le temps n’efface pas tout, certains instants restent intacts en nos mémoires, sans que l’on sache pourquoi ceux-là plus que d’autres. Peut-être sont-ce là quelques confidences subtiles que la vie nous livre en silence.

Ma vie est un désastre, mais personne ne le voit car je suis très poli : je souris tout le temps. Je souris parce que je pense que si l'on cache sa souffrance elle disparaît. Et dans un sens, c'est vrai : elle est invisible donc elle n'existe pas, puisque nous vivons dans le monde du visible, du vérifiable, du matériel. Ma douleur n'est pas matérielle ; elle est occultée. Je suis un négationniste de moi-même

Il est des petites choses que l'on laisse derrière soi, des moments de vie ancrés dans la poussière du temps. On peut tenter de les ignorer, mais ces petits riens mis bout à bout forment une chaîne qui vous raccroche au passé.

I cannot express the uneasiness caused in me by this intrusion of mystery and beauty into a room I had at last filled with myself to the point of paying no more attention to the room than to that self. The anesthetizing influence of habit having ceased, I would begin to have thoughts, and feelings, and they are such sad things.

Even from the simplest, the most realistic point of view, the countries which we long for occupy, at any given moment, a far larger place in our actual life than the country in which we happen to be.

People don't know when they are happy. They're never so unhappy as they think they are.

I cannot believe that the most delicious things were placed here merely to test us, to temp us, to make it the more difficult for us to capture the grand prize: the safety of the void. To fashion of life such a petty game is unworthy of both men and gods.

in my cowardice I became at once a man, and did what all we grown men do when face to face with suffering and injustice; I preferred not to see them

Voilà, ma petite Amélie, vous n'avez pas des os en verre. Vous pouvez vous cogner à la vie. Si vous laissez passer cette chance, alors avec le temps, c'est votre cœur qui va devenir aussi sec et cassant que mon squelette. Alors, allez-y, nom d'un chien!

These dreams reminded me that, since I wished some day to become a writer, it was high time to decide what sort of books I was going to write. But as soon as I asked myself the question, and tried to discover some subject to which I could impart a philosophical significance of infinite value, my mind would stop like a clock, my consciousness would be faced with a blank, I would feel either that I was wholly devoid of talent or perhaps that some malady of the brain was hindering its development.

Laissez les bon temps roulez.

the comfort of reclusion, the poetry of hibernation

La mémoire est aussi paresseuse qu’hypocrite, elle ne retient que les meilleurs et les pires souvenirs, les temps forts, jamais la mesure du quotidien, qu’elle efface.

Il était presque toujours de bonne humeur, le reste du temps il dormait.

On est heureux quand on cesse de penser tout le temps a soi et de juger les autres

Être seul est devenu une maladie honteuse. Pourquoi tout le monde fuit-il la solitude? Parce qu'elle oblige à penser. De nos jours, Descartes n'écrirait plus: “Je pense donc je suis.” Il dirait: “Je suis seul donc je pense.” Personne ne veut la solitude, car elle laisse trop de temps pour réfléchir. Or plus on pense, plus on est intelligent, donc plus on est triste.

Tu as compté les heures, observant avec ravissement la course des aiguilles. Le temps était fictif : était-il dix heures ou vingt-deux heures, mardi ou dimanche ? Cela n’avait pas d’importance ; de nouveau tu pouvais régulariser ta vie, à midi j’ai faim, à minuit sommeil. Un rythme, quelque chose à quoi se raccrocher.

Many years have passed since that night. The wall of the staircase up which I had watched the light of his candle gradually climb was long ago demolished. And in myself, too, many things have perished which I imagined would last for ever, and new ones have arisen, giving birth to new sorrows and new joys which in those days I could not have foreseen, just as now the old are hard to understand.

For what we suppose to be our love or our jealousy is never a single, continuous and indivisible passion. It is composed of an infinity of successive loves, of different jealousies, each of which is ephemeral, although by their uninterrupted multiplicity they give us the impression of continuity, the illusion of unity.

Anyone moderately familiar with the rigours of composition will not need to be told the story in detail; how he wrote and it seemed good; read and it seemed vile; corrected and tore up; cut out; put in; was in ecstasy; in despair; had his good nights and bad mornings; snatched at ideas and lost them; saw his book plain before him and it vanished; acted people's parts as he ate; mouthed them as he walked; now cried; now laughed; vacillated between this style and that; now preferred the heroic and pompous; next the plain and simple; now the vales of Tempe; then the fields of Kent or Cornwall; and could not decide whether he was the divinest genius or the greatest fool in the world.

