Quotes About Innocence

may the tide that is entering even now the lip of our understanding carry you out beyond the face of fear may you kiss the wind then turn from it certain that it will love your back may you open your eyes to water water waving forever and may you in your innocence sail through this to that — Lucille Clifton, "blessing the boats," Blessing the Boats: New and Selected Poems, 1988-2000 . (BOA Editions Ltd. April 1, 2000)

Believe me, that was a happy age, before the days of architects, before the days of builders.

To children, especially religious little ones, Heaven is always very near, and that one of its denizens should come to them does not seem so improbable as it does to mature minds.

Könnt eins doch allweil ein Kind bleiben! Da ist jeder Tag ein ganzes Leben. Nachher schlafst du und fangst wieder ein neues an.

Only the pure in heart can make a good soup.

My mother nods toward Violet and her little friend, sprinkling grass over their mud pies. "This has been going on so much longer than either of us, Kennedy. From where you stepped in, in your life, it looks like we've got miles to go. But me?" She smiles in the direction of the girls. "I look at that, and I guess I'm amazed at how far we've come." —

Children are supposed to go to school, play on swing sets, skin their knees.

the smile of a child is a tattoo: indelible art.

Babies are such blank slates. They don't come into this world with the assumptions their parents have made, or the promises their church will give, or the ability to sort people into groups they like and don't like. They don't come into this world with anything, really, except a need for comfort. And they will take it from anyone, without judging the giver.

The baby's body lay in a bassinet. He was the size of a half loaf of bread, his bones light as a bird's and stretched with thin skin.

What I want, more than anything, is to turn back time a little. To become the kid I used to be, who believed whatever my mother said was one hundred percent true and right without looking hard enough to see the hairline cracks.

Every baby is born beautiful. It's what we project on them that makes them ugly.

every baby is born beautiful. It's what we project on them that makes them ugly.

When I was little I used to read the obituaries and one day I asked my mother why people die in alphabetical order.

Babies are such blank slates. They don't come into this world with the assumptions their parents have made, or the promises their church will give, or the ability to sort people into groups they like and don't like.

Regardez mon enfant, voyez l'éclat de ses boucles folles et son sourire pareil à un vol de papillon. Un tel visage ne peut pas être celui de quelqu'un qui meurt à petit feu. Je ne la connais que depuis deux ans. Mais si vous preniez chaque souvenir, chaque instant, si vous les étiriez bout à bout, ça ferait une éternité.

one person's trauma is another's loss of innocence. Ervin

In my first memory, I am three years old and I am trying to kill my sister.

one person's trauma is another's loss of innocence.

When I was four years old, I kept telling my mother that the little boy in our house was stealing things.

Innocence ain't all it's cracked up to be, you know. Innocent little kids rip the wings off flies, because they don't know any better. That's innocence.

Those days were like a crown of gold over her head. Her hair was a knotted nest of some tiny white and yellow flowers with little bluebells wrapped inside her curls. Maybe she'd bring him a sandwich or a bottle of Coca-Cola, all cold and full of beads of ice along the side. Wasn't it all so pretty? Wasn't it all so nice?

But she had to go to bed first, and all night she slept soundly on her bed of hay, dreaming of nothing but of shining mountains with red roses all over them, among which happy little Snowflake went leaping in and out.

Heidi, it's just as if we were in a high carriage and were going to drive straight into heaven.