Goose Feather Down Pillows Quotes

It is not, perhaps, entirely because the whale is so excessively unctuous that landsmen seem to regard the eating of him with abhorrence; that appears to result, in some way, from the consideration before mentioned: i.e. that a man should eat a newly murdered thing of the sea, and eat it too by its own light. But no doubt the first man that ever murdered an ox was regarded as murderer; perhaps he was hung; and if he had been put on his trial by oxen, he certainly would have been; and he certainly deserved it if any murderer does. Go to the meat-market of a Saturday night and see the crowds of live bipeds staring up at the long rows of dead quadrupeds. Does not that sight take a tooth out of the cannibal's jaw? Cannibals? who is not a cannibal? I tell you it will be more tolerable for the Fejee that salted down a lean missionary in his cellar against a coming famine; it will be more tolerable for that provident Fejee, I say, in the day of judgment, than for thee, civilized and enlightened gourmand, who nailest geese to the ground and featest on their bloated livers in they pate-de-fois-gras.

But Stubb, he eats the whale by its own light, does he? and that is adding insult to injury, is it? Look at your knife-handle, there, my civilized and enlightened gourmand dining off that roast beef, what is that handle made of? - what but the bones of the brother of the very ox you are eating? And what do you pick your teeth with, after devouring that fat goose? With a feather ~ Herman Melville

He leaned down, far enough that the dark ends of his hair brushed feather-light against her face, caught in her lashes, She had just enough time to take in a breath, to blink, to part her lips before he took them with his own.
Time froze. Her heart ceased to beat. Her eyes fluttered shut.
The cool slip of the small metal loop pressed into her skin as he kissed her.
Urgent.
Gentle.
So slow.
Sweet, soft demolition.
He tasted of cloves and coffee. And of something else. A farawat essence, familiar and yet somehow foreign, too. Something sere and arid.
A little like some.
A little like decay
Ash. ~ Kelly Creagh

Why should she listen to a litany of her flaws when she knew them all so well? She never stood up straight. She always looked down at the ground when she walked. She jutted out her elbows and didn't stand with grace. She never backed up until she felt the chair behind her and then gracefully sank to the cushion like a feather. Instead, she sat like a stone falling to the ground.
When she did laugh, it normally ended in an unladylike snort. She cried much too often when touched by a scene, a flower, a sunset. ~ Karen Ranney

Yes, you can lose somebody overnight, yes, your whole life can be turned upside down. Life is short. It can come and go like a feather in the wind. ~ Shania Twain

Doctor Wilde. Explain how someone got my DNA without my knowledge."
"Um, you know what I'd like to do right now?" Even at seventy-five years old, Doc's voice still got higher-pitched when he was nervous. He tried to give me a sexy look. Little did he know, he always looked sexy to me. "I'd like to suck that fat cock of yours. Let's go to the bedroom."
" You sound like a porn star. It's not as sexy when I know your knee is acting up," I muttered, sliding my arm around his waist and kissing his cheek. "But I'm still going to take you up on it. Later. We'll put some pillows down. ~ Lucy Lennox

I picked her up and carried her down the hall to the bathroom, just a pitiful skeleton with skin stretched over the top and a great red scar across her chest. She sank onto the plastic seat we had got from the hospital and closed her eyes as I washed her, leaning her poor bald head back exhaustedly against the back of the shower cubicle. "I'll just change the sheets," I said, "I won't be a minute - would you rather sit under the water, or shall I turn it off and wrap you up in a towel ?"
"Under the water," she whispered.
I had to strip the bed entirely, and two of the pillows were saturated. I replaced them with pillows from my bed, and while I was at it my duvet as well. Then I propped the poor woman up against the bathroom sink to dry and dress her, picked her up and carried her back to bed. Never have I been so grateful to be, after all, a strapping wench rather than a delicate wisp of a girl.
As I pulled the covers up under her chin she opened her eyes, looked at me sternly and said with nearly her old decision, "This is not the way I wish to be remembered, Josephine."
"I know," I whispered, the tears spilling unchecked down my cheeks. Nurses are supposed to be bright and matter-of-fact about these things: my bracing professional manner left a lot to be desired. "I'll get you some dinner."
"No," she said. "Just my pills, love."
Back in the kitchen I stood for a moment in a trance of indecision, wondering where the hell to start. It didn't re ~ Danielle Hawkins