Il est temps d'ecouter son coeur.

But, when nothing subsists of an old past, after the death of people, after the destruction of things, alone, frailer but more enduring, more immaterial, more persistent, more faithful, smell and taste still remain for a long time, like souls, remembering, waiting, hoping, on the ruin of all the rest, bearing without giving way, on their almost impalpable droplet, the immense edifice of memory.

Si je m'intéresse à ce que pensent les cons, je n'aurai plus de temps pour ce que pensent les gens intelligents.

A little tap at the window, as though some missile had struck it, followed by a plentiful, falling sound, as light, though, as if a shower of sand were being sprinkled from a window overhead; then the fall spread, took on an order, a rhythm, became liquid, loud, drumming, musical, innumerable, universal. It was the rain

L'amour le plus fort est celui qui n'est pas partagé. J'aurais préféré ne jamais le savoir, mais telle est la vérité: il n'y a rien de pire que d'aimer quelqu'un qui ne vous aime pas - et en même temps c'est la chose la plus belle qui me soit jamais arrivée. Aimer quelqu'un qui vous aime aussi, c'est du narcissisme. Aimer quelqu'un qui ne vous aime pas,ça, c'est de l'amour.

Most of the supposed expressions of our feelings merely relieve us of them by drawing them out of us in an indistinct form that does not teach us to know them.

Je passe le plus clair de mon temps à l'obscurcir parce que la lumière me gêne

Even the simple act which we describe as 'seeing someone we know' is, to some extent, an intellectual process. We pack the physical outline of the creature we see with all the ideas we already formed about him, and in the complete picture of him which we compose in our minds those ideas have certainly the principal place. In the end they come to fill out so completely the curve of his cheeks, to follow so exactly the line of his nose, they blend so harmoniously in the sound of his voice that these seem to be no more than a transparent envelope, so that each time we see the face or hear the voice it is our own ideas of him which we recognize and to which we listen.

La rayuela se juega con una piedrita que hay que empujar con la punta del zapato. Ingredientes: una acera, una piedrita, un zapato, y un bello dibujo con tiza, preferentemente de colores. En lo alto está el Cielo, abajo está la Tierra, es muy difícil llegar con la piedrita al Cielo, casi siempre se calcula mal y la piedra sale del dibujo. Poco a poco, sin embargo, se va adquiriendo la habilidad necesaria para salvar las diferentes casillas (rayuela caracol, rayuela rectangular, rayuela de fantasía, poco usada) y un día se aprende a salir de la Tierra y remontar la piedrita hasta el Cielo, hasta entrar en el Cielo, (Et tous nos amours, sollozó Emmanuèle boca abajo), lo malo es que justamente a esa altura, cuando casi nadie ha aprendido a remontar la piedrita hasta el Cielo, se acaba de golpe la infancia y se cae en las novelas, en la angustia al divino cohete, en la especulación de otro Cielo al que también hay que aprender a llegar. Y porque se ha salido de la infancia (Je n'oublierai pas le temps des cérises, pataleó Emmanuèle en el suelo) se olvida que para llegar al Cielo se necesitan, como ingredientes, una piedrita y la punta de un zapato.

I loved her [Gilberte]; I was sorry not to have had the time and the inspiration to insult her, to hurt her, to force her to keep some memory of me. I thought her so beautiful that I should have liked to be able to retrace my steps so as to shake my fist at her and shout, "I think you're hideous, grotesque; how I loathe you!"_

The reality that I had known no longer existed. The places that we have known belong now only to the little world of space on which we map them for our own convenience. None of them was ever more than a thin slice, held between the contiguous impressions that composed our life at that time; remembrance of a particular form is but regret for a particular moment; and houses, roads, avenues are as fugitive, alas, as the years.

This malady which Swann’s love had become had so proliferated, was so closely interwoven with all his habits, with all his actions, with his thoughts, his health, his sleep, his life, even with what he hoped for after his death, was so utterly inseparable from him, that it would have been impossible to eradicate it without almost entirely destroying him; as surgeons say, his love was no longer operable.

Sometimes in the afternoon sky the moon would pass white as a cloud, furtive, lusterless, like an actress who does not have to perform yet and who, from the audience, in street clothes, watches the other actors for a moment, making herself inconspicuous, not wanting anyone to pay attention to her.

