Vivid Warm Quotes

You should always be taking pictures, if not with a camera then with your mind. Memories you capture on purpose are always more vivid than the ones you pick up by accident.

Memories you capture on purpose are always more vivid than the ones you pick up by accident.

Days to come stand in front of us like a row of lighted candles— golden, warm, and vivid candles. Days gone by fall behind us, a gloomy line of snuffed-out candles; the nearest are smoking still, cold, melted, and bent. I don’t want to look at them: their shape saddens me, and it saddens me to remember their original light. I look ahead at my lighted candles. I don’t want to turn for fear of seeing, terrified, how quickly that dark line gets longer, how quickly the snuffed-out candles proliferate.

For every man there are certain words that are as if closer and more intimate to him than any others. And often, unexpectedly, in some remote, forsaken backwater, some deserted desert, one meets a man whose warming conversation makes you forget the pathlessness of your paths, the homelessness of your nights, and the contemporary world full of people's stupidity, of deceptions for deceiving man. Forever and always an evening spent in this way will vividly remain with you, and all that was and that took place then will be retained by the faithful memory: who was there, and who stood where, and what he was holding--the walls, the corners, and every trifle.

His so-fucking-vivid imagination rarely gave him the horrors, but when it did, God help him. God help him once it was warmed up. It was not only warmed up now, it was hot and running on full choke. That there was no sense at all in what he was thinking made not a whit of difference in the dark. In the dark, rationality seemed stupid and logic a dream. In the dark he thought with his skin.

She gathers my half of the blankets around her and curls up against the wall. She will sleep for hours more, dreaming endless landscapes and novas of colour both gorgeous and frightening. If I stayed she would wake up and describe them to me. All the mad plot twists and surrealist imagery, so vivid to her while so meaningless to me. There was a time when I treasured listening to her, when I found the commotion in her soul bitter-sweet and lovely, but I can no longer bear it.

And so it stood, a warm and vivid patch in his life, casting a radiance that glowed in a thousand recollections.

I never knew what sad work the reading of old-letters was before that evening, though I could hardly tell why. The letters were as happy as letters could be — at least those early letters were. There was in them a vivid and intense sense of the present time, which seemed so strong and full, as if it could never pass away, and as if the warm, living hearts that so expressed themselves could never die, and be as nothing to the sunny earth. I should have felt less melancholy, I believe, if the letters had been more so.

Some lessons you learn gradually and some you learn in a sudden moment, like a flash going off in a dark room. I sift and rake and dig around in my vivid recollections of young Sean on the floor in summer, and I try to see what makes him tick, but I know a secret about young Sean, I guess, that he kind of ends up telling the world: nothing makes him tick. It just happens all by itself, tick tick tick tick tick, without any proximal cause, with nothing underneath it. He is like a jellyfish adrift in the sea, throbbing quietly in the warm waves of the surf just off the highway where the dusty white vans with smoked windows and indistinct decals near their wheel hubs roll innocently past.

The rooms hidden behind the multitude of tents in Le Cirque des Rêves are a stark contrast to the black and white of the circus. Alive with color. Warm with glowing amber lamps. The space kept by the Murray twins is particularly vivid. A kaleidoscope of color, blazing with carmine and coral and canary, so much so that the entire room often appears to be on fire, dotted with fluffy kittens dark as soot and bright as sparks.

Poetry reveals to us the loveliness of nature, brings back the freshness of youthful feelings, reviews the relish of simple pleasures, keeps unquenched the enthusiasm which warmed the springtime of our being, refines youthful love, strengthens our interest in human nature, by vivid delineations of its tenderest and softest feelings, and through the brightness of its prophetic visions, helps faith to lay hold on the future life.

The seamen had whitewashed the smoky ceilings of the ward, and that dear homely smell carried the vividness of thatch and lumpy walls and stew given from the goodness of a stranger's heart. But that was all there was of comfort, and the salt air had turned from cold to warm in the passing of a life, an afternoon.

She cried then, letting the raw emotions overtake her. She cried for the loss of her youth that bled out on a bathroom floor many years ago. She cried for the fairytale shattered by an exploding gun. She cried for all of the things she could not tell him, the regret, the fear of a future marked by desperation for things she could never have. She cried for the babies she would never bear. She pleaded for God to take away her memories of him, but they came one by one, spilling into the forefront of her mind, vivid as the moment they had just happened. And she was seventeen all over again, lying beside him in his warm bed, and had just loved him, was drunk with the love he had poured into her.

If I was given the ability to foretell one event in the future, I wish that that fate would tell me when you will walk into my life from the day I was born. That way every day of my life would be making a step closer to you. I will be hoping for tomorrow like a freezing traveler yearning for a warm fireplace, even if tomorrow will greet me with a storm or blizzard. Because my yearning for you is so vivid that it could embellish every mired land and trenches in the world with a layer of gold.

Now here is an oddity. A question for the zombie philosophers. What does it mean that my past is a fog but my present is brilliant, bursting with sound and color? Since I became Dead I've recorded new memories with the fidelity of an old cassette deck, faint and muffled and ultimately forgettable. But I can recall every hour of the last few days in vivid detail, and the thought of losing a single one horrifies me. Where am I getting this focus? This clarity? I can trace a solid line from the moment I met Julie all the way to now, lying next to her in this sepulchral bedroom, and despite the millions of past moments I've lost or tossed away like highway trash, I know with a lockjawed certainty I'll remember this one for the rest of my life.

Coral, my love, you are too pure, too innocent, too alive for me,” he said slowly, almost carefully. “My world is like a drawing in black and white on a gray canvas, without a single note of color to bring it to life. And now, on this pale and melancholic picture, a red flower has fallen, a warm and scented flower.” He sighed. “It’s a wonderful contrast, but too vivid…

And it is in New York I have those strangest things of all: human friendships. Not many friendships and not of spent familiarities: for I don't like actual human beings too much around me. But yet friendships made of the edges of thoughts and vivid pathos and pregnant odds and ends of nervous human flesh and fire. It is in New York I go to the apartment of a Friend at the end of an afternoon. In the apartment are some persons having tea, men and women. The Friend greets me at the door. She wears maybe a dress of thin dark and light silk, shaped in the quaint outlandish fashion of the hour. And she has shrewd kindly eyes like a Rembrandt portrait, and a worn New-York-ish Latin-ish brain and heart both of which are made of steel, sparkle and the very plain red meat of living. She says, 'Hello-Mary-Mac-Lane,' and clasps my hand, and we exchange a glance of no real understanding at all but suggesting warmed challenge of personality, and an oblique sweet call of depth to depth, and of friendship which by mere force of preference and of our separate quality and calibre is true rather than false. So close and no closer may friendship be. And friendship with-all, is closer than any love. It is the closest human beings ever come to meeting.

He watched her for several minutes. Something was stirred in him, something not accounted for by the warm smell of the afternoon or the triumphant vividness of red. He felt persistently that the girl was beautiful — then of a sudden he understood: it was her distance, not a rare and precious distance of soul but still distance, if only in terrestrial yards. The autumn air was between them, and the roofs and the blurred voices. Yet for a not altogether explained second, posing perversely in time, his emotion had been nearer to adoration than in the deepest kiss he had ever known.

I watched my best friend fall in love with the same girl a million times in the same minute.  She had vivid eyes, a warm smile, and a streak of purple in her hair.  They were too drunk to notice I was watching; I was too sober to not realize what was happening.  Someone kept cutting off the oxygen in the room every time their faces got close.  But I knew if it were for just a few more inches, they would have kissed.  I also knew that it was because of the fact that she had a boyfriend that they didn't.  Even I could feel his heart racing as she licked off the birthday cake icing off his right cheek.  I saw his eyes light up; it was much more than the effects of inebriation.  There was suddenly a different kind of gravity present in the room.  And I then I realized: The same forces that bring two people together are the same ones that pull them apart.  But I knew from the way he looked at her.  I knew what he felt.  I knew how much she meant to him.  And in that moment, I finally understood.  Because that's the exact same way I look at you.  (I have learned to see gravity; it is the colour of your skin.)

