Forbidden Ground Quotes

All roads lead to Rome, and there were times when it might have struck us that almost every branch of study or subject of conversation skirted forbidden ground. ~ Henry James

Under the olive trees, from the ground Grows this flower, which is a wound. It is easier to ignore Than the heroes' sunset fire Of death plunged in their willed desire Raging with flags on the world's shore. ~ Stephen Spender

As a mode of perception that often becomes a style of life, paranoia weaves around the vulnerable self or group an air-tight metaphysic and world view. Paranoia is an antireligious mysticism based on the feeling or perception that the world in general, and others in particular, are against me or us. Reality is perceived as hostile. By contrast, the religious mystic experiences the ground of being as basically friendly to the deepest needs of the self. That which is unknown, strange, or beyond our comprehension is with and for rather than against us. ~ Sam Keen

Immature people falling in love destroy each other's freedom, create a bondage, make a prison. Mature persons in love help each other to be free; they help each other to destroy all sorts of bondages. And when love flows with freedom there is beauty. When love flows with dependence there is ugliness.

A mature person does not fall in love, he or she rises in love. Only immature people fall; they stumble and fall down in love. Somehow they were managing and standing. Now they cannot manage and they cannot stand. They were always ready to fall on the ground and to creep. They don't have the backbone, the spine; they don't have the integrity to stand alone.

A mature person has the integrity to stand alone. And when a mature person gives love, he or she gives without any strings attached to it. When two mature persons are in love, one of the great paradoxes of life happens, one of the most beautiful phenomena: they are together and yet tremendously alone. They are together so much that they are almost one. Two mature persons in love help each other to become more free. There is no politics involved, no diplomacy, no effort to dominate. Only freedom and love. ~ Osho

But when Odysseus rose, that man of many devices, fixing his down-cast eyes on the ground he stood: nor his scepter swayed, either this way or that like a practiced speaker, but held it motionless, even as a man unskilled in the arts of persuasion. One would declare him mute with passion or wanting in judgment. But when he spoke, when his powerful voice went forth from his bosom, issuing words which fell like flakes of snow in winter, surely no mortal man might hope to compete with Odysseus. Lost in wonder we sat, but not, as before, at his manner. ~ Homer

For someone making a pilot, assuming the talent is there and you can maneuver the system properly, it's just a matter of standing your ground and trying to make something great until you are making enough money for the studio that they let you keep making it. ~ Alex Graves

As a revelation from God, they have stood the test of many ages; and as such maintained their ground against every species of enemy, and every mode of attack. Truth is mighty, and must prevail. ~ Adam Clarke

Diderot took the ground that, if orthodox religion be true Christ was guilty of suicide. Having the power to defend himself he should have used it. ~ Robert Green Ingersoll

If an economy is to sustain progress, it must satisfy the basic principles of ecology. If it does not, it will decline and eventually collapse. There is no middle ground ~ Lester R. Brown

You can be our critic. Would you dig that? (Yes, he was the last Man in America who could say "dig" with a straight face without referring to the process of using a tool to remove dirt from the ground.) ~ Jordan Sonnenblick

In the land of Uz, there lived a man, righteous and God-fearing, and he had great wealth, so many camels, so many sheep and asses, and his children feasted, and he loved them very much and prayed for them. 'It may be that my sons have sinned in their feasting.' Now the devil came before the Lord together with the sons of God, and said to the Lord that he had gone up and down the earth and under the earth. 'And hast thou considered my servant Job?' God asked of him. And God boasted to the devil, pointing to his great and holy servant. And the devil laughed at God's words. 'Give him over to me and Thou wilt see that Thy servant will murmur against Thee and curse Thy name.' And God gave up the just man He loved so, to the devil. And the devil smote his children and his cattle and scattered his wealth, all of a sudden like a thunderbolt from heaven. And Job rent his mantel and fell down upon the ground and cried aloud, 'Naked came I out of my mother's womb, and naked shall I return into the earth; the Lord gave and the Lord has taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord for ever and ever.'

Fathers and teachers, forgive my tears now, for all my childhood rises up again before me, and I breathe now as I breathed then, with the breast of a little child of eight, and I feel as I did then, awe and wonder and gladness. The camels at that time caught my imagination, and Satan, who talked like that with God, and God who gave His servant up to destruction, and His servant cryi ~ Fyodor Dostoyevsky

I had a temper when I played junior golf and had my clubs taken away for slamming them on the ground. I learned very quickly that I didn't want my clubs taken away from me. ~ Matt Kuchar

Where there is sorrow, there is holy ground. ~ Oscar Wilde

Thanks to the moon, the ground in front of me was well-lit, and I wondered if this were the reason God created and placed the moon up there in the first place, so girls like me could effortlessly sneak out in the midst of night, or maybe so their fathers might catch them. ...I prayed that God put the moon up there for the first reason and not the second. ~ Christine Lemmon

I assume that a sufficiently skilled will be able to do anything not explicitly forbidden by the hardware. ~ Bjarne Stroustrup