We have such numerous interests in our lives that it is not uncommon, on a single occasion, for the foundations of a happiness that does not yet exist to be laid down alongside the intensification of a grief from which we are still suffering.

Mais, quand d’un passé ancien rien ne subsiste, après la mort des êtres, après la destruction des choses, seules, plus frêles mais plus vivaces, plus immatérielles, plus persistantes, plus fidèles, l’odeur et la saveur restent encore longtemps, comme des âmes, à se rappeler, à attendre, à espérer, sur la ruine de tout le reste, à porter sans fléchir, sur leur gouttelette presque impalpable, l’édifice immense du souvenir.

There was no discussion between them; it was as if the bugs had worked out this whole scenario long ago. Temp put on a burst of speed for the end of the bridge, and Tick turned to face down the army of rats alone.

Whether it is because the faith which creates has ceased to exist in me, or because reality takes shape in the memory alone, the flowers that people show me nowadays for the first time never seem to me to be true flowers.

Anyone who has chanced like me to roam through desolate mountains and studied at length their fantastic shapes and drunk the invigorating air of their valleys can understand why I wish to describe and depict these magic scenes for others.

For often I have wished to see a person again without realising that it was simply because that personal recalled to me a hedge of hawthorns in blossom, and I have been led to believe, and to make someone else believe, in a renewal of affection, by what was no more than an inclination to travel.

Je suis seul au milieu de ces voix joyeuses et raisonnables. Tous ces types passent leur temps à s’expliquer, à reconnaître avec bonheur qu’ils sont du même avis. Quelle importance ils attachent, mon Dieu, à penser tous ensemble les mêmes choses.

Facts do not find their way into the world in which our beliefs reside; they did not produce our beliefs, they do not destroy them; they may inflict on them the most constant refutations without weakening them, and an avalanche of afflictions or ailments succeeding one another without interruption in a family will not make it doubt the goodness of its God or the talent of its doctor.

All of the creatures were staring fixedly at Boots. She was standing on the back of her loyal cockroach friend, Temp, smack in the middle of the octagon, singing "The Itsy-Bisty Spider" at the top of her lungs. The green spider, to whom the song principially was directed, seemed to be cringing. Boots was somewhat off-key, but Gregor was pretty sure it was the loudness that was making the arachnid hunch down and contract. "She has been going on like this for hours," whispered Nerissa. "Days more like it," said Ripred in disgust. "Next I will sing one for you!" announced Boots, pointing at the bat, who actually flinched.

And so it is with our own past. It is a labour in vain to attempt to recapture it: all the efforts of our intellect must prove futile. The past is hidden somewhere outside the realm, beyond the reach of intellect, in some material object (in the sensation which that material object will give us) of which we have no inkling. And it depends on chance whether or not we come upon this object before we ourselves must die.

Si seulement je pouvais m'arrêter de penser, ça irait déjà mieux. Les pensées, c'est ce qu'il y a de plus fade. Plus fade encore que de la chair. Ça s'étire à n'en plus finir et ça laisse un drôle de goût. Et puis il y a les mots, au-dedans des pensées, les mots inachevés, les ébauches de phrases qui reviennent tout le temps.

She poured out Swann's tea, inquired "Lemon or cream?" and, on his answering "Cream, please," said to him with a laugh: "A cloud!" And as he pronounced it excellent, "You see, I know just how you like it." This tea had indeed seemed to Swann, just as it seemed to her; something precious, and love has such a need to find some justification for itself, some guarantee of duration, in pleasures which without it would have no existence and must cease with its passing.

I have friends wherever there are companies of trees, wounded but not vanquished, which huddle together with touching obstinancy to implore an inclement and pitiless sky.

The air of those rooms was saturated with the fine bouquet of a silence so nourishing, so succulent, that I never went into them without a sort of greedy anticipation, particularly on those first mornings, chilly still, of the Easter holidays, when I could taste it more fully because I had only just arrived in Combray[...]

In the sort of screen dappled with different states of mind which my consciousness would simultaneously unfold while I read, and which ranged from the aspirations hidden deepest within me to the completely exterior vision of the horizon which I had, at the bottom of the garden, before my eyes, what was first in me, innermost, the constantly moving handle that controlled the rest, was my belief in the philosophical richness and beauty of the book I was reading, and my desire to appropriate them for myself, whatever that book might be.