The Red Keep was full of cats: lazy old cats dozing in the sun, cold-eyed mousers twitching their tails, quick little kittens with claws like needles, ladies' cats all combed and trusting, ragged shadows prowling the midden heaps. One by one Arya had chased them down and snatched them up and brought them proudly to Syrio Forel … all but this one, this one-eared black devil of a tomcat. "That's the real king of this castle right there," one of the gold cloaks had told her. "Older than sin and twice as mean. One time, the king was feasting the queen's father, and that black bastard hopped up on the table and snatched a roast quail right out of Lord Tywin's fingers. Robert laughed so hard he like to burst. You stay away from that one, child."

He had run her halfway across the castle; twice around the Tower of the Hand, across the inner bailey, through the stables, down the serpentine steps, past the small kitchen and the pig yard and the barracks of the gold cloaks, along the base of the river wall and up more steps and back and forth over Traitor's Walk, and then down again and through a gate and around a well and in and out of strange buildings until Arya didn't know where she was.

Now at last she had him. High walls pressed close on either side, and ahead was a blank windowless mass of stone. Quiet as a shadow, she repeated, sliding forward, light as a feather.

When she was three steps away from him, the tomcat bolted. Left, then right, he wen ~ George R.R. Martin

Now I'm free of him and I'm light as a feather. There's no weight holding me down; I'm ready to spread my wings and fly. ~ Larry Holmes

She climbs a tree
And scrapes her knee
Her dress has got a tear.
She waltzes on her way to mass
And whistles on the stair.
And underneath her wimple
She has curlers in her hair!
Maria's not an asset to the abbey.

She's always late for chapel,
But her penitence is real.
She's always late for everything!
Except for every meal.
I hate to have to say it
But I very firmly feel
Maria's not an asset to the abbey!

I'd like to say a word on her behalf.
Maria makes me laugh.

How do you solve a problem like Maria?
How do you catch a cloud and pin it down?
How do you find a word that means Maria?
A flibbertigibbet!
A will o' the wisp!
A clown!

Many a thing you know you'd like to tell her,
Many a thing she ought to understand.
But how do you make her stay
And listen to all you say,
How do you keep a wave upon the sand?
Oh, how do you solve a problem like Maria?
How do you hold a moonbeam in your hand?

When I'm with her I'm confused
Out of focus and bemused,
And I never know exactly where I am.
Unpredictable as weather,
She's as flighty as a feather,
She's a darling,
She's a demon,
She's a lamb.

She'd out-pester any pest,
Drive a hornet from his nest,
She can throw a whirling dervish out of whirl.
She is gentle,
Rodgers & Hammerstein

Situating oneself in a spot of bother is not the coolest idea neither is gulping down pain reliever for another's headache a feather in your cap. ~ Vincent Okay Nwachukwu

Revelation 22:17 says, "And the Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely." One who is athirst may come and is invited to come. And if you "willed" to come, then that is all God requires. It is not walking down an aisle, nor joining a church, nor feeling light as a feather, nor having some great emotional experience that saves one. It is simply turning one's case over to Jesus Christ. ~ John R. Rice

The world was so unbearably pretty, and it continued being so all the way down the mountain to school. I felt slightly high because of the beauty, and the inside of my head tickled. I wondered if this is how artists go through life, with all of its sensations tickling their craniums like a peacock feather.. ~ Douglas Coupland

I get a message from my dad. In the mood I'm in, I tear up to see his name in my inbox, and imagine him down the hall in bed, propped on pillows, emailing me.
"Hon,
Enjoyed our gelato date the other night. I just want to say I'm proud of you for a lot of reasons. Also, I've attached a picture of my foot."
He's such a weirdo goofball. I love him. ~ Sara Zarr

Back home, he sleeps in Clarence's bed. Then he moves across and arranges the pillows beside the ghost of his wife. All three of them lie down together. The pulse of Louis Armstrong sounds out from the record player, the notes moving tenderly through his torment. ~ Colum McCann

