Quotes About Loss

If only it were possible to grasp the moment when two people first become strangers to each other.

But, alas! in this world nothing lasts forever. Even the moon is not always perfect in shape, but loses its roundness with time, and flowers bloom and then fade.

i smile. things taken for granted have a way of catching you offguard when you least expect it, and then you're taken by what the portuguese calls saudade, a sense of longing for something, someone not there anymore.

When the dead departed, they took away any falsehoods that they might have allowed us to believe while alive; we who are left behind have to embark on a different life, since the dead are no longer here to help us deceive ourselves.

she knew that in all stories she must be left out-the life she had made for herself was a life of flight, of discarding the inessential and the essential alike, making use of the stolen pieces and memories, retreating to the lost moments of other people's lives.

Time corrupts. And we pay a price for everything corruptible: food, roof beams, souls.

The decaying that had dragged on for too long had only turned tragedy into nuisance; death, when it strikes, better completes its annihilating act on the first try.

but like all mothers whose children are growing up and drifting away from them, she felt an urge to stay in his shack as long as she could, to cling to anything that she could use, when he vanished from her life, to reconstruct a son from memory.

But how do you speak to a granddaughter in her dead mother's stead? Can the responsibility to the dead ever be replaced by the responsibility to the living?

It had never occurred to Teacher Gu that he and his wife were to pay for the bullet that would take their daughter's life, but why question such absurdity when it was not his position to ask?

To be forgotten was a defeat. To be doomed to remember someone was a defeat, too.

I grew up with the dread of seeing piles of old newspapers collect dust and used matches put back into matchboxes. But more than that, I dreaded the memories that were not mine, yet were so adamant to be heard and remembered as the only memories that mattered.

and left. When the three children died in the same year she remained indifferent to Nikolai's loss. Worse than enduring a tyrannical parent is to be the favored child.

The mass and majesty of this world, all That carries weight and always weighs the same Lay in the hands of others; they were small And could not hope for help and no help came: What their foes liked to do was done, their shame Was all the worst could wish; they lost their pride And died as men before their bodies died. —W. H. AUDEN, "THE SHIELD OF ACHILLES

Boy, Whitey, I hope I never see my name up there. To Whitey Ford during scoreboard tribute on opening day to recently deceased Yankees.

Quant à l'endroit où se trouvait mon père, le jour de ses funérailles, ma mère me l'avait indiqué. C'est un peu loin, mais un jour ou l'autre nous irons le rejoindre, il n'y a pas à craindre de s'égarer. Ton papa est gentil, il est seulement parti devant pour voir comment c'était, m'avait-elle dit.

When you go to war, both sides lose totally.

This piercing cold I feel:my dead wife's comb, in our bedroomunder my heel…

The bell strikes One. We take no note of time But from its loss. To give it then a tongue Is wise in man. As if an angel spoke, I feel the solemn sound. If heard aright, It is the knell of my departed hours.

I'm trying to think of the number of championship games that we were in and that I was in, and I honestly lose track. It was like, have I been in four or five? Was it before I got there in '87, had they been in three or four? I don't mean to be flippant at all. I'm literally not sure how many championship games --? I know how many we won, that's easy, but how many we lost, they are bitter.

Transformation without work and pain, without suffering, without a sense of loss is just an illusion of true change.

V?a nãy anh khóc là c? t??ng Nh?t L?c ?ã ch?t, bây gi? khóc là vì ?ã trông th?y Nh?t L?c v?n còn s?ng…

Di colpo privata di due persone, come ce l'avrebbe fatta ad andare avanti questa famiglia? Era come una pentola spezzata: mezza pentola non fa una pentola, mezza famiglia non fa una famiglia.

Chunsheng," gli dissi, "non devi assolutamente fare il pazzo, i morti stessi vorrebbero tornare a vivere, un uomo sano e forte come te non può morire!" Poi aggiunsi: "La vita te l'hanno data tuo padre e tua madre, se non la vuoi più, devi prima chiederlo a loro". "Mio padre e mia madre sono morti da tempo," disse Chunsheng asciugandosi le lacrime. "A maggior ragione, allora, devi vivere e bene, pensaci: hai fatto tante guerre in giro per il mondo, è stato forse facile restare in vita?