Like everyone who possesses something precious in order to know what would happen if he ceased for a moment to possess it, he had detached the precious object from his mind, leaving, as he thought, everything else in the same state as when it was there. But the absence of one part from a whole is not only that, it is not simply a partial lack, it is a derangement of all the other parts, a new state which it was impossible to foresee in the old.

Fall in love with a dog's bum, And thou'll think it pretty as a plum.

Valentine clears his throat. "So. Why can't you just say it?" "Say what?" "You know what." "It's hardly the time or place." "It is if you're dying." "I can't." "You're a dick. Just fucking say it!" "I can't! I'm... English." "What am I, a Martian? I say it all the time. I know you love me, why can't you say it?" "If you know, then why do I have to?" "You're missing the point a bit." "I took your bullet, you little twat, don't you dare question whether I love you." "Yeah, but you could say it." The throb of the gunshots is pounding all down his arm and body. The pain's so bad he wants to cry, like he's five and he's skinned his knee coming off his bike. "Je t'aime," he says, through gritted teeth, to shut the kid up. "Je ne sais pas pourquoi. Tu es... complètement bête, tu t'habilles comme une pute travestie, je hais ta musique, tu es fou, tu me rends fou, mais je suis fou de toi et je pense à toi tout le temps et je t'aime, oui. Tu comprends? Je t'aime. Seulement... pas en anglais. Je ne peux pas." Valentine's shifting about like he's uncomfortable. "I ain't got no idea what you just said but I think I need to change my pants." "Maintenant, ta gueule.

People who, not being in love themselves, feel that a clever man should only be unhappy about a person who is worth his while; which is rather like being astonished that anyone should condescend to die of cholera at the bidding of so insignificant a creature as the comma bacillus.

None of us constitutes a material whole, identical for everyone, which a person has only to go look up as though we were a book of specifications or a last testament; our social personality is a creation of the minds of others. Even the very simple act that we call "seeing a person we know" is in part an intellectual one. We fill the physical appearance of the individual we see with all the notions we have about him, and of the total picture that we form for ourselves, these notions certainly occupy the greater part.

Crois-moi, il n'y a pas de grande douleur, pas de grands repentirs, de grands souvenirs. Tout s'oublie même les grandes amours. C'est ce qu'il y a de triste et d'exaltant à la fois dans la vie. Il y a seulement une certaine façon de voir les choses et elle surgit de temps en temps. C'est pour ça qu'il est bon quand même d'avoir eu un grand amour, une passion malheureuse dans sa vie. Ça fait du moins un alibi pour les désespoirs sans raison dont nous sommes accablés.

I feel that there is much to be said for the Celtic belief that the souls of those whom we have lost are held captive in some inferior being, in an animal, in a plant, in some inanimate object, and thus effectively lost to us until the day (which to many never comes) when we happen to pass by the tree or to obtain possession of the object which forms their prison. Then they start and tremble, they call us by our name, and as soon as we have recognised them the spell is broken. Delivered by us, they have overcome death and return to share our life. And so it is with our own past. It is a labour in vain to attempt to recapture it: all the efforts of our intellect must prove futile. The past is hidden somewhere outside the realm, beyond the reach of intellect, in some material object (in the sensation which that material object will give us) of which we have no inkling. And it depends on chance whether or not we come upon this object before we ourselves must die.

Quartering the topmost branches of one of the tall trees, an invisible bird was striving to make the day seem shorter, exploring with a long-drawn note the solitude that pressed it on every side, but it received at once so unanimous an answer, so powerful a repercussion of silence and of immobility, that one felt it had arrested for all eternity the moment which it had been trying to make pass more quickly.

He knew that the very memory of the piano falsified still further the perspective in which he saw the elements of music, that the field open to the musician is not a miserable stave of seven notes, but an immeasurable keyboard (still almost entirely unknown) on which, here and there only, separated by the thick darkness of its unexplored tracts, some few among the millions of keys of tenderness, of passion, of courage, of serenity, which compose it, each one differing from all the rest as one universe differs from another, have been discovered by a few great artists who do us the service, when they awaken in us the emotion corresponding to the theme they have discovered, of showing us what richness, what variety lies hidden, unknown to us, in that vast, unfathomed and forbidding night of our soul which we take to be an impenetrable void.

Maybe it is nothingness that is real and our entire dream is nonexistent, but in that case we feel that these phrases of music, and these notions that exist in relation to our dream, must also be nothing. We will perish, but we have for hostages these divine captives who will follow us and share our fate. And death in their company is less bitter, less inglorious, perhaps less probable.