Some of them stole off to those cryptical realms which are known only to cats and which villagers say are on the moon's dark side, whither the cats leap from tall housetops; but one small black kitten crept upstairs and sprang in Carter's lap to purr and play, and curled up near his feet when he lay down at last on the little couch whose pillows were stuffed with fragrant drowsy herbs. ~ H.P. Lovecraft

The kids helped keep me together as well. One day they came in from playing after dinner, and I told them I was just completely exhausted by work and everything else. I said I'd take a shower as soon as I finished up; then we'd read and get ready for bed.
They warmed up some towels in the dryer while I was showering and had them waiting for me when I was done. They made some hot coffee--not really understanding that coffee before bed isn't the best strategy. But it was just the way I like it, and waiting on the bed stand. They turned down the bedcovers and even fluffed my pillows.
Most of the time, their gifts are unintentional.
Angel recently decided that, since the Tooth Fairy is so nice, someone should be nice to her. My daughter wrote a little note and left it under her pillow with some coins and her tooth.
Right?
The Tooth Fairy was very taken with that, and wrote a note back.
"I'm not allowed to take money from the children I visit," she wrote. "But I was so grateful. Thank you."
Then there was the time the kids were rummaging through one of Chris's closets and discovered the Christmas Elf.
Now everyone knows that the Christmas Elf only appears on Christmas Eve. He stays for a short while as part of holiday cheer, then magically disappears for the rest of the year.
"What was he doing here!" they said, very concerned, as they brought the little elf to me. "And in Daddy's closet!"
I called on the special brain cells paren ~ Taya Kyle

I love you Kai."
He closed his eyes and shivered as if a feather had been drawn down his back. My own eyes burned all over again. He didn't say it back, but that was okay. I understood. He'd never said those words to anyone in his life, I was certain. The fact that he was here, that he'd comeafter me-this moment-his actions. That's all that mattered to me. ~ Wendy Higgins

To a Young Poet Time cannot break the bird's wing from the bird. Bird and wing together Go down, one feather. No thing that ever flew, Not the lark, not you, Can die as others do. ~ Edna St. Vincent Millay

Who can tell?
Your living is an organized hell.
The mansion of your mind just an oversized cell.
The pressure, everything is done to a measure.
In the sea of competition sunk like a treasure.
Like a feather falling slow spiraling to the floor.
Strung up like a broken violin to your course.
Opportunity is knocking at your door,
But you never left a welcome mat (It doesn't matter anymore.).
Or anyhow, but you're too late to turn back.
Fate pushing you into the wall like a thumbtack.
Ain't no comebacks in this game of life.
Roll the dice again,
Roll it once, never twice.

Keep on going, and taste the stars.
Keep on growing, and raise the bar.
You're living life for the As down to the Zs,
After one drop you got a fountain to seize.

Wanna break from the world, but the world wanna break you,
The weight makes your backbone curl up and make you. ~ Tablo

Belle blinked at the vision before her and inhaled sharply. Books! Books everywhere. The enormous room was two stories tall, with a spiraling stairway on each side leading up to the upper level. Leather-bound volumes filled the shelves from floor to ceiling on both floors, and the upper level looked down upon them with an open loft area surrounded by an ornate wrought-iron railing. Several rolling ladders were in front of the bookcases to allow easy access to even the highest-placed books. And best of all were the chairs and couches around the floor, and the pillows piled high by the windows, perfect for getting comfortable with a story. The library was filled with sunlight during the day, as well as having numerous lamps available for cozy nighttime reading. ~ Shoshanna Evers

