Quotes About Reflection

When anger rushes unrestrained to action, like a hot steed, it stumbles on its way. The man of thought strikes deepest and strikes safely.

What a wonderful person I am!

A man does not know whose hands will stroke from him the last bubbles of his life. That alone should make him kinder to strangers.

At midnight I looked about to discover that I was the oldest living human being in the world. A twinge of shame. I should be at home, I thought, in my slippers and my bronchitic scarf.

Each person's self has become his principal burden; to know oneself has become an end, instead of a means through which one knows the world.

I mean here to propound a paradox, that people can actively enter into their own passivity.

On the other hand, if there's an underlying core of poetry that I go to, I go to the sea. I've lived on the sea all my life. I live on the sea in Cape Breton.

Every human being, no matter how 'ignorant' or submerged in the 'culture of silence' he may be, is capable of looking critically at his world in dialogical encounter with others.

the more that sin is seen, the more it is hated, and therefore it is less. Dust particles are in a room before the sun shines, but they only appear then.

Nay, [2] after conversion we need bruising, that (1) reeds may know themselves to be reeds, and not oaks; even reeds need bruising, by reason of the remainder of pride in our nature, and to let us see that we live by mercy. And (2) that weaker Christians may not be too much discouraged when they see the stronger shaken and bruised.

And there is a proud kind of moderation likewise, when men will take upon them to censure both parties, as if they were wiser than both

True love is carried to the person; It is adulterous love, to love the thing, or the gift more than the person, St. Paul loved the person of Christ, because he felt sweet experience that Christ loved him; his love was but a reflection of Christ's love first, he loved to see Christ, to embrace him, and enjoy him, that had done so much and suffered so much for his soul, that had forgiven him so many sins

I swear, I end up feeling empty, like you've taken something out of me and I have to search my body for scars.

History repeats itself. Someone says this. History throws its shadow over beginning, over the desktop, over the sock drawer with its socks, its hidden letters. history is the little man in a brown suit trying to define a room he is outside of, I know history. There are many names in history... but none of them are ours.

I'm not suggesting the world is good, that life is easy, or that any of us are entitled to better. But please, isn't this the kind of thing you talk about in somber tones, in the afternoon, with some degree of hope and maybe even a handful of strategies?

Wearing your clothes or standing in the shower for over an hour, pretending that this skin is your skin, these hands your hands, these shins, these soapy flanks

Dear Forgiveness, you know that recently we have had our difficulties and there are many things I want to ask you.

You are playing cards with three Jeffs. One is your father, one is your brother, and the other is your current boyfriend. All of them have seen you naked and heard you talking in your sleep. Your boyfriend Jeff gets up to answer the phone. To them he is a mirror, but to you he is a room.

Something's not right about what I'm doing but I'm still doing it— living in the worst parts, ruining myself.

Sometimes, at night, in bed, before I fall asleep, I think about a poem I might write, someday, about my heart, says the heart.

Do we simply stare at what is horrible and forgive it?

I'm sorry about the blood in your mouth. I wish it was mine.

Even when I look away I am still looking.

The best part of spirituality is reverence. There are other parts. Some people like to hear the sound of their own voice. If you don't believe in the world it would be stupid to paint it. If you don't believe in God, then who are you talking to?