Girls are the only ones who can really give each other close attention, the kind we equate with being loved. They noticed what we want noticed. And that's what I did for Tamar, I responded to her symbols. To the style of her hair and clothes and the smell of her L'Air Du Temps perfume. Like this was data that mattered. Signs that reflected something of her inner self. I took her beauty personally.

Asparagus, tinged with ultramarine and rosy pink which ran from their heads, finely stippled in mauve and azure, through a series of imperceptible changes to their white feet, still stained a little by the soil of their garden-bed: a rainbow-loveliness that was not of this world. I felt that these celestial hues indicated the presence of exquisite creatures who had been pleased to assume vegetable form, who, through the disguise which covered their firm and edible flesh, allowed me to discern in this radiance of earliest dawn, these hinted rainbows, these blue evening shades, that precious quality which I should recognise again when, all night long after a dinner at which I had partaken of them, they played (lyrical and coarse in their jesting as the fairies in Shakespeare’s Dream) at transforming my humble chamberpot into a bower of aromatic perfume.

J'ai tant rêvé de toi que tu perds ta réalité. Est-il encore temps d'atteindre ce corps vivant et de baiser sur cette bouche la naissance de la voix qui m'est chère? J'ai tant rêvé de toi que mes bras habitués en étreignant ton ombre à se croiser sur ma poitrine ne se plieraient pas au contour de ton corps, peut-être. Et que, devant l'apparence réelle de ce qui me hante et me gouverne depuis des jours et des années, je deviendrais une ombre sans doute. O balances sentimentales.

Ah, in those earliest days of love how naturally the kisses spring into life! So closely, in their profusion, do they crowd together that lovers would find it as hard to count the kisses exchanged in an hour as to count the flowers in a meadow in May.

En effet: je mourais déjà. Je venais d'apprendre cette nouvelle horrible que tout humain apprend un jour ou l'autre: ce que tu aimes, tu vas le perdre. "Ce qui t'a été donné te sera repris." Face à la découverte de cette spoliation future, il y a deux attitudes possibles: soit on décide de ne pas s'attacher aux êtres et aux choses, afin de rendre l'amputation moins douloureuse; soit on décide, au contraire, d'aimer d'autant plus les êtres et les choses, d'y mettre le paquet - "puisque nous n'aurons pas beaucoup de temps ensemble, je vais te donner en un an tout l'amour que j'aurais pu te donner en une vie.

Now are the woods all black, but still the sky is blue. May you always see a blue sky overhead, my young friend; and then, even when the time comes, which is coming now for me, when the woods are all black, when night is fast falling, you will be able to console yourself, as I am doing, by looking up to the sky.

Adieu, dit-il… - Adieu, dit le renard. Voici mon secret. Il est très simple : on ne voit bien qu’avec le coeur. L’essentiel est invisible pour les yeux. - L’essentiel est invisible pour les yeux, répéta le petit prince, afin de se souvenir. - C’est le temps que tu a perdu pour ta rose qui fait ta rose si importante. - C’est le temps que j’ai perdu pour ma rose… fit le petit prince, afin de se souvenir. - Les hommes ont oublié cette vérité, dit le renard. Mais tu ne dois pas l’oublier. Tu deviens responsable pour toujours de ce que tu as apprivoisé. Tu es responsable de ta rose… - Je suis responsable de ma rose… répéta le petit prince, afin de se souvenir.

On s'ennuie de tout, mon ange, c'est une loi de la nature; ce n'est pas ma faute. Si donc, je m'ennuie aujourd'hui d'une aventure qui m'a occupé entièrement depuis quatre mortels mois, ce n'est pas ma faute. Si, par exemple, j'ai eu juste autant d'amour que toi de vertu, et c'est surement beaucoup dire, il n'est pas étonnant que l'un ait fini en même temps que l'autre. Ce n'est pas ma faute. Il suit de là, que depuis quelque temps je t'ai trompée: mais aussi ton impitoyable tendresse m'y forçait en quelque sorte! Ce n'est pas ma faute. Aujourd'hui, une femme que j'aime éperdument exige que je te sacrifie. Ce n'est pas ma faute. Je sens bien que voilà une belle occasion de crier au parjure: mais si la Nature n'a accordé aux hommes que la constance, tandis qu'elle donnait aux femmes l'obstination, ce n'est pas ma faute. Crois-moi, choisis un autre amant, comme j'ai fait une maîtresse. Ce conseil est bon, très bon; si tu le trouve mauvais, ce n'est pas ma faute. Adieu, mon ange, je t'ai prise avec plaisir, je te quitte sans regrets: je te reviendrai peut-être. Ainsi va le monde. Ce n'est pas ma faute.