Espionage has something of the quality of a dream. In the spy's world, as in dreams, the terrain is always uncertain. You put your foot on what looks like solid ground and it gives way under you and you go into a kind of free fall, turning slowly tail over tip and clutching onto things that are themselves falling. This instability, this myriad-ness, that the world takes on, is both the attraction and terror of being a spy. Attraction, because in the midst of such uncertainty you are never required to be yourself; whatever you do, there is another, alternative you standing invisibly to one side, observing, evaluating, remembering…. This is the secret power of the spy… it is the power to be and not be, to detach oneself from oneself, to be oneself and at the same time another. The trouble is, if I were always at least two versions of myself, so all others must be similarly twinned with themselves in this awful, slippery way. ~ John Banville

Oh. Wow.'
'What?'
He held my hand up between us. 'Look.'
I squinted at my hands. 'I don't see anything.' Sighing, he flipped my hand over, and my jaw hit the ground. A faint blue line marked the center of my palm with a smaller line through it. It would've looked like a cross, except the horizontal line was slanted.
'Oh. My. Gods.' I jerked my hand away, scrambling back. 'I have a rune on my hand. It's an Apollyon rune, isn't it.'
Seth rested his hands on his knees. 'I think so. I have one like that.'
'But why is it still there? Why is it there at all?' I flipped my palm over several times, shook it, but the faint blue tattoo was still there. 'You can see it, right? Like right now, you can see it?'
'Yes. It hasn't faded.' Seth leaned forward, catching my hand. 'Stop shaking it like it's a damn Etch-A-Sketch. That doesn't make them disappear. ~ Jennifer L. Armentrout

Mr. Bradshaw was, in a way, my second father. I trusted him and wanted to make him proud. But that day, as I lowered myself to the ground in shock, it was hard to believe I was staring up at the same person. ~ Embee

Nature has no beauty forbidden
Manmade concrete slab: guilt-ridden
Wings or leaves whatever we may care
Those limbs with the birds only trees will share ~ Munia Khan

I spent the last Friday of summer vacation spreading hot, sticky tar across the roof of George Washington High. My companions were Dopey, Toothless, and Joe, the brain surgeons in charge of building maintenance. At least they were getting paid. I was working forty feet above the ground, breathing in sulfur fumes from Satan's vomitorium, for free.
Character building, my father said.
Mandatory community service, the judge said. Court-ordered restitution for the Foul Deed. He nailed me with the bill for the damage I had done, which meant I had to sell my car and bust my hump at a landscaping company all summer. Oh, and he gave me six months of meetings with a probation officer who thought I was a waste of human flesh.
Still, it was better than jail.
I pushed the mop back and forth, trying to coat the seams evenly. We didn't want any rain getting into the building and destroying the classrooms. Didn't want to hurt the school. No, sir, we sure didn't. ~ Laurie Halse Anderson

I am very sure of the ground I stand on. I am also very sure that it is the path shared by republicans across this island genuinely interested in building a new agreed Ireland: republicans who put Ireland before ego, criminality, and self-gain. ~ Martin McGuinness

The boy will remain a son and never become a father. He will be forgotten by the crowd once his blood is rinsed clean from the ground; his sister will think of him but soon she will forget him, too. He will live on only in Han's memory, a child punished not for his own insincerity but someone else's disbelief. ~ Yiyun Li

To be successful, you have to be out there, you have to hit the ground running ~ Richard Branson

The teaching fellow establishes the atmosphere of a class in the first few meetings. I have found that students appreciate having the ground rules clearly defined from the start. ~ Catherine Asaro

There may be dead ground in between; and I may not have got The knack of judging a distance; I will only venture A guess that perhaps between me and the apparent lovers, (Who, incidentally, appear by now to have finished,) At seven o'clock from the houses, is roughly a distance Of about one year and a half. ~ Henry Reed

When it comes to wildlife, no state is deadlier than Florida. Let me count the ways: fire ants, mosquitoes, alligators, eastern diamondback rattlers, black bears, panthers, coral snakes, bull sharks, jellyfish, black widow spiders, water moccasins, wasps, crocodiles, pygmy rattlers, brown recluse spiders, wild boar, copperheads, scorpions, Burmese pythons. And ticks. No state has more attacks from fire ants, sharks, or snakes. Let's not forget Mother Nature, who is equally aggressive. Florida is the lightning capital of the United States, attracting by far the most strikes to ground, injuries (more than two thousand since 1959) and fatalities (nearly five hundred since 1959). About seven people die each year from lightning in the Sunshine State, accounting for about 15 percent of the total number of U.S. fatalities each year. ~ Joe Gisondi

The notion that graduate school is a specialized training ground for future professors has been untenable for more than two generations, but the antiquated structure of graduate education marks our collective longing for a brief postwar golden age when a job as a professor was waiting for anyone with a doctorate. This ~ Leonard Cassuto

God saw Hansen tighten his chokehold on Day and he could see his lover fighting to breathe. Day's ears and neck were bright red. His lips were turning a darker color as his body was deprived of oxygen. Hansen pressed the barrel in deeper and yelled.

"Two minutes and fifteen seconds before I get to zero and I provide the great state of Georgia the luxury of one less narc."