He touched her chin. His eyes never left hers, and she almost felt as if he'd touched those as well. And then, with the softest, most tender caress imaginable, he kissed her. Sophie didn't just feel loved; she felt revered.
"I should wait until Monday," he said, "but I don't want to."
"I don't want you to wait," she whispered.
He kissed her again, this time with a bit more urgency. "You're so beautiful," he murmured. "Everything I ever dreamed of."
His lips found her cheek, her chin, her neck, and every kiss, every nibble robbed her of balance and breath. She was sure her legs would give out, sure her strength would fail her under his tender onslaught, and just when she was convinced she'd crumple to the floor, he scooped her into his arms and carried her to the bed.
"In my heart," he vowed, settling her against the quilts and pillows, "you are my wife."
Sophie's breath caught.
"After our wedding it will be legal," he said, stretching out alongside her, "blessed by God and country, but right now - " His voice grew hoarse as he propped himself up on one elbow so that he could gaze into her eyes. "Right now it is true."
Sophie reached up and touched his face. "I love you," she whispered. "I have always loved you. I think I loved you before I even knew you."
He leaned down to kiss her anew, but she stopped him with a breathy, "No, wait."
He paused, mere inches from her lips.
"At the masquerade," she said, her voice ~ Julia Quinn

YOU REALLY DO impress me, you know."

Cade peered down at Brooke, who lay against his chest, curled up in the sheets of her bed. "Thanks. I even impressed myself with that one."

She chuckled. "I wasn't referring to that move you threw in at the end there. Although, yes, well done, you."

"Glad you approve."

"Actually, I was thinking about our conversation earlier, when you were talking about being out with Vaughn and Huxley."

"You're thinking about Vaughn and Huxley while we're lying in bed together? Not sure I like the sound of that."

She perked her head up and looked at him. "Oh . . . so that's not something you would ever consider? The three of you, you know . . . all at once? Because I kind of have this fantasy I was going to talk to you about."

Cade was about to laugh, but then she held his gaze so unflinchingly that for a split second he wondered if she was actually serious.

Okay . . . this definitely was not a conversation he'd ever expected to have with Brooke Parker of Sterling Restaurants, the Gorgeous Green Eyes, and Holy Shit She's Into Foursomes.

But then he saw the telltale sparkle in her eyes.

He exhaled. "You suck."

"Oh my God, you should've seen the look on your - " She cut off, laughing when he beaned her with one of the pillows. Then he bonked her two more times for good measure.

She sprawled across the bed when he'd finished, he ~ Julie James

Elsie was gross. Her eyes were squished above cheek bubbles of fat. Her chin rippled down her neck. She really didn't have a waist except where her stomach bulged out below her chest. Her legs looked like two bed pillows with the ends stuffed in shoes. I knew everyone hated having Elsie in our room. ~ Barthe DeClements

Except fang. I glared at him. "Go on, try to stop me, I dare you." It was like the old days when we used to wrestle, each trying to get the better of the other. I was ready to take him down, my hands curled into fist. "I was just going to say be careful," Fang told me. He stepped closer and brushed some hair out of my eyes. "And I've got your back." He motioned with his head toward the torpedo chamber. Oh my God. It hit me like a tsunami then, how perfect he was for me, how no one else would ever, could ever, be so perfect for me, how he was everything I could possibly hope for, as a friend, boyfriend, maybe even more. He was it for me. There would be no more looking. I really, really loved him, with a whole new kind of love I'd never felt before, something that made every other kind of love I'd ever felt feel washed out and wimpy in comparison. I loved him with every cell in my body, every thought in my head, every feather in my wings, every breathe in my lungs. and air sacs. Too bad I was going out to face almost certain death. Right there in front of everyone, I threw my arms around his neck and smashed my mouth against his. He was startled for a second, then his strong arms wrapped around me so tightly I could hardly breathe. "ZOMG," I heard Nudge whisper, but still fang and I kissed slanting our heads this way and that to get closer. I could have stood there and kissed him happily for the next millennium, but Angel, or what was left of her was still out there in the coul ~ James Patterson

-You know how to call me
although such a noise now
would only confuse the air
Neither of us can forget
the steps we danced
the words you stretched
to call me out of dust
Yes I long for you
not just as a leaf for weather
or vase for hands
but with a narrow human longing
that makes a man refuse
any fields but his own
I wait for you at an
unexpected place in your journey
like the rusted key
or the feather you do not pick up.-

-I WILL NEVER FIND THE FACES
FOR ALL GOODBYES I'VE MADE.-


For Anyone Dressed in Marble
The miracle we all are waiting for
is waiting till the Parthenon falls down
and House of Birthdays is a house no more
and fathers are unpoisoned by renown.
The medals and the records of abuse
can't help us on our pilgrimage to lust,
but like whips certain perverts never use,
compel our flesh in paralysing trust.
I see an orphan, lawless and serene,
standing in a corner of the sky,
body something like bodies that have been,
but not the scar of naming in his eye.
Bred close to the ovens, he's burnt inside.
Light, wind, cold, dark -- they use him like a bride.