Sous le pont Mirabeau coule la Seine Et nos amours Faut-il qu'il m'en souvienne La joie venait toujours après la peine Vienne la nuit sonne l'heure Les jours s'en vont je demeure Les mains dans les mains restons face à face Tandis que sous Le pont de nos bras passe des éternels regards l'onde si lasse Vienne la nuit sonne l'heure Les jours s'en vont je demeure l'amour s'en va comme cette eau courante L'amour s'en va Comme la vie est lente Et comme l'Espérance est violente Vienne la nuit sonne l'heure Les jours s'en vont je demeure Passent les jours et passent les semaines Ni temps passé Ni les amours reviennent Sous le pont Mirabeau coule la Seine Vienne la nuit sonne l'heure Les jours s'en vont je demeure

The novelist’s happy discovery was to think of substituting for those opaque sections, impenetrable by the human spirit, their equivalent in immaterial sections, things, that is, which the spirit can assimilate to itself. After which it matters not that the actions, the feelings of this new order of creatures appear to us in the guise of truth, since we have made them our own, since it is in ourselves that they are happening, that they are holding in thrall, while we turn over, feverishly, the pages of the book, our quickened breath and staring eyes. And once the novelist has brought us to that state, in which, as in all purely mental states, every emotion is multiplied ten-fold, into which his book comes to disturb us as might a dream, but a dream more lucid, and of a more lasting impression than those which come to us in sleep; why, then, for the space of an hour he sets free within us all the joys and sorrows in the world, a few of which, only, we should have to spend years of our actual life in getting to know, and the keenest, the most intense of which would never have been revealed to us because the slow course of their development stops our perception of them.

ENIVREZ-VOUS Il faut être toujours ivre, tout est là ; c'est l'unique question. Pour ne pas sentir l'horrible fardeau du temps qui brise vos épaules et vous penche vers la terre, il faut vous enivrer sans trêve. Mais de quoi? De vin, de poésie, ou de vertu à votre guise, mais enivrez-vous! Et si quelquefois, sur les marches d'un palais, sur l'herbe verte d'un fossé, vous vous réveillez, l'ivresse déjà diminuée ou disparue, demandez au vent, à la vague, à l'étoile, à l'oiseau, à l'horloge; à tout ce qui fuit, à tout ce qui gémit, à tout ce qui roule, à tout ce qui chante, à tout ce qui parle, demandez quelle heure il est. Et le vent, la vague, l'étoile, l'oiseau, l'horloge, vous répondront, il est l'heure de s'enivrer ; pour ne pas être les esclaves martyrisés du temps, enivrez-vous, enivrez-vous sans cesse de vin, de poésie, de vertu, à votre guise. (in Le Spleen de Paris)

Sometimes, as Eve was born from one of Adam’s ribs, a woman was born during my sleep from a cramped position of my thigh. Formed from the pleasure I was on the point of enjoying, she, I imagined, was the one offering it to me. My body, which felt in hers my own warmth, would try to find itself inside her, I would wake up. The rest of humanity seemed very remote compared to this woman I had left scarcely a few moments before; my cheek was still warm from her kiss, my body aching from the weight of hers. If, as sometimes happens, she had the features of a woman I had known in life, I would devote myself entirely to this end: to finding her again, like those who go off on a journey to see a longed-for city with their own eyes and imagine that one can enjoy in reality the charm of a dream. Little by little, the memory of her would fade, I had forgotten the girl of my dream.

This was not to say, however, that she did not long, at times, for some greater change, that she did not experience some of those exceptional moments when one thirsts for something other than what is, and when those who, through lack of energy or imagination, are unable to generate any motive power in themselves, cry out, as the clock strikes or the postman knocks, for something new, even if it is worse, some emotion, some sorrow; when the heartstrings, which contentment has silenced, like a harp laid by, yearn to be plucked and sounded again by some hand, however rough, even if it should break them; when the will, which has with such difficulty won the right to indulge without let or hindrance in its own desires and woes, would gladly fling the reins into the hands of imperious circumstance, however cruel.