I let no chance go by untaken. I never hesitated to follow where my curiosity beckoned. I willingly went where there was danger in beauty and beauty in danger. I had experiences in plenty. Many were enjoyable, some were instructive, a few I would rather have missed. But I had them, and I have them still in memory. If, as soon as tomorrow, I go to my grave, it will be no black and silent hole. I can paint the darkness with vivid colors, and fill it with music both martial and languorous, with the flicker of swords and the flutter of kisses, with flavors and excitements and sensations, with the fragrance of a field of clover that has been warmed in the sun and then washed by a gentle rain, the sweetest-scented thing God ever put on this earth. Yes, I can enliven eternity. Others may have to endure it; I can enjoy it.

The siren soared again, closer at hand, and then, with no anticipatory roar and clamour, a dark and sinuous body curved into view against the shadows far down the high-banked track, and with no sound but the rush of the cleft wind and the clock like tick of the rails, moved towards the bridge - it was an electric train. Above the engine two vivid blurs of blue light formed incessantly a radiant crackling bar between them, which, like a spluttering flame in a lamp beside a corpse, lit for an instant the successive rows of trees and caused Gloria to draw back instinctively to the far side of the road. The light was tepid - the temperature of warm blood... The clicking blended suddenly with itself in a rush of even sound, and then, elongating in sombre elasticity, the thing roared blindly by her and thundered onto the bridge, racing the lurid shaft of fire it cast into the solemn river alongside. Then it contracted swiftly, sucking in its sound until it left only a reverberant echo, which died upon the farther bank.

You should always be taking pictures, if not with a camera then with your mind. Memories you capture on purpose are always more vivid than the ones you pick up by accident.

My father always used to tell one of his dreams, because it somehow seemed of a piece with what was to follow. He believed that it was a consequence of the thing's presence in the next room. My father dreamed of blood. It was the vividness of the dreams that was impressive, their minute detail and horrible reality. The blood came through the keyhole of a locked door which communicated with the next room. I suppose the two rooms had originally been designed en suite. It ran down the door panel with a viscous ripple, like the artificial one created in the conduit of Trumpingdon Street. But it was heavy, and smelled. The slow welling of it sopped the carpet and reached the bed. It was warm and sticky. My father woke up with the impression that it was all over his hands. He was rubbing his first two fingers together, trying to rid them of the greasy adhesion where the fingers joined." ("The Troll")

he studied Grandma Mama, hearing her hum a morning melody. her flowered robe was slightly soiles, but still vivid in splashes of rose colors.She was a short woman, and a little wide.Her salt-and-pepper hair was pulled back in a bun, and when she spoke, her gold tooth winked at you.All warm and friendly,Grandma Mama had a heart of gold, but a fist full of fire at the same time.

The bullet will go through his skull, splashing warm blood and brain fluid all over. And from then on you'll have recurring nightmares of vivid colors and dead faces... with their eyes popping out and leaking bits of brain. Are you sure you want to do this?

it was as that strange, vivid night was drawing to a close, as the faint blue light of dawn had begun to seep into the sky's black ink, that i suddenly thought of you, dong-ho. yes, you'd been there with me, that day. until something like a cold cudgel had suddenly slammed into my side. until i collapsed like a rag doll. until my arms flung themselves up in mute alarm, amid the cacophony of footsteps drumming against the tarmac, ear-splitting gunfire. until i felt the warm spread of my own blood moving up over my shoulder, the back of my neck. until then, you were with me.

But support will always have a special and vividly erotic set of image/meanings for me now, one of which is floating upon a sea within a ring of women like warm bubbles keeping me afloat upon the surface of that sea. I can feel the texture of inviting water just beneath their eyes, and do not fear it. It is the sweet smell of their breath and laughter and voices calling my name that gives me volition, helps me remember I want to turn away from looking down. These images flow quickly, the tangible floods of energy rolling off these women toward me that I converted into power to heal myself.

He remembered how his father had told him that when it snowed even humans could see the wind, and it was so. He watched as gusty eddies danced and flickered, a single flake pausing for a moment to hover before his eyes, a twirling crystal of light, the exhale of his warm breath causing it to dance away even as it melted.

I looked at her, as vivid in my doorway as the moon in the autumn sky. Her eyes held mine, grey and steady. The light slanted through the window, pooling warm on our bare feet. It is a common saying that women are delicate creatures, flowers, eggs, anything that may be crushed in a moment's carelessness. If I had ever believed it, I no longer did.

He says I was around five and crying and was vividly red in the cold spring air. I was saying something over and over; he couldn’t make it out until our mother saw me and shut down the tiller, ears ringing, and came over to see what I was holding out. This turned out to have been a large patch of mold—Orin posits from some dark corner of the Weston home’s basement, which was warm from the furnace and flooded every spring. The patch itself he describes as horrific: darkly green, glossy, vaguely hirsute, speckled with parasitic fungal points of yellow, orange, red. Worse, they could see that the patch looked oddly incomplete, gnawed-on; and some of the nauseous stuff was smeared around my open mouth. ‘I ate this,

Above the engine two vivid blurs of blue light formed incessantly a radiant crackling bar between them, which, like a spluttering flame in a lamp beside a corpse, lit for an instant the successive rows of trees and caused Gloria to draw back instinctively to the far side of the road. The light was tepid, the temperature of warm blood…. The clicking blended suddenly with itself in a rush of even sound, and then, elongating in sombre elasticity, the thing roared blindly by her and thundered onto the bridge, racing the lurid shaft of fire it cast into the solemn river alongside. Then it contracted swiftly, sucking in its sound until it left only a reverberant echo, which died upon the farther bank. Silence crept down again over the wet country;

He peeled the towel that imprisoned us away and let it fall. I felt it slide softly off my backside, and I felt, too, his rising excite¬ment, hard, erect, pressing against me. My nipples were erect, straining, aching, pressed against his strong warm damp chest, the tangle and pattern of his hair. He was a beast, an animal. My excitement was rising again, to match his. It was as if my heart were about to burst or to flip flop, breathless, into a dark abyss. “Of course, you are crazy, my darling, but, then, so am I.” He kissed me and his oh-so-clever hands seized my waist, tighten¬ing, and then sneaking up my backside, pulling me, pressing me closer, into him. He kissed me again, and his lips moved down my neck to my shoulder and then to my breasts. “Oh,” I said, “Oh.” He bent over me, kissing my collarbone and then my breasts, carefully, slowly, his hands traveling down my back, and over my backside; suddenly, he was on his knees, kissing the whorl of 101 my belly button; then he was forcing me open, gently, gently, his tongue exploring caressing, devouring … “Oh …” I exhaled a deep, shuddering breath. I tipped on the very edge. He bit me, gently. Oooooh! He pulled in the reins, the bit and bridle, of the frisky frothing filly that I had become; this sudden halt made me wilder, crazier; then, once again, he brought me, trembling, up to the very, very edge of the cliff – of orgasm, of loss of self. Then he pulled me back. I blinked and trembled. Around the two of us, there was a whole world, a whole universe. It seemed too vivid to be real, like the backdrop in an opera. Venus was brighter and lower now. The sky had turned deep indigo. One by one, stars appeared.

