Greyhound Quotes

I liked to call myself a poet and had affected a habit of reading classical texts (in translation, of course – I was a lazy student). I would ride the Greyhound for thirty-six hours down from the Midwest to Leechfield, then spend days dressed in black in the scalding heat of my mother's front porch reading Homer (or Ovid or Virgil) and waiting for someone to ask me what I was reading. No one ever did. People asked me what I was drinking, how much I weighed, where I was living, and if I had married yet, but no one gave me a chance to deliver my lecture on Great Literature. ~ Mary Karr

Sometimes the fluffy bunny of incredulity zooms around the bend so rapidly that the greyhound of language is left, agog, in the starting cage. ~ David Mitchell

When the windows like the jackal's eye and desire pierce the dawn, silken windlasses lift me up to suburban footbridges. I summon a girl who is dreaming in the little gilded house; she meets me on the piles of black moss and offers me her lips which are stones in the rapid river depths. Veiled forebodings descend the buildings' steps. The best thing is to flee from the great feather cylinders when the hunters limp into the sodden lands. If you take a bath in the watery patterns of the streets, childhood returns to the country like a greyhound. Man seeks his prey in the breezes and the fruits are drying on the screens of pink paper, in the shadow of the names overgrown by forgetfulness. Joys and sorrows spread in the town. Gold and eucalyptus, similarly scented, attack dreams. Among the bridles and the dark edelweiss subterranean forms are resting like perfumers' corks. ~ Andre Breton

I think writing a poem is like being a greyhound. Writing a novel is like being a mule. You go up one long row, then down another, and try not to look up too often to see how far you still have to go. ~ Ron Rash

Anger does not come easy to me. It is something I have to encourage, like a greyhound in second place. ~ Joe Dunthorne

I'm born originally in Toronto, and I have what I call my 'Fame' story. I took a Greyhound bus and went