I Had It for a Moment

I had it for a moment
I knew why I must thank you
I saw powerful governing men in black suits
I saw them undressed
in the arms of young mistresses
the men more nake ~ Leonard Cohen

During Snow White's story, her mother had somehow survived sharing a castle with the Greatest Evil the World Has Ever Known and come out of it not only okay but Happily Ever After. What advice would her mother give?
Apple knew because Snow White had cross-stitched the words on a pillow and propped it up in the informal receiving room: When Life Is All Dark Woods And Poisoned Apples, Remember You Have Friends. Snow White had stitched messages on other pillows, too, such as: Squirrels Will Never Let You Down, Unless They're Hibernating; There Are Always Birds; Nature Loves A Broom; Love Is Knowing A rabbit Needs You; Hugs Are How It's Done; Double Hugs Are For The Grumpy; Trees And Dogs Are Happy, So Start Barking; and others. Honestly, it was hard to find a sofa in the enormous White Castle that didn't sport a cross-stitched pillow. But the "Remember You Have Friends" one offered the most insight to Apple at the moment. ~ Shannon Hale

The backs of their heads were hollowed out; their faces were nothing but thin masks at the front. Within each hollow a candle was burning. This was so plain to him now, that he wondered he had never noticed it before. He imagined what would happen if he went down into the street and blew some of the candles out. It made him laugh to think of it. He laughed so much that he could no longer stand. His laughter echoed round and round the house. Some small remaining shred of reason warned him that he ought not to let the landlord and his family know what he was doing so he went to bed and muffled the sound of his laughter in the pillows, kicking his legs from time to time with the sheer hilarity of the idea. ~ Susanna Clarke

How'd you get the burn?"
Ignoring him only got me a barrage of chatter.
"Yeah, how?"
'Did something, or someone, do it?"
"You're bleeding."
"It's her knee again."
"She opened it up."
"Did you fall?"
"You've got grass in your hair."
"Were you in a fight?"
"How'd you get grass in your hair?"
"I think she was in a fight."
"Leaves and some dirt, too. And...is that a feather?"
"You were in a fight with a bird?"
"Hey, how did you manage to knock Blake down?"
"She didn't knock me down! I caught her."
"Hah! A little girl took you out."
"Shut up or I'll take you out."
"Her extreme velocity overcame Blake's superior mass."
"I am superior."
"How'd you get moving so fast?"

I stopped abruptly and turned on them, arms gesturing wildly. "Shut up! ~ A. Kirk

Snow. I wondered what it felt like. Aunt Bernette said it could be both soft and hard, cold and hot. It stung and burned when the wind pelted it through the air, and it was a gentle cold feather when it drifted down in lazy circles from the sky. I couldn't imagine it being so many things, and I wondered if she had taken license with her story as Father always claimed. I couldn't stop thinking of it.
Snow. ~ Mary E. Pearson

All she saw, down in the cellar well beneath the stoop, was a light yellow feather with a tip of green. And she had never named him. Had called him "my parrot" all these years. "My parrot." "Love you. "Love you."
Did the dogs get him? Or did he get the message - that she said, "My parrot" and he said, "Love you," and she had never said it back or even taken the trouble to name him - and manage somehow to fly away on wings that had not soared for six years. ~ Toni Morrison

If you were Queen of pleasure
And I were King of pain
We'd hunt down Love together,
Pluck out his flying-feather,
And teach his feet a measure,
And find his mouth a rein;
If you were Queen of pleasure
And I were King of pain. ~ Algernon Charles Swinburne