The Job Application Esteemed gentlemen, I am a poor, young, unemployed person in the business field, my name is Wenzel, I am seeking a suitable position, and I take the liberty of asking you, nicely and politely, if perhaps in your airy, bright, amiable rooms such a position might be free. I know that your good firm is large, proud, old, and rich, thus I may yield to the pleasing supposition that a nice, easy, pretty little place would be available, into which, as into a kind of warm cubbyhole, I can slip. I am excellently suited, you should know, to occupy just such a modest haven, for my nature is altogether delicate, and I am essentially a quiet, polite, and dreamy child, who is made to feel cheerful by people thinking of him that he does not ask for much, and allowing him to take possession of a very, very small patch of existence, where he can be useful in his own way and thus feel at ease. A quiet, sweet, small place in the shade has always been the tender substance of all my dreams, and if now the illusions I have about you grow so intense as to make me hope that my dream, young and old, might be transformed into delicious, vivid reality, then you have, in me, the most zealous and most loyal servitor, who will take it as a matter of conscience to discharge precisely and punctually all his duties. Large and difficult tasks I cannot perform, and obligations of a far-ranging sort are too strenuous for my mind. I am not particularly clever, and first and foremost I do not like to strain my intelligence overmuch. I am a dreamer rather than a thinker, a zero rather than a force, dim rather than sharp. Assuredly there exists in your extensive institution, which I imagine to be overflowing with main and subsidiary functions and offices, work of the kind that one can do as in a dream? --I am, to put it frankly, a Chinese; that is to say, a person who deems everything small and modest to be beautiful and pleasing, and to whom all that is big and exacting is fearsome and horrid. I know only the need to feel at my ease, so that each day I can thank God for life's boon, with all its blessings. The passion to go far in the world is unknown to me. Africa with its deserts is to me not more foreign. Well, so now you know what sort of a person I am.--I write, as you see, a graceful and fluent hand, and you need not imagine me to be entirely without intelligence. My mind is clear, but it refuses to grasp things that are many, or too many by far, shunning them. I am sincere and honest, and I am aware that this signifies precious little in the world in which we live, so I shall be waiting, esteemed gentlemen, to see what it will be your pleasure to reply to your respectful servant, positively drowning in obedience. Wenzel

As a teenager, the future vice president and his sister read and talked about Silent Spring. A happy and vivid memory, Al Gore recalled. Rachel Carson’s picture hangs in his office and her example inspired Gore to write Earth in the Balance.[2] It is one of the most extraordinary books by any democratic politician seeking high elective office, for it constitutes an attack on Western civilisation and a fundamental rejection of two of its greatest accomplishments – the Industrial and Scientific Revolutions.

Siesta is sweet when the light is gold, and when the vivid, young face on the pillow looks into yours, beside her, inches away, and smiles the woman-smile older than time, her exhalations warm against your mouth, as with slow fingers she traces your brows, lips, and the shape of cheek and jaw. There is nothing more es-stock. It has all been unfastened, all turned loose, with a guile that was so sweetly planned it could not be denied, even had there been any thought of denying it. Elena, you are the Mexican afternoons forever.

Ye examined Feng. The kerosene lamp was a wonderful artist and created a classical painting with dignified colors and bright strokes: Feng had her coat draped over her shoulders, exposing her red belly-band, and a strong, graceful arm. The glow from the kerosene lamp painted her figure with vivid, warm colors, while the rest of the room dissolved into a gentle darkness. Close attention revealed a dim red glow, which didn't come from the kerosene lamp, but the heating charcoal on the ground. The cold air outside sculpted beautiful ice patterns on the windowpanes with the room's warm, humid air.

Presumably, it won’t be only one way. Even before the age of climate change, the literature of conservation furnished many metaphors to choose from. James Lovelock gave us the Gaia hypothesis, which conjured an image of the world as a single, evolving quasi-biological entity. Buckminster Fuller popularized “spaceship earth,” which presents the planet as a kind of desperate life raft in what Archibald MacLeish called “the enormous, empty night”; today, the phrase suggests a vivid picture of a world spinning through the solar system barnacled with enough carbon capture plants to actually stall out warming, or even reverse it, restoring as if by magic the breathability of the air between the machines. The Voyager 1 space probe gave us the “Pale Blue Dot”—the inescapable smallness, and fragility, of the entire experiment we’re engaged in, together, whether we like it or not. Personally, I think that climate change itself offers the most invigorating picture, in that even its cruelty flatters our sense of power, and in so doing calls the world, as one, to action. At least I hope it does. But that is another meaning of the climate kaleidoscope. You can choose your metaphor. You can’t choose the planet, which is the only one any of us will ever call home.

What can we do to maintain slowness in the face of those periods of busyness? How can we avoid overload, exhaustion, or even burnout? Perhaps unsurprisingly, my answer is simply to pay attention. I recognize the way I'm inclined to stay up late, the way I will procrastinate at every option- and instead of spiraling into that overwhelming sense of too much, I check in with myself. Why am I feeling this way? What has changed? What is there more of? What is there less of? Become better at recognizing the signs of a looming backslide and pay close attention to the areas of our lives that have the greatest impact, ensuring they never slip too far out of hand. Nicholas Bate refers to this regular checking in as "taking your MEDS" or more specifically, paying attention to: - Mindfulness - Exercise - Diet - Sleep Once I recognize which of these areas has changed, its simpler (not necessarily easier) to recognize the issue and start fixing it. Sometimes the changes aren't in my control, so I need to look for ways of finding slow by creating more opportunities for a moment of deep breathing or paying close attention to whats in front of me. But other times, I've simply lost sight of what works, and its a matter of adding more of these things I've neglected- Mindfulness, simplicity, kindness- and reducing the things that don't serve me well. Above all else, though, I simply go back to my Why. I call to mind the foundation of this life I want. The vivid imaging of a life well lived. The loved ones, the generosity, the adventure, and the world I want to leave behind. And if that feels too big, I call to mind even smaller reminders, like the warm pressure of my kids hands in mine, the wholeness of a good conversation with Ben, the lightness of simply sitting quietly. Our Why is the antidote to overload. Its a call back to the important things and a reminder that we don't need to carry the weight of everything- only those things that are important to us.

There have been moments when writing this book has made me hopeful, but almost always I’ve felt rage or despair. You’ve been stealing those pleasures. Hope? Yes, but also rage and despair. Stealing? Not giving anything in return. Rage and despair are pleasures? The guiltiest. Why do you think New York magazine’s doomsday article about global warming went viral? People were suddenly ravenous for climate science? No, we were ravenous for a vivid description of our apocalypse. We’re drawn to it the same way we’re drawn to horror movies, car accidents, and the chaos of the current administration. And don’t pretend that the bleakest scenarios aren’t your favorite parts to write. I’m not pretending.

There are many ways of attaining the various levels of human bliss. But one of the highest states of mental, spiritual and physical happiness is readily reached by way of a good meal, pleasant company, and easy seats by a good log fire. (Preferably there should be a vague impression of cold weather in the night outside your cosy room) The cares of the world are lost . There is a magical presence . You feel love for all humanity. Every remark made by your friend is a precious pearl of wisdom, and everything you say , encouraged by the warm smiles of your companion, is the essence of all your years of struggle and experience. You can suddenly recall incidents of the past, vivid-ly, and they take on a meaning which they never had before.

The tulips are too excitable, it is winter here. Look how white everything is, how quiet, how snowed-in. I am learning peacefulness, lying by myself quietly As the light lies on these white walls, this bed, these hands. I am nobody; I have nothing to do with explosions. I have given my name and my day-clothes up to the nurses And my history to the anesthetist and my body to surgeons. They have propped my head between the pillow and the sheet-cuff Like an eye between two white lids that will not shut. Stupid pupil, it has to take everything in. The nurses pass and pass, they are no trouble, They pass the way gulls pass inland in their white caps, Doing things with their hands, one just the same as another, So it is impossible to tell how many there are. My body is a pebble to them, they tend it as water Tends to the pebbles it must run over, smoothing them gently. They bring me numbness in their bright needles, they bring me sleep. Now I have lost myself I am sick of baggage—— My patent leather overnight case like a black pillbox, My husband and child smiling out of the family photo; Their smiles catch onto my skin, little smiling hooks. I have let things slip, a thirty-year-old cargo boat stubbornly hanging on to my name and address. They have swabbed me clear of my loving associations. Scared and bare on the green plastic-pillowed trolley I watched my teaset, my bureaus of linen, my books Sink out of sight, and the water went over my head. I am a nun now, I have never been so pure. I didn’t want any flowers, I only wanted To lie with my hands turned up and be utterly empty. How free it is, you have no idea how free—— The peacefulness is so big it dazes you, And it asks nothing, a name tag, a few trinkets. It is what the dead close on, finally; I imagine them Shutting their mouths on it, like a Communion tablet. The tulips are too red in the first place, they hurt me. Even through the gift paper I could hear them breathe Lightly, through their white swaddlings, like an awful baby. Their redness talks to my wound, it corresponds. They are subtle : they seem to float, though they weigh me down, Upsetting me with their sudden tongues and their color, A dozen red lead sinkers round my neck. Nobody watched me before, now I am watched. The tulips turn to me, and the window behind me Where once a day the light slowly widens and slowly thins, And I see myself, flat, ridiculous, a cut-paper shadow Between the eye of the sun and the eyes of the tulips, And I have no face, I have wanted to efface myself. The vivid tulips eat my oxygen. Before they came the air was calm enough, Coming and going, breath by breath, without any fuss. Then the tulips filled it up like a loud noise. Now the air snags and eddies round them the way a river Snags and eddies round a sunken rust-red engine. They concentrate my attention, that was happy Playing and resting without committing itself. The walls, also, seem to be warming themselves. The tulips should be behind bars like dangerous animals; They are opening like the mouth of some great African cat, And I am aware of my heart: it opens and closes Its bowl of red blooms out of sheer love of me. The water I taste is warm and salt, like the sea, And comes from a country far away as health. --"Tulips", written 18 March 1961