Did you get me that movie about Genghis Khan? 'It's in the Netflix queue, but that's not the surprise. You don't need to worry, it'll be something good. I just don't want you to feel depressed about going home.' Oh, I won't. But it would be cool to have a stream like this in the backyard. Can you make one? 'Ummm... no.' I figured. Can't blame a hound for trying. Oberon was indeed surprised when we got back home to Tempe. Hal had made the arrangements for me and Oberon perked up as soon as we were dropped off by the shuttle from the car rental company. 'Hey, smells like someone's in my territory,' he said. 'Nobody could be here without my permission, you know that.' 'Flidais did it.' 'That isn't Flidais you smell, believe me.' I opened the front door, and Oberon immediately ran to the kitchen window that gazed upon the backyard. He barked joyously when he saw what was waiting for him there. 'French poodles! All black and curly with poofy little tails!' 'And every one of them in heat.' 'Oh, WOW! Thanks Atticus! I can't wait to sniff their asses!' He bounded over to the door and pawed at it because the doggie door was closed to prevent the poodles from entering. 'You earned it, buddy. Hold on, get down off the door so I can open it for you, and be careful, don't hurt any of them.' I opened the door, expecting him to bolt through it and dive into his own personal canine harem, but instead he took one step and stopped, looking up at me with a mournful expression, his ears drooping and a tiny whine escaping his snout. 'Only five?

Rien n'est jamais acquis à l'homme Ni sa force Ni sa faiblesse ni son coeur Et quand il croit Ouvrir ses bras son ombre est celle d'une croix Et quand il croit serrer son bonheur il le broie Sa vie est un étrange et douloureux divorce Il n'y a pas d'amour heureux Sa vie Elle ressemble à ces soldats sans armes Qu'on avait habillés pour un autre destin A quoi peut leur servir de se lever matin Eux qu'on retrouve au soir désoeuvrés incertains Dites ces mots Ma vie Et retenez vos larmes Il n'y a pas d'amour heureux Mon bel amour mon cher amour ma déchirure Je te porte dans moi comme un oiseau blessé Et ceux-là sans savoir nous regardent passer Répétant après moi les mots que j'ai tressés Et qui pour tes grands yeux tout aussitôt moururent Il n'y a pas d'amour heureux Le temps d'apprendre à vivre il est déjà trop tard Que pleurent dans la nuit nos coeurs à l'unisson Ce qu'il faut de malheur pour la moindre chanson Ce qu'il faut de regrets pour payer un frisson Ce qu'il faut de sanglots pour un air de guitare Il n'y a pas d'amour heureux Il n'y a pas d'amour qui ne soit à douleur Il n'y a pas d'amour dont on ne soit meurtri Il n'y a pas d'amour dont on ne soit flétri Et pas plus que de toi l'amour de la patrie Il n'y a pas d'amour qui ne vive de pleurs Il n'y a pas d'amour heureux Mais c'est notre amour à tous les deux

A qui écris-tu? -A toi. En fait, je ne t'écris pas vraiment, j'écris ce que j'ai envie de faire avec toi... Il y avait des feuilles partout. Autour d'elle, à ses pieds, sur le lit. J'en ai pris une au hasard: "...Pique-niquer, faire la sieste au bord d'une rivière, manger des pêches, des crevettes, des croissants, du riz gluant, nager, danser, m'acheter des chaussures, de la lingerie, du parfum, lire le journal, lécher les vitrines, prendre le métro, surveiller l'heure, te pousser quand tu prends toute la place, étendre le linge, aller à l'Opéra, faire des barbecues, râler parce que tu as oublié le charbon, me laver les dents en même temps que toi, t'acheter des caleçons, tondre la pelouse, lire le journal par-dessus ton épaule, t'empêcher de manger trop de cacahuètes, visiter les caves de la Loire, et celles de la Hunter Valley, faire l'idiote, jacasser, cueillir des mûres, cuisiner, jardiner, te réveiller encore parce que tu ronfles, aller au zoo, aux puces, à Paris, à Londres, te chanter des chansons, arrêter de fumer, te demander de me couper les ongles, acheter de la vaisselle, des bêtises, des choses qui ne servent à rien, manger des glaces, regarder les gens, te battre aux échecs, écouter du jazz, du reggae, danser le mambo et le cha-cha-cha, m'ennuyer, faire des caprices, bouder, rire, t'entortiller autour de mon petit doigt, chercher une maison avec vue sur les vaches, remplir d'indécents Caddie, repeindre un plafond, coudre des rideaux, rester des heures à table à discuter avec des gens intéressants, te tenir par la barbichette, te couper les cheveux, enlever les mauvaises herbes, laver la voiture, voir la mer, t'appeler encore, te dire des mots crus, apprendre à tricoter, te tricoter une écharpe, défaire cette horreur, recueillir des chats, des chiens, des perroquets, des éléphants, louer des bicyclettes, ne pas s'en servir, rester dans un hamac, boire des margaritas à l'ombre, tricher, apprendre à me servir d'un fer à repasser, jeter le fer à repasser par la fenêtre, chanter sous la pluie, fuire les touristes, m'enivrer, te dire toute la vérité, me souvenir que toute vérité n'est pas bonne à dire, t'écouter, te donner la main, récupérer mon fer à repasser, écouter les paroles des chansons, mettre le réveil, oublier nos valises, m'arrêter de courir, descendre les poubelles, te demander si tu m'aimes toujours, discuter avec la voisine, te raconter mon enfance, faire des mouillettes, des étiquettes pour les pots de confiture..." Et ça continuais comme ça pendant des pages et des pages...