God's mind exploded at the thought of not having Day in a world he lived in. He looked into his partner's glistening eyes and saw he was turning blue and possibly getting ready to faint. Day was still looking at him, looking into God's green eyes.

No, no, no! He's saying good-bye.

God closed his eyes and released a loud, gut-wrenching growl cutting off the SWAT leader's negotiations.

"Godfrey, get yourself under control," his captain said while grabbing for him.

God jerked himself away from the hold and stepped forward, his angry eyes boring into Hansen's dark ones. Hansen stared at him as if God was crazy. Little did he know God was at that moment.

"Godfrey, get back here and stand down. That's an order, Detective!" his captain barked.

God's large hands clenched at his sides fighting not to pull out his weapons. He ground his teeth together so hard his jaw ached.

"Do you have any idea of the shit storm you're about to bring down on your life," God spoke with a menacing snarl while his large frame shook with fu ~ A.E. Via

Ohlen stood and walked around the clearing, examining the ground as he went. "I see only one set of tracks ... " his voice trailed off as he knelt, inspecting the footprints more closely. "I've seen these before. This is the cru'gan."
Ahmahn came over and bent down beside his friend. "Him? Do you mean the scarred one that has Mirra?"
"Either that or a ferocious rabbit wearing cru'gan boots," Ohlen said sardonically. ~ Steven Scott Williamson

As though it had always been forbidden to remember
each of us grew up
knowing nothing about the beginning ~ W.S. Merwin

My girlfriend is a great support, and I've got a big circle of mates who keep my feet on the ground. ~ Rob James-Collier

Sabbaths, 1982 - IV
("A gardener rises out of the ground")


Thrush song, stream song, holy love
That flows through earthly forms and folds,
The song of Heaven's Sabbath fleshed
In throat and ear, in stream and stone,
A grace living here as we live,
Move my mind now to that which holds
Things as they change.
The warmth has come.
The doors have opened. Flower and song
Embroider ground and air, lead me
Beside the healing field that waits;
Growth, death, and a restoring form
Of human use will make it well.
But I go on, beyond, higher
In the hill's fold, forget the time
I come from and go to, recall
This grove left out of all account,
A place enclosed in song.
Design
Now falls from thought. I go amazed
Into the maze of a design
That mind can follow but not know,
Apparent, plain, and yet unknown,
The outline lost in earth and sky.
What form wakens and rumples this?
Be still. A man who seems to be
A gardener rises out of the ground,
Stands like a tree, shakes off the dark,
The bluebells opening at his feet,
The light a figured cloth of song. ~ Wendell Berry

At the center of President Obama's strategy for dealing with the Islamic State is an empty space. It's supposed be filled by a 'Sunni ground force,' but after more than a year of effort, it's still not there. Unless this gap is filled, Obama's plan won't work. ~ David Ignatius

Ford considers that development journalism means getting behind the cliches of starving children and getting people to tell their own stories: "We are looking at big policies affecting developing countries and looking at how this relates on the ground to those who expect to be benefiting. ~ Anonymous

In waiting for the glorious moment of that first book contract, writers must have giant reservoirs of patience. Yet they must persevere because they don't know the destiny that is being worked out for them. They creep humbly along the ground, without the spacious aerial vision of their lives that would show them the destiny in store for them. ~ Ron Chernow

The museums and parks are graveyards above the ground- congealed memories of the past that act as a pretext for reality. ~ Robert Smithson

Sitting on the ground, she looked up at her best friend. "Danke," she said. "Thank you."
Rudy bowed. "My pleasure." He tried for a little more. "No point asking if I get a kiss for that, I guess?"
"For bringing my shoes, which you left behind?"
"Fair enough." He held up his hands and continued speaking as they walked on, and Liesel made a concerted effort to ignore him. She only heard the last part. "Probably wouldn't want to kiss you anyway
not if your breath's anything like your shoes."
"You disgust me," she informed him, and she hoped he couldn't see the escaped beginnings of a smile that had fallen from her mouth. ~ Markus Zusak

I'm the son of Jupiter!" he shouted, and just for effect, he summoned the winds, rising a few feet off the ground. "I'm a child of Rome, consul to demigods, praetor of the First Legion. ~ Rick Riordan

Maybe tomorrow is counting on me
To learn my lessons today
I'll start by taking a step at a time
And stop throwing my blessings away
I'll get myself up and I'll brush myself off
And take back some of the pride that I've lost
'Cause you can't always keep your feet on the ground
I guess we all learn the hard way and we all fall down ~ Bekka Bramlett

Like water spilt upon the ground
alas, Our little lives flow swiftly on and pass; Yet may they bring rich harvests and green grass! ~ Henry Van Dyke

We are ever striving after what is forbidden, and coveting what is denied us. ~ Ovid

now I'm blinking in a new gloaming
and all I see as I'm stretched low down here
is a world of women flat on their frozen
faces. we are the ground itself, corporeal
carpet of cells, softness calloused hard
beneath the pebbled soles of the fathers
and husbands and brothers and priests

and it's a horror if you could see it,
a world of women ruined
by man's fear. ~ Beth Morey