So Callie is a rake." She blushed. "I don't think so." Silence fell between them as he watched the wash of pink across her cheeks. He lifted her wounded arm in his hand, placing a soft kiss on the back of her hand. She breathed deeply at the feel of his lips on her skin, so warm and soft, and her eyes flew to his, intently focused on her. He held her gaze, and she felt a shock of liquid heat as his tongue circled one of her knuckles. He registered her surprise, smiling against her and turning her hand palm up, then setting his tongue and lips to work on the soft, sensitive spot at its center. Her breath quickened, and she closed her eyes to the sensation, unable to watch the erotic movement of his mouth across her skin. He lifted his lips from her hand and, when she opened her eyes again, it was to find him watching her, a wicked smile on his lips. Reaching out, he traced one finger along the line of her jaw, sending a shiver through her. When he spoke, his voice was thick and liquid, and it sent a shock of heat down her spine. "I shouldn't give up on that part of her just yet, Empress." She caught her breath at the endearment, which brought with it a hazy memory from long ago. He chased the vision away with the vivid present as he clasped her chin, bringing her face closer to his. "You forget, I've met the women several times... In carriages..." His lips hovered just above hers, sending a tremor of anticipation through her, "And in theatres..." She tried to close the distance between them and he pulled back just enough to drive her slightly mad. "And in bedchambers. In fact," he added, his words a caress along the sensitive skin of her lips, "I rather like the rakish side of her." And then he settled his lips upon hers, and she was lost. She was consumed by the softness of his mouth, the gentleness of the caress- so very different than the kisses they had shared before. This kiss consumed her, made her forget herself, their surroundings, everything but the magnificent pressure of his lips on hers. His thumb stroked her jaw as his mouth ate at hers, sending waves of pulsing pleasure through her. She gasped at the feeling, and he took advantage of her open lips to plunder her mouth with deep, drugging kisses that made her dizzy. She reached for him, her anchor in a sea of sensuality, wrapping her arms around his neck and plunging her fingers into his heavy, soft hair. He made a deep, satisfied sound at the feeling of her wrapped around him, and traced a path across her cheek and down the column of her throat with soft, moist kisses that sent explosions of pleasure through her.

February gave way to March, with its bursting colors of a too-early spring. Such warm weather was a welcome contrast to the near freezes of the previous year, as if this newborn century was impatient to exhibit its glory and all the unforeseen changes it would bring. Alice’s heart expanded at the sight of white snowdrops in lieu of absent snow; the vivid purples of wild petunias, pincushion flowers, and irises laced with the varying hues of tulips; and the glorious flowering shrubs---azaleas and camellias---lighting up the shade, covered entirely in blossoms as if they nurtured blooms but no leaves. She had seen the prairie carpeted in wildflowers, but this display was unlike that wild one of nature, somehow singularly intimate and welcoming, whereas the prairie engulfed and dwarfed her. There is not one thing that humankind has done on earth that is equal to one square inch of this, she thought.

From the river to the sea. From here to eternity. Swimming and diving in a river to rest by the sea, on the shore. There are forests all around, outside this unique tunnel of water and love and light. The green is powerful, more cutting-edge than dream-like. Really, really intense. It hurts. It cuts. The leaves, the nettle. Stay inside. Warm inside. Plenty of air inside. The forests and jungles all around are peaceful, quiet, quiet, peaceful, but too vivid to be bearable in this Matrix, in this matrix of sound, sonic oceanic tunnel, natural flowing watercourses, light, different shades of grey, white, black, yellow, blue… The green outside is religious, fanatic, horror vacui, but calm, calming from a distance, from a safe distance. Love and hate in everything that is, in the green every nettle and leave and in the river and sea every fish. Floating on a cloud made of feathers while sleeping on a dream while sleeping on an immaculate hotel bed on an island, tout seul.

It was delicious in the garden. The storm had passed over long since, and it was still and warm; the sweetness of the stocks and roses filled the air with the peculiar intensity of fragrance of flowers after rain - in the evening light they had the unnatural shadowy vividness of a coloured photograph. The rain had stirred up the nightingales too - near and far, their bubbling ecstasy welled out from the dark shelter of ilexes and cypresses, and through the open windows of the villa there came presently the cool elusive sequences of Debussy's music - ghosts of melody rather than melodies, evocations rather than statements; gleams on water and pale lights in spring skies, a single star, slow waves beating in mist on a deserted shore. Grace leant back in the corner of her seat, listening, watching the leaves of the buckthorns, like little curved pencils, against the sky above her head; in the relaxation of fatigue her attention was fixed on nothing, but some part of her was profoundly aware of all these things - the scent of the flowers, the song of the nightingales, the cool western music, with its memories of her own Atlantic shores.

The two men, unable to see each other, kept silent till the lighter, slipping before the fitful breeze, passed out between almost invisible headlands into the still deeper darkness of the gulf. For a time the lantern on the jetty shone after them. The wind failed, then fanned up again, but so faintly that the big, half-decked boat slipped along with no more noise than if she had been suspended in the air. ‘We are out in the gulf now,’ said the calm voice of Nostromo. A moment after he added, ‘Señor Mitchell has lowered the light.’ ‘Yes,’ said Decoud; ‘nobody can find us now.’ A great recrudescence of obscurity embraced the boat. The sea in the gulf was as black as the clouds above. Nostromo, after striking a couple of matches to get a glimpse of the boat-compass he had with him in the lighter, steered by the feel of the wind on his cheek. It was a new experience for Decoud, this mysteriousness of the great waters spread out strangely smooth, as if their restlessness had been crushed by the weight of that dense night. The Placido was sleeping profoundly under its black ponho. The main thing now for success was to get away from the coast and gain the middle of the gulf before day broke. The Isabels were somewhere at hand. ‘On your left as you look forward, señor,’ said Nostromo suddenly. When his voice ceased, the enormous stillness, without light or sound, seemed to affect Decoud’s senses like a powerful drug. He didn’t even know at times whether he were asleep or awake. Like a man lost in slumber, he heard nothing, he saw nothing. Even his hand held before his face did not exist for his eyes. The change from the agitation, the passions and the dangers, from the sights and sounds of the shore, was so complete that it would have resembled death had it not been for the survival of his thoughts. In this foretaste of eternal peace they floated vivid and light, like unearthly clear dreams of earthly things that may haunt the souls freed by death from the misty atmosphere of regrets and hopes. Decoud shook himself, shuddered a bit, though the air that drifted past him was warm. He had the strangest sensation of his soul having just returned into his body from the circumambient darkness in which land, sea, sky, the mountains, and the rocks were as if they had not been.