Thou still unravish’d bride of quietness, Thou foster-child of silence and slow time, Sylvan historian, who canst thus express A flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme: What leaf-fring’d legend haunts about thy shape Of deities or mortals, or of both, In Tempe or the dales of Arcady? What men or gods are these? What maidens loth? What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape? What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy? Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard Are sweeter; therefore, ye soft pipes, play on; Not to the sensual ear, but, more endear’d, Pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone: Fair youth, beneath the trees, thou canst not leave Thy song, nor ever can those trees be bare; Bold Lover, never, never canst thou kiss, Though winning near the goal yet, do not grieve; She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss, For ever wilt thou love, and she be fair! Ah, happy, happy boughs! that cannot shed Your leaves, nor ever bid the Spring adieu; And, happy melodist, unwearied, For ever piping songs for ever new; More happy love! more happy, happy love! For ever warm and still to be enjoy’d, For ever panting, and for ever young; All breathing human passion far above, That leaves a heart high-sorrowful and cloy’d, A burning forehead, and a parching tongue. Who are these coming to the sacrifice? To what green altar, O mysterious priest, Lead’st thou that heifer lowing at the skies, And all her silken flanks with garlands drest? What little town by river or sea shore, Or mountain-built with peaceful citadel, Is emptied of this folk, this pious morn? And, little town, thy streets for evermore Will silent be; and not a soul to tell Why thou art desolate, can e’er return. O Attic shape! Fair attitude! with brede Of marble men and maidens overwrought, With forest branches and the trodden weed; Thou, silent form, dost tease us out of thought As doth eternity: Cold Pastoral! When old age shall this generation waste, Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe Than ours, a friend to man, to whom thou say’st, “Beauty is truth, truth beauty,—that is all Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.

For folks who have that casual-dude energy coursing through their bloodstream, that's great. But gays should not grow up alienated just for us to alienate each other. It's too predictable, like any other cycle of abuse. Plus, the conformist, competitive notion that by "toning down" we are "growing up" ultimately blunts the radical edge of what it is to be queer; it truncates our colorful journey of identity. Said another way, it's like living in West Hollywood and working a gay job by day and working it in the gay nightlife, wearing delicate shiny shirts picked from up the gay dry cleaners, yet coquettishly left unbuttoned to reveal the pec implants purchased from a gay surgeon and shown off by prancing around the gay-owned-and-operated theater hopped up on gay health clinic steroids and wheat grass purchased from the friendly gay boy who's new to the city, and impressed by the monstrous SUV purchased from a gay car dealership with its rainbow-striped bumper sticker that says "Celebrate Diversity." Then logging on to the local Gay.com listings and describing yourself as "straight-acting." Let me make myself clear. This is not a campaign for everyone to be like me. That'd be a total yawn. Instead, this narrative is about praise for the prancy boys. Granted, there's undecided gender-fucks, dagger dykes, faux-mos, po-mos, FTMs, fisting-top daddies, and lezzie looners who also need props for broadening the sexual spectrum, but they're telling their own stories. The Cliff's Notes of me and mine are this: the only moments I feel alive are when I'm just being myself - not some stiff-necked temp masquerading as normal in the workplace, not some insecure gay boy aspiring to be an overpumped circuit queen, not some comic book version of swank WeHo living. If that's considered a political act in the homogenized world of twenty-first century homosexuals, then so be it. — excerpt of "Praise For The Prancy Boys," by Clint Catalyst appears in first edition (ISBN # 1-932360-56-5)