Diggory's Dyke was a deep cut between two chalk downs-high, green hills, where a thin layer of green grass and reddish earth covered the chalk, and there was scarcely soil enough for trees. The Dyke looked, from a distance, like a white chalk gash on a green velvet board. Local legend had it that the cut was dug, in a day and a night, by one Diggory, using a spade that had once been a sword blade before Wayland Smith had melted it down and beaten it out, on his journey into Faerie from the Wall. There was those who said the sword had once been Flamberge, and others, that it was one the sword Balmung; but there was none who claimed to know just who Diggory had been, and it might all have been stuff and nonsense. Anyway, the path to Wall went through Diggory's Dyke, and any foot-traveler or any person going by any manner of wheeled vehicle went through the Dyke, where the chalk rose on either side of you like thick white walls, and the Downs rose up above them like green pillows of a giant's bed. ~ Neil Gaiman

The rain began the next morning and showed no signs of letting up. Mud sucked at Arin's boots as he helped Kestrel ready her horse. The rain intensified, dropping down like little stones.
Arin squinted up at it. "Terrible day to ride." He hated to see her go.
She wiped water from her face, glancing over at Risha, whose head was tipped back under the rain, eyes closed. "Not for everyone," Kestrel said, "and the rain will make it less likely a Valorian scout will notice that a small band is riding from camp."
True. The middle distance was a gray fog. Arin raked dripping hair off his brow. He tried to be all right. His nerves sparked the way a blade does against the grinder.
Kestrel touched his cheek. "The rain is good for us."
"Come here."
She tasted like the rain: cool and fresh and sweet. Her mouth warmed as he kissed her. He felt the way her clothes stuck to her skin. He forgot himself.
She murmured, "I have something for you."
"You needn't give me anything."
"It's not a gift. It's for you to keep safe until I return." She placed a speckled yellow feather on his palm.
The rain fell in a veil behind her. ~ Marie Rutkoski

What in the sodding Dark happened back there on Aarden? What did you find?"

He stared at her hand for a long moment. His cheek muscle bunched rhythmically, a tell she had learned meant he was struggling over some internal debate. Sigel's Wives burned down from above; Sherp went on snoring away, and Scow appeared to be giving chase again. Mung, Voth and Rantham hadn't moved from where they lay in some time, either, and Biiko was at his post. This was about as alone as they could ever hope to be.

She reached up with her other hand, feather-soft, touched his cheek, his chin. It was rough with stubble, the same fiery copper-and-chestnut as his hair. His jaw stopped twitching and he closed his eyes, but did not resist as she gently turned his head to face her. She could hear the subtle trembling in his breathing and leaned closer, licked her cracked lips.

"Triistan, please...tell me what terrible secret you are guarding..." she whispered, barely a breath really, but his eyes snapped open as if she'd struck him. He looked so sad.

"I'm sorry," he mumbled. Then he was standing, gently disengaging himself from her, and moving towards Biiko where he stood his watch on the other side of the launch. He paused a moment at the mainmast and she thought he might come back, but he only turned his head, speaking over his shoulder without looking at her. His voice was heavy with sorrow.

"Please don't take my journal again." Without botheri ~ T.B. Schmid

Two uniformed trolls were standing in front of Sergeant Colon's high desk, with a slightly smaller troll between them. This troll was wearing a slightly downcast expression. It was also wearing a tutu and had a small pair of gauzed wings glued to its back.
" - happen to know that trolls don't have any tradition of a Tooth Fairy," Colon was saying. "Especially not one called' - he looked down - "Clinkerbell. So how about we just call it breaking and entering without a Thieves' Guild license?"
"Is racial prejudice, not letting trolls have a Tooth Fairy," Clinkerbell muttered.
One of the troll guards upended a sack on the desk. Various items of silverwear cascaded over the paperwork.
"And this is what you found under their pillows, was it?" said Colon.
"Bless dere little hearts," said Clinkerbell. ~ Terry Pratchett