Switching on the ground-floor lights, she checked the gas jet and the main gas plug and poured water over the smoldering, half-buried charcoal in the brazier. She stood before the upright mirror in the four-and-a-half-mat room and held up her skirts. The bloodstains made it seem as if a bold, vivid pattern was printed across the lower half of her white kimono. When she sat down before the mirror, she was conscious of the dampness and coldness of her husband’s blood in the region of her thighs, and she shivered. Then, for a long while, she lingered over her toilet preparations. She applied the rouge generously to her cheeks, and her lips too she painted heavily. This was no longer make-up to please her husband. It was make-up for the world which she would leave behind, and there was a touch of the magnificent and the spectacular in her brushwork. When she rose, the mat before the mirror was wet with blood. Reiko was not concerned about this. (...) The lieutenant was lying on his face in a sea of blood. The point protruding from his neck seemed to have grown even more prominent than before. Reiko walked heedlessly across the blood. Sitting beside the lieutenant’s corpse, she stared intently at the face, which lay on one cheek on the mat. The eyes were opened wide, as if the lieutenant’s attention had been attracted by something. She raised the head, folding it in her sleeve, wiped the blood from the lips, and bestowed a last kiss. (...) Reiko sat herself on a spot about one foot distant from the lieutenant’s body. Drawing the dagger from her sash, she examined its dully gleaming blade intently, and held it to her tongue. The taste of the polished steel was slightly sweet. Reiko did not linger. When she thought how the pain which had previously opened such a gulf between herself and her dying husband was now to become a part of her own experience, she saw before her only the joy of herself entering a realm her husband had already made his own. In her husband’s agonized face there had been something inexplicable which she was seeing for the first time. Now she would solve that riddle. Reiko sensed that at last she too would be able to taste the true bitterness and sweetness of that great moral principle in which her husband believed. What had until now been tasted only faintly through her husband’s example she was about to savor directly with her own tongue. Reiko rested the point of the blade against the base of her throat. She thrust hard. The wound was only shallow. Her head blazed, and her hands shook uncontrollably. She gave the blade a strong pull sideways. A warm substance flooded into her mouth, and everything before her eyes reddened, in a vision of spouting blood. She gathered her strength and plunged the point of the blade deep into her throat.

I thought I saw you scurrying in here hubby-kins!” A girl in a vivid orange dress stepped into the room and I had to look up at her towering height and shoulders which nearly matched the breadth of the Heirs'. Her teeth protruded a little from her lower jaw and her eyes seemed to wander, never landing on one spot. Her hair was a massive brown frizz with a pink bow clipped into the top of it, perfectly matching the violently bright shade of her eyeshadow. She marched between Tory and I like we were made of paper, forcing us aside with her elbows as she charted a direct path for Darius. “Mildred,” he said tersely, his eyes darkening as his bride-to-be reached out to him. Caleb, Seth and Max sniggered as Mildred leaned in for a kiss and Darius only managed to stop her at the last second by planting his palm on her forehead with a loud clap. “Not before the wedding,” he said firmly and I looked at Tory who was falling into a fit of silent laughter, clutching her side. I tried to smother the giggle that fought its way out of my chest but it floated free and Mildred rounded on us like a hungry animal. “These must be the Vega Twins,” she said coldly. “Well don't waste your time sniffing around my snookums. Daddy says he's saving himself for our wedding night.” Max roared with laughter and Mildred turned on him like a loaded weapon, jabbing him right in the chest. Max's smile fell away as she glared at him like he was her next meal. “What are you laughing at you overgrown starfish?” she demanded, her eyes flashing red and her pupils turning to slits. “I've eaten bigger bites than you before, so don't tempt me because I adore seafood.” Max reached out, laying a hand on her bare arm, shifting it slightly as his fingers brushed a hairy mole. “Calm down Milly, we're just having a bit of fun. We want to get to know Darius's betrothed. Why don't you have a shot?” He nodded to Caleb who promptly picked one up and held it one out for Mildred to take. “Daddy says drinking will grow hairs on my chest,” she said, refusing it. “Too late for that,” Seth said under his breath and the others started laughing. A knot of sympathy tugged at my gut, but Mildred didn't seem to care about their mocking. She stepped toward Seth with a wicked grin and his smile fell away. “Oh and what's wrong with that exactly, Seth Capella? You like your girls hairy, don't you?” Seth gawped at her in answer. “What the hell does that mean?” “You like mutt muff,” she answered, jutting out her chin and I noticed a few wiry hairs protruding from it. Seth growled, scratching his stomach as he stepped forward. “I don't screw girls in their Order form, idiot.” “Maybe not, but you do, don't you Caleb Altair?” She rounded on him and now I was really starting to warm to Mildred as she cut them all down to size. I settled in for the show, folding my arms and smiling as I waited for her to go on. “My sister's boyfriend’s cousin said you like Pegasus butts. He even sent a video to Aurora Academy of you humping a Pegasex blow up doll and it went viral within a day.” Caleb's mouth fell open and his face paled in horror. “I didn't hump it!” “I didn't watch the video, but everyone told me what was in it. Why would I want to see you screwing a plastic horse?” She shrugged then turned to Tory and I with absolutely no kindness in her eyes. Oh crap.(Darcy)

Ghost shook his head as he sat on the very edge of the bed, poised to take flight if need be. The spiral under his hair felt warm, almost painful, but he resisted the urge to rub it. It never helped when he did, and he was not sure what Gerry would do if the man saw it. The Witch had a symbol she called a triskele, the ink a vivid scarlet still, but no male that had ever come for healing bore a mark like hers, or like his. He had never found the words to ask the Witch about it, about why he was marked like a witch.

So focus your language efforts on moments that are known to remain vivid in memory: hellos (make yours unusually warm and personal), good-byes (make them wonderful), and recoveries after service failures (yours should be more graceful than anybody else’s).

It was good for me to be afflicted. (Psalm 119:71) It is a remarkable occurrence of nature that the most brilliant colors of plants are found on the highest mountains, in places that are the most exposed to the fiercest weather. The brightest lichens and mosses, as well as the most beautiful wildflowers, abound high upon the windswept, storm-ravaged peaks. One of the finest arrays of living color I have ever seen was just above the great Saint Bernard Hospice near the ten-thousand-foot summit of Mont Cenis in the French Alps. The entire face of one expansive rock was covered with a strikingly vivid yellow lichen, which shone in the sunshine like a golden wall protecting an enchanted castle. Amid the loneliness and barrenness of that high altitude and exposed to the fiercest winds of the sky, this lichen exhibited glorious color it has never displayed in the shelter of the valley. As I write these words, I have two specimens of the same type of lichen before me. One is from this Saint Bernard area, and the other is from the wall of a Scottish castle, which is surrounded by sycamore trees. The difference in their form and coloring is quite striking. The one grown amid the fierce storms of the mountain peak has a lovely yellow color of a primrose, a smooth texture, and a definite form and shape. But the one cultivated amid the warm air and the soft showers of the lowland valley has a dull, rusty color, a rough texture, and an indistinct and broken shape. Isn’t it the same with a Christian who is afflicted, storm-tossed, and without comfort? Until the storms and difficulties allowed by God’s providence beat upon a believer again and again, his character appears flawed and blurred. Yet the trials actually clear away the clouds and shadows, perfect the form of his character, and bestow brightness and blessing to his life. Amidst my list of blessings infinite Stands this the foremost, that my heart has bled; For all I bless You, most for the severe. Hugh Macmillan

The oversize jar that held Regan’s collection of beach glass was stored at the back of his closet, shoved there years ago because, like so much else in the house, it triggered bad memories. But as he pulled it out and carried it downstairs, the edges of his dark mood lifted for the first time all day. The sweet, generous side of Regan’s nature would have loved passing on her precious beach stones to Livia, one little girl to another. As he descended the stairs that his sister had raced up and down a dozen times a day, something brushed past him. Something warm. Invisible. He stopped where he was and shut his eyes, the glass jar cool in his hands, his sister’s face vivid in his mind. Regan smiling at him. A smile that said Be happy.

