Quotes About Nature

possums are among the least likely of any mammal to contract rabies. In fact, they are one of the most disease-free animals

He skied Mount Bachelor. I wasn't much of a skier, so I went off to track down wildlife while he had a great time on the slopes. Meeting him at the lodge afterward, I had to head off a leggy blonde who was intent on teaching Steve how to use an American pay phone. Not the kind of wildlife I was interested in him experiencing.

The name of the zoo was the Queensland Reptile and Fauna Park. As I crossed the parking area, I prepared myself for disappointment. I am going to see a collection of snakes, lizards, and miserable creatures in jars, feel terribly sorry for them, and leave.

Crocodiles are easy,' Steve said, 'they try to kill and eat you. People are harder. Sometimes they pretend to be your friend first.

Never has the earth been so lovely nor the sun so bright, as today . . . —NIKINAPI

From the beginning there were drums, beating out world rhythm—the booming, never-failing tide on the beach; the four seasons, gliding smoothly, one from the other; when the birds come, when they go, the bear hibernating for his winter sleep. Unfathomable the way, yet all in perfect time. Watch the heartbeat in your wrist—a precise pulsing beat of life's Drum—with loss of timing you are ill. —JIMALEE BURTON (HO-CHEE-NEE), CHEROKEE, 1974

The Cherokee lives as a natural part of his environment and strives to complement it, not subdue or dominate it. It's an Indian philosophy that is playing an increasing role in everyone's life now that we realize that natural resources are limited and imbalance between man's technology and nature is perilously close to disaster. —HUEY P. LONG, CHEROKEE

The Crow country is good country. The Great Spirit has put it exactly in the right place; while you are in it you fare well; whenever you go out of it, which ever way you travel, you fare worse . . . There is no country like Crow country. —ARAPOOSH, CROW, 1833

Take only memories, leave nothing but footprints. —CHIEF SEATTLE (SEATHL), DUWAMISH-SUQUAMISH, 1785–1866 A

The earth has received the embrace of the sun and we shall see the results of that love. —HUNKESNI (SITTING BULL), HUNKPAPA SIOUX, 1831-1890 A

Scratch a schoolboy and you find a savage.

seen the big bear, he squatted down to read

Always there was a moment—a quick slip of time—when the sun broke free of the trees and bled from its yolk, spilling in red-orange rivers over the silk.

That's the nature of praise. It draws our attention away from our problems, no matter how overwhelming they are, and lifts our gaze to God.

We're kind to the pigs and the chickens as well, mama. But then butchery comes and we prosper. It is the way of things.

And still the storm approaches. And there's nothing I can do. So I wait and watch and feel his breath against my face, cool and brave. His salt licks my skin, his promise brushes my hair. His fury drives the wind to touch my cheek and whisper something I can't hear. I think he loves me. I think he comes to see me. I am young. I will learn

The ocean tosses up a thousand arms to embrace the storm that falls across her like a drunken sailor. His thunder slaps her thighs, his lighting piercing her waters. They pound me between the hips and I begin to panic, knowing their passion will destroy me.

Empirical reality becomes nature when we view it with respect to its universal characteristics; it becomes history when we view it as particular and individual.

If cats looked like frogs we'd realize what nasty, cruel little bastards they are. Style. That's what people remember.

For animals, the entire universe has been neatly divided into things to (a) mate with, (b) eat, (c) run away from, and (d) rocks.

Music can also be a sensual pleasure, like eating food or sex. But its highest vibration for me is that point of taking us to a real understanding of something in our nature which we can very rarely get at. It is a spiritual state of oneness.

Once upon a time, when women were birds, there was the simple understanding that to sing at dawn and to sing at dusk was to heal the world through joy. The birds still remember what we have forgotten, that the world is meant to be celebrated.

The world is holy. We are holy. All life is holy. Daily prayers are delivered on the lips of breaking waves, the whisperings of grasses, the shimmering of leaves.

I pray to the birds because they remind me of what I love rather than what I fear. And at the end of my prayers, they teach me how to listen.