Jay showed up after school with a bouquet of flowers and an armful of DVDs, although Violet couldn't have cared less about either . . . he was all she wanted. She couldn't help the electric thrill of excitement she felt when he came strolling in, grinning at her foolishly as if he hadn't seen her in weeks rather than hours. He scooped her up from the couch and dropped her onto his lap as he sat down where she had been just a moment before. He was careful to arrange her ankle on a neatly stacked pile of pillows beside him.
He stubbornly refused to hide his affection for her, and if Violet hadn't known better she would have sword that he was going out of his way to make her self-conscious in her own home. Fortunately her parents were giving them some space for the time being, and they were left by themselves most of the time.
"Did you miss me?" he asked arrogantly as he gently brushed his lips over hers, not bothering to wait for an answer.
She smiled while she kissed him back, loving the topsy-turvy feeling that her stomach always got when he was so close to her. She wound her arms around his neck, forgetting that she was in the middle of the family room and not hidden away in the privacy of her bedroom.
He pulled away from her, suddenly serious. "You know, we didn't get much time alone yesterday. And I didn't get a chance to tell you . . ."
Violet was mesmerized by the thick timbre of his deep voice. She barely heard his words but rather concentrated ~ Kimberly Derting

Because I don't need oxygen. I've already come to all my conclusions. I'm just slowly gliding down. Someday I'll be as light as a feather. ~ Mark Helprin

It's time to make love, douse the glim; The fireflies twinkle and dim; The stars lean together Like birds of a feather, And the loin lies down with the limb. ~ Conrad Aiken

Laura decided to send a cable to Lady Honoria after all, on the chance that she might still reach her in Baden-Baden. But while she was planning what to say, she felt, all of a sudden, the room start to spin about her, dizzying her, so that she fell back across the bed and across the pillows wondering what was happening to her until everything went as pitch-black as night and she sank down and down and down into a dark, endless tunnel. ~ Rosemary Rogers

Kevin tried to sleep with a pillow tight over his face, and he nearly suffocated himself. When he tiptoed over to close the door, they were talking in a subdued tone on the narrow couch. Colette's bare legs were curled up on the pillows, her head riding on the camelback motion of his chest. But her eyes were open, and she looked more adrift than comforted. In a tired baritone, Jerry was talking about prison. It was a horror story -- about the echoing screams of young kids and eyeballs cut open with smuggled razor blades, beginning as the usual speech about the hell he'd seen. But somehow it bcame a lonesome country-western love song, about how every long night of his life he had dreamed of a woman like her-- quick-witted and beautiful and tenacious. It was more than Kevin expected from the man. He told her that if he could buy her safe passage out of this life, hers and Kevin's, he would; but it was hard with a teenage son always pressing to know more and a tiring and insatiable young girlfriend who wanted to devour the world. Think of the pressure on him. "You need to know that we're together like this partly because of you. You keep us up and running. I know it and Kevin knows it. I'm not a good person, Colette -- I never claimed to be, I don't want to be, and you can't expect me to be. But look me in the eye and accept me as a snake, and I'll tell you whatever you're waiting to hear: I need you, I want you, I hurt for you, down in the dust, honey, down in the dust of my bo ~ Peter Craig

THE ELFIN KNIGHT

Are you going to Scarborough Fair?
Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme
Remember me to one who lives there
She must be a true love of mine

Tell her she'll sleep in a goose-feather bed
Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme
Tell her I sear she'll have nothing to dread
She must be a true love of mine

Tell her tomorrow her answer make known
Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme
What e'er she may say I'll not leave her alone
She must be a true love of mine

Her answer came in a week and a day
Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme
I'm sorry good sir, I must answer thee nay
I'll not be a true love of thine

From the sting of my curse she can never be free
Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme
Unless she unravels my riddlings three
She will be a true love of mine

Tell her to make me a magical shirt
Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme
Without any seam or needlework
Else she'll be a true love of mine

Tell her to find me an acre of land
Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme
Between the salt water and the sea strand
Else she'll be a true love of mine

Tell her to plow it with just a goat's horn
Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme
And sow it all over with one grain of corn
Else she'll be a true love of mine
And her daughters forever possessions of mine ~ Nancy Werlin

I want you, too, Liana." A feather-light kiss, lingering and warm beneath my ear. "I need you… like the sun needs the sky." A hotter kiss down the slope of my neck, while he kept my hands and my body locked in place against the railing. "Like the stars need the night." He removed his mouth from my skin, sliding his hands up my arms, and then backed his body away from mine, holding me at the waist. "Like a dragon needs flight. ~ Juliette Cross

One by one, the snowflakes floated down on to his warm snout, and melted. He reached out to grab them so he could admire them for a fleeting moment. He looked towards the sky and watched them drift down towards him, more and more, soft and light as a feather. 'So that's how it works,' thought Moomintroll. 'And I thought somehow that the snow grew from the ground up! ~ Tove Jansson, Moominland Midwinter

At her feet, a luminous path lit the way through the grassy field. It was made entirely from glow sticks; each of the radiant lights had been painstakingly set into the ground at perfect intervals, tracing a curved trail that shone through the darkness.
Apparently, Jay had been busy.
Near the water's edge, at the end of the iridescent pathway and beneath a stand of trees, Jay had set up more than just a picnic. He had created a retreat, an oasis for the two of them.
Violet shook her head, unable to find the words to speak.
He led her closer, and Violet followed, amazed.
Jay had hung more of the luminous glow sticks from the low-hanging branches, so they dangled overhead. They drifted and swayed in the breeze that blew up from the lake.
Beneath the natural canopy of limbs, he had set up two folding lounge chairs and covered them with pillows and blankets.
"I'd planned to use candles, but the wind would've blown 'em out, so I had to improvise."
"Seriously, Jay? This is amazing." Violet felt awed. She couldn't imagine how long it must have taken him.
"I'm glad you like it."
He led her to one of the chairs and drew her down until she was sitting before he started unpacking the cooler.
She half-expected him to pull out a jar of Beluga caviar, some fancy French cheeses, and Dom Perignon champagne. Maybe even a cluster of grapes to feed to her…one at a time. So when he started laying out their picnic, Violet laughed.
Instea ~ Kimberly Derting

He was looking at Mr. Nancy, an old black man with a pencil moustache, in his check sports jacket and his lemon yellow gloves, riding a carousel lion as it rose and lowered, high in the air; and, at the same time, in the same place, he saw a jeweled spider as high as a horse, its eyes an emerald nebula, strutting, staring down at him; and simultaneously he was looking at an extraordinarily tall man with teak colored skin and three sets of arms, wearing a flowing ostrich-feather headdress, his face painted with red stripes, riding an irritated golden lion, two of his six hands holding on tightly to the beast's mane; and he was also seeing a young black boy, dressed in rags, his left foot all swollen and crawling with black flies; and last of all, and behind all these things, Shadow was looking at a tiny brown spider, hiding under a withered ochre leaf. Shadow saw all these things, and he knew they were the same thing. ~ Neil Gaiman

Waking to the sound of the bells for third-gold, I found myself staring up at a pair of interested brown eyes.
"She's awake!" my watcher called over her shoulder. Then she turned back to me and grinned. She had a pointed face, curly dark hair escaping from two short braids, and a merry voice as she said, "Splat!" She clapped her hands lightly. "We were fair guffered when you toppled right off Drith, facedown in the chickenyard mud. Lucky it was so early, for no one was about but us."
I winced.
She grinned again. "You're either the worst horse thief in the entire kingdom, or else you're that missing countess. Which is it?"
"Ara." The voice of quiet reproach came from the doorway.
I lifted my eyes without moving my head, saw a matron of pleasant demeanor and comfortable build come into the room bearing a tray.
Ara jumped up. She seemed a couple years younger than I. "Let me!"
"Only if you promise not to pester her with questions," the mother replied. "She's still much too ill."
Ara shrugged, looking unrepentant. "But I'm dying to know."
The mother set the tray down on a side table and smiled down at me. She had the same brown eyes as her daughter, but hers were harder to read. "Can you sit up yet?"
"I can try," I said hoarsely.
"Just high enough so's we can put these pillows behind you." Ara spoke over her shoulder as she dashed across the room.
My head ached just to watch her, and I closed my eyes again.
"Ara."Sherwood Smith