Sensations were completely different. Like the night she had run free as the wolf, Savannah now had the senses of a bird of prey. Her vision was sharp and clear, her eyes enormously wide. She spread her wings experimentally, then flapped them in the light drizzle. They were much bigger than she had anticipated. It delighted her, and she flapped them harder so she could create a wind, causing waves in the water standing in the patio. Are you having fun? Gregori’s voice held a hint of laughter. This is so cool, lifemate, she answered. Her rapidly beating wings lifted her into the air. The light mist was already passing overhead. The air was warm and heavy with the promise of moisture, but she soared high, reveling in her ability to do so. Gregori’s larger, stronger body dropped over hers, close and protective, guiding her in the direction of the bayou. As high up as they were, the sharp eyes of the raptor could spot the smallest of movements below. Details were vivid and clear. Even colors were different. Infrared vision, heat sensors— Savannah wasn’t certain what it was exactly, but the way she perceived the world was a different and unique experience. She dipped beneath Gregori and soared away from him, turning sideways and circling high above him. In her mind she could hear him swearing. As always he sounded arrogant, elegant, Old World, completely in command. Laughing, she caught a thermal and rode it up over the river. The male dropped down to cover her with his huge wings, fencing her in. Spoilsport! she accused him, her touch in his mind a whisper of lightness, of invitation to join in her fun. You are in a great deal of trouble, ma femme. He knew the threat was empty when he made it; he would give her the world. But why did she have to be such a little dare-devil all the time? Anyone choosing to live with you would have to have a sense of adventure, don’t you think? Her soft laughter played over his skin like music, like the gentle breeze blowing from the mountains in their homeland. Even within the bird’s body, he stirred to life, need and hunger rising to become a part of him. Relentless. Demanding. Savage in its intensity. It was more than simple lust. More than hunger. More than need. It was all of it merged together with a tenderness he had never conceived he could feel. When she was at her most outrageous, her most defiant, that was when his heart melted.

God is Santa Claus for grown-ups, not a misery-guts, not an asshole; we've got enough of those in town already. I didn't believe; but the guy I didn't believe in wasn't like that. He was a warm, smiling chap, overflowing with benevolence; someone you looked up to with the same bafflement and confused wonder and absolute trust that you had for the giants who put you on your potty when you were two. He was a nice guy who would make it all right; who understood; the one guy you never had to explain your screw-ups to. He smelled good, too: of pews and old hassocks, floor polish and musty velvet drapes, of candle wax and mildewed pages. He resided in the tranquility that can fill even the heart of an unbeliever in old churches, where the eye and the spirit are soothed by the flicker of golden candlelight and the gentle but vivid hues from the stained-glass good guys above the altar. And the great thing about Him was, He was human. You could feel sorry for Him. I knew there could be only one reason why He let us suffer like this: He can't find a way to stop it. Like a roller-coaster ride that gets too scary, there's no way off. He set it in motion and now He's as helpless as the rest of us.

Her former life of the brilliant textiles, vibrant patterns and vivid colors of the palace would be replaced with the less radiant but warmer tones and hues of her new home. Where the palace was eye-catching and flamboyant, the Temple of Danray was warm and homey, bursting with the muted colors of the earth. The training fields were weather-beaten and rich, and the buildings full of coppers, bronzes and golds. She noted that the Danrayen warriors and trainees all wore outfits in hues of fawn, mushroom, sage, and nut-brown that helped them blend in with their surroundings, and she was glad for the new wardrobe that helped her to look like she belonged, regardless of how scratchy and stiff she might find the fabric.

Sister, why do you think the stars in the sky don’t fall down?” Ye examined Feng. The kerosene lamp was a wonderful artist and created a classical painting with dignified colors and bright strokes: Feng had her coat draped over her shoulders, exposing her red belly-band, and a strong, graceful arm. The glow from the kerosene lamp painted her figure with vivid, warm colors, while the rest of the room dissolved into a gentle darkness. Close attention revealed a dim red glow, which didn’t come from the kerosene lamp, but the heating charcoal on the ground. The cold air outside sculpted beautiful ice patterns on the windowpanes with the room’s warm, humid air. “You’re afraid of the stars falling down?” Ye asked softly. Feng laughed and shook her head. “What’s there to be afraid of? They’re so tiny.” Ye did not give her the answer of an astrophysicist. She only said, “They’re very, very far away. They can’t fall.” Feng was satisfied with this answer, and went back to her needlework. But Ye could no longer be at peace. She put down her book and lay down on the warm surface of the kang, closing her eyes. In her imagination, the rest of the universe around their tiny cottage disappeared, just the way the kerosene lamp hid most of the room in darkness. Then she substituted the universe in Feng’s heart for the real one. The night sky was a black dome that was just large enough to cover the entirety of the world. The surface of the dome was inlaid with countless stars shining with a crystalline silver light, none of which was bigger than the mirror on the old wooden table next to the bed. The world was flat and extended very far in each direction, but ultimately there was an edge where it met the sky. The flat surface was covered with mountain ranges like the Greater Khingan Mountains, and with forests dotted with tiny villages, just like Qijiatun.… This toy-box-like universe comforted Ye, and gradually it shifted from her imagination into her dreams. In this tiny mountain hamlet deep in the Greater Khingan Mountains, something finally thawed in Ye Wenjie’s heart. In the frozen tundra of her soul, a tiny, clear lake of meltwater appeared.

a vivid, wonderful world so full of winter and spring, warm rain and cold snow, adventures and contentments, good things and bad. How often you will have me near you when wood smoke drifts across the wind, or the first tulips arrive, or the sky darkens in a summer storm…. Think of me today, and in the days to come, as I am thinking of you this minute, not gone or alone or dead, but part of the earth beneath you, part of the air around you, part of the heart that must not be lonely.

I can vividly recall my first day and could only imagine the conversations which took place prior to my arrival. I was not met with open arms and warm smiles. I faced blatant racism, adversity, and non-acceptance—not only from the faculty, but from parents and students alike. Often, I wanted to leave, but I was proud of my heritage and my accomplishments as an educator. In spite of it all, I did not allow this to interfere with my genuine passion for teaching. I did the best I could under difficult circumstances to educate and nurture the children.

If God intended for us to draw near to him by consistently denying ourselves the goodness with which he has endowed this world, the we certainly wouldn't have verses like "Taste and see that the Lord is good (Psalm 34:8). Jesus would never gave transformed water into the tastiest wine at the wedding. Set would be a clinical act of reproduction instead of a pleasurable and unifying act of intimacy inside marriage. A God who intended us to ignore our most basic needs and desires would never have dreamt up over 2,000 species of jellyfish to dazzle us or painted the sunset with the most delicate hues of peach against backdrops of vivid tangerine. We serve a God who created giraffes with their spindly necks, puzzle-piece-patterned bodies, and ludicrously long tongues and called it good. We serve a God who granted newborn babies the most delicious-smelling heads and dreamed up the idea of juicy, sun-warmed strawberries. We serve a God who rejoices over us with singing (Zephaniah 3:17) and thought that the world was incomplete without the contribution of musical geniuses like Handel, Mozart, and Beethoven. We do not serve a curmudgeonly or stingy God but a lavish and loving God, one who delights to give us good gifts, starting with his very presence.

She laughed. ‘My dear Carlo, compliments even now aren’t quite so rare that I don’t recognise them, believe me. Thank you, Miss Martin, that was sweet of you.’ Her eyes as she smiled at me were friendly, almost warm, and for the first time since I had met her I saw charm in her – not the easy charm of the vivid personality, but the real and irresistible charm that reaches out halfway to meet you, assuring you that you are wanted and liked. And heaven knew I needed that assurance … I was very ready to meet any gesture, however slight, with the response of affection. Perhaps at last … But even as I smiled back at her it happened again. The warmth drained away as if wine had seeped from a crack and left the glass empty, a cool and misted shell, reflecting nothing. She turned away to pick up her embroidery.

She was a vision, there was no doubt of it, her face warm and pretty for all its years. It wasn’t gaunt so much as naturally angular, and her thinning lips were nearly brightened with rose lipstick, and her eyes, in spite of the fine wrinkles around them, were still vividly blue. The diamonds and pearls on her breast were stunning, and she wore several rich diamond rings on her long hands.

No desert autumn colors on the horizon more vivid than the tone of her warm ivory flesh. Her legs and back shifting in my sheets like the serpent-like swivels curving down the spine of the mountain.

A God who intended us to ignore our most basic needs and desires would never have dreamt up over 2,000 species of jellyfish to dazzle us or painted the sunset with the most delicate hues of peach against backdrops of vivid tangerine. We serve a God who created giraffes with their spindly necks, puzzle-piece-patterned bodies, and ludicrously long tongues and called it good. We serve a God who granted newborn babies the most delicious-smelling heads and dreamed up the idea of juicy, sun-warmed strawberries. We serve a God who rejoices over us with singing (Zephaniah 3:17) and thought that the world was incomplete without the contributions of musical geniuses like Handel, Mozart, and Beethoven. We do not serve a curmudgeonly or stingy God but a lavish and loving God, one who delights to give us good gifts, starting with his very presence.

It was not like her to lose her senses. The ability to drift was beaten from her long ago. But Sorasa drifted now, pacing the beach. She did not hear the shift of sand, or the heavy scuff of boots over the loose stones. There was only the wind. Until a strand of gold blew across her vision, joined by a warm unyielding palm against her shoulder. Her body jolted as she turned, nose to nose with Domacridhan of Iona. His green eyes glittered, his mouth open as he shouted something again, his voice swallowed up by the droning in her own head. “Sorasa.” It came to her slowly, as if through deep water. Her own name, over and over again. She could only stare back into the verdant green, lost in the fields of his eyes. In her chest, her heart stumbled. She expected her body to follow. Instead, her fist closed and her knuckles met cheekbone. Dom was good enough to turn his head, letting the blow glance off. Begrudgingly, Sorasa knew he had spared her a broken hand on top of everything else. “How dare you,” she forced out, trembling. Whatever concern he wore burned away in an instant. “How dare I what? Save your life?” he snarled, letting her go Sorasa swayed without his support. She clenched her own jaw, fighting to maintain her balance lest she fall to pieces entirely. “Is that another Amhara lesson?” he raged on, throwing up both arms. “When given the choice between death or indignity, choose death?!” Hissing, Sorasa looked back to the spot where she woke up. Heat crept up her face as she realized her body left a trail through the sand when he dragged her up from the tide line. A blind man would have noticed it. But not Sorasa in her fury and grief. “Oh,” was all she could manage. Her mouth flapped open, her mind spinning. Only the truth came, and that was far too embarrassing. “I did not see. I—” Her head throbbed again and she pressed a hand to her temple, wincing away from his stern glare. “I will feel better if you sit,” Dom said stiffly. Despite the pain, Sorasa loosed a growl. She wanted to stand just to spite him, but thought better of it. With a huff, she sank, cross-legged on the cool sand. Dom was quick to follow, almost blurring. It made her head spin again. “So you saved me from the shipwreck just to abandon me here?” Sorasa muttered as Dom opened his mouth to protest. “I don’t blame you. Time is of the essence now. A wounded mortal will only slow you down.” She expected him to bluster and lie. Instead, his brow furrowed, lines creasing between his still vivid eyes. The light off the ocean suited him. “Are you? Wounded?” he asked gently, his gaze raking over her. His focus snagged on her temple, and the gash there. “Anywhere else, I mean?” For the first time since she woke, Sorasa tried to still herself. Her breath slowed as she assessed herself, feeling her own body from toes to scalp. As her awareness traveled, she noted every blooming bruise and cut, every dull ache and shooting pain. Bruises ribs. A sprained wrist. Her tongue flicked in her mouth. Scowling, she spit out a broken tooth. “No, I’m not wounded,” she said aloud. Dom’s desperate smile broke wide. He went slack against the sand for an instant, falling back on his elbows to tip his face to the sky. His eyes fluttered shut only for a moment. Sorasa knew his gods were too far. He had said so himself. The gods of Glorian could not hear their children in this realm. Even so, Sorasa saw it on his face. Dom prayed anyway. In his gratitude or anger, she did not know. “Good,” he finally said, sitting back up.

And with that, he stepped out from the darkness of the tunnel mouth to find himself in a kind of cave; the air was warm with sandalwood, and nutmeg, and allspice, and cardamom, and the Moths were all around him. For a moment, Tom was breathless with the beauty of the Midnight Folk. In the semi-darkness, their wings shone with a faint luminescence and their skin gleamed with unearthly tattoos, like something under black light. Their hair was braided with feathers and rags, and all of them seemed to be covered with a powdery dust that twinkled and shone against their skin, setting the shadows darkly aflame. And all around them lay a pattern of those vivid tracks, as if the luminescence could be transferred to their surroundings by touch; each set of prints a different shade in troubled, alien colors. Instinctively, he looked for Charissa's colors in the crowd. But she was nowhere to be seen. Instead, he was surrounded by the dangerous shine of the enemy. He saw them only in slices of light against the velvet darkness. The tip of a wing; the gleam of an eye; the mystic spiral of a tattoo that seemed to move across the skin.

Meredith Etherington-Smith Meredith Etherington-Smith became an editor of Paris Vogue in London and GQ magazine in the United States during the 1970s. During the 1980s, she served as deputy and features editor of Harpers & Queen magazine and has since become a leading art critic. Currently, she is editor in chief of Christie’s magazine. She is also a noted artist biographer; her book on Salvador Dali, The Persistence of Memory, was an international bestseller and was translated into a dozen languages. Her drawing room that morning was much like any comfortable, slightly formal drawing room to be found in country houses throughout England: the paintings, hung on pale yellow walls, were better; the furniture, chintz-covered; the flowers, natural garden bouquets. It was charming. And so was she, as she swooped in from a room beyond. I had never seen pictures of her without any makeup, with just-washed hair and dressed in jeans and a white T-shirt. She looked more vital, more beautiful, than any photograph had ever managed to convey. She was, in a word, staggering; here was the most famous woman in the world up close, relaxed, funny, and warm. The tragic Diana, the royal Diana, the wronged Diana: a clever, interesting person who wasn’t afraid to say she didn’t know how an auction sale worked, and would it be possible to work with me on it? “Of course, ma’am,” I said. “It’s your sale, and if you would like, then we’ll work on it together to make the most money we can for your charities.” “So what do we do next?” she asked me. “First, I think you had better choose the clothes for sale.” The next time I saw her drawing room, Paul Burrell, her butler, had wheeled in rack after rack of jeweled, sequined, embroidered, and lacy dresses, almost all of which I recognized from photographs of the Princess at some state event or gala evening. The visible relics of a royal life that had ended. The Princess, in another pair of immaculately pressed jeans and a stripy shirt, looked so different from these formal meringues that it was almost laughable. I think at that point the germ of an idea entered my mind: that sometime, when I had gotten to know her better and she trusted me, I would like to see photographs of the “new” Princess Diana--a modern woman unencumbered by the protocol of royal dress. Eventually, this idea led to putting together the suite of pictures of this sea-change princess with Mario Testino. I didn’t want her to wear jewels; I wanted virtually no makeup and completely natural hair. “But Meredith, I always have people do my hair and makeup,” she explained. “Yes ma’am, but I think it is time for a change--I want Mario to capture your speed, and electricity, the real you and not the Princess.” She laughed and agreed, but she did turn up at the historic shoot laden with her turquoise leather jewel boxes. We never opened them. Hair and makeup took ten minutes, and she came out of the dressing room looking breathtaking. The pictures are famous now; they caused a sensation at the time. My favorite memory of Princess Diana is when I brought the work prints round to Kensington Palace for her to look at. She was so keen to see them that she raced down the stairs and grabbed them. She went silent for a moment or two as she looked at these vivid, radiant images. Then she turned to me and said, “But these are really me. I’ve been set free and these show it. Don’t you think,” she asked me, “that I look a bit like Marilyn Monroe in some of them?” And laughed.

The cool, pearly sheen of dawn had warmed in the East to a blaze of vivid rose that deepened along the horizon's edge to a bar of living, glowing scarlet, and bathed the still sea and the dreaming islands in an uncanny, sunset radiance.

Can you really see different things in a painting from day to day?" This seemed to genuinely interest the duke. She wasn't certain which part of it fascinated him most, the fact that a painting could change or that she thought it could. "Well, it isn't like a crystal ball. Whereby you see shifting images and the like. But haven't you ever looked at a painting for a length of time, or on more than one occasion, and experienced it differently each time?" Where to begin explaining art to someone who seemed to know nothing about it? Now, if she were dancing with Harry... "Of course. As a young man touring the Continent, I once looked at 'length' at a painting called 'Venus and Mars' by an Italian painter called Veronese. Do you know it? Venus is nude as the day she was born, and Mars is entirely clothed and down on his knees in front of her, and it looks as though Mars is about to give her a pleasuring. And there are cherubs hanging about. I looked at it for quite some time." A... pleasuring. 'God above.' He had her attention now. She was speechless. Everything was astonishing about what he'd just said. She stared up at him, her mind exploding with vivid images, her cheeks going increasingly hotter. She knew the painting. She knew 'precisely' where Mars was kneeling in front of Venus. The duke had said it purposely. Suddenly she was acutely aware of her five senses, as though they were blinking on, one by one, like fireflies in the dark. Most particularly vivid was touch. She was potently aware of his hands: the one resting with firm assurance against her waist, warm there now through the fine silk of her gown, the other enfolding hers. She was acutely aware of his size, and everything that was masculine to her feminine. Goodness. He could certainly look at her for a long time without blinking.

Some people did stand out in her memory, one of them being Sir Grant Morgan's wife, Lady Victoria. Having long been curious about what kind of woman would wed the intimidating giant, Sophia was surprised to discover that his wife was quite small of stature. Lady Victoria was also one of the most spectacularly beautiful women Sophia had ever seen, with a voluptuous figure, a profusion of vivid red hair, and a vivacious smile. "Lady Sophia," the petite red-haired woman said warmly, "no words can express how thrilled we are that Sir Ross has finally married. Only a remarkable woman could have enticed him away from widowerhood." Sophia returned her smile. "The advantage of the match is entirely mine, I assure you." Sir Grant interceded, his green eyes twinkling warmly. He seemed far different from when he was at Bow Street, and Sophia observed that he basked in the presence of his wife as a cat would in sunshine. "I beg to disagree, my lady," he told Sophia. "The match holds many advantages for Sir Ross- which is obvious to all who know him." "Indeed," Lady Victoria added thoughtfully, her gaze finding Ross's dark form as he stood in a separate receiving line. "I've never seen him look so well. In fact, this may be the first time I've ever seen him smile." "And his face didn't even crack," Morgan commented. "Grant," his wife scolded beneath her breath. Sophia laughed. Morgan winked at her and drew his wife away.

I did much of my writing in a little alcove by the bar, where I could be alone, private, invisible, yet warmed and stimulated by the vivid life at the bar.

Jacques knew, as his body moved gently and lovingly into hers, as his hips thrust forward and he buried himself ever deeper, that his life was changed forever. He would have a home, a family, children; he would have love and laughter surrounding him all the days he chose to remain on earth. He would have her body, her heart, her purity and goodness to temper his predatory nature. His hell had become a paradise that he had somehow, through all his mistakes, managed to reach. Because she could read his mind so easily, because he rarely left her completely, Shea could glimpse his feelings. She laid her head on his shoulder, closed her eyes, and allowed the building explosion to overtake her, Her arms tightened around Jacques, around her anchor, her security. Whatever happened in the future, whatever they were forced to face and deal with, they had one another, and that was all anyone could ask. Jacques lifted them to the heavens, and they soared there together while the water in the pool splashed and receded around them. He framed her face gently with his large hands and looked into her vivid green eyes. “I love you, Shea. I always will,” he vowed softly. “I love you too, Jacques,” she whispered back. He found her mouth, the warm sweetness only she could provide, and took it hungrily. They slipped deeper into their embrace, and the water closed over their heads. Laughing, coughing, they broke apart and swam to the surface, the horrors of the day drowned in the depth of their love.

The voluptuous flowers of the Honeysuckle vine produce sticky sweet nectar that’s completely irresistible to creatures and humans alike. ... The scent is known to carry vivid dreams of love and lust in through the windows on warm summer nights.

I began scampering across the lawn against the direction the wind was blowing. The lure of it was irresistible. As I walked, it grew stronger. Soon I crossed the grass and found myself at a flower bed. I came face-to-face with a cluster of plants with heart-shaped leaves and white flowers. Their abundant, mesmerizing, heady perfume filled the air. I began chewing their green stalks. Dear reader, I had no choice. I was compelled! Reaching into the bed, I licked the stems and shook my head. I found myself so overcome with desire for this strange fragrance that I began to quiver. I rubbed my face against the plants. Then I launched myself completely into the bed, crushing stalks and bringing flowers down upon me. Oh bliss! I stretched and rolled and curled my whole body into the redolent foliage. I couldn’t get enough! Never had I abandoned myself so completely to such sensual indulgence—not even during my ill-fated romance with the mackerel tabby. Could this be the legendary catnip? The plant whose potent, almost magical effect is one for which we cats are born with such an unfettered craving? At some point the effect started to wear off. The pleasure became less vivid. The scent less beguiling. Curled like a furry croissant in the flower bed, I closed my eyes and felt the warm afternoon sun on my face.

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who was born in 1882, was considered a hero in Jersey City, although I don’t think that my parents saw him that way. He was born in Dutchess County, NY to a prominent Dutch family and, much later, when I lived in Pawling, New York, I got to know his son, Franklin Roosevelt, Jr. What I remember most vividly, was walking up and down Nelson Avenue on April 12, 1945, announcing that the President had died in Warm Springs, Georgia. I was not yet eleven years old when I followed the details of the transfer of power to Harry S. Truman, who succeeded him to the presidency. Over a year had passed since American troops had landed in Italy and started reclaiming Europe. Hitler committed suicide and Germany surrendered to the Allies a few days later on May 7, 1945, freeing me from the unfounded suspicion of being a Nazi and part of the evil empire in the eyes of my schoolmates.

The hidden beauties of standard authors break upon the mind by surprise. It is like discovering a secret spring in an old jewel. You take up the book in an idle moment, as you have done a thousand times before, perhaps wondering, as you turn over the leaves, what the world finds in it to admire, when suddenly, as you read, your fingers press close upon the covers, your frame thrills, and the passage you have chanced upon chains you like a spell,—it is so vividly true and beautiful. Milton’s ‘Comus’ flashed upon me in this way. I never could read the ‘Rape of the Lock’ till a friend quoted some passages from it during a walk. I know no more exquisite sensation than this warming of the heart to an old author; and it seems to me that the most delicious portion of intellectual existence is the brief period in which, one by one, the great minds of old are admitted with all their time-mellowed worth to the affections.

the sun shines down upon us, the lucky ones...you're the radiant autumn leaves, so bright and vibrant, so vivid and ablaze with warming colors...i am your reflection in the river, only just a bit darker, and hazy opaque, and slightly blurred, more cooled by the waters (but still burning for you)...but we're complimentary mirrors to each other, such beautiful simplicity, two incomplete parts of the perfect whole, we are together one the same...one love in the glowing light

Step 2: Observe what’s vivid. Next, consider what stood out for you the most. Was it the cold in your toes? The smell of jasmine from outside? How rapid your breath was? Be curious about what captures your attention and write it down. Eventually, you can take this practice out into the world. Is there a beautiful sunset? A terrific-smelling restaurant? A warm breeze? When something vivid happens—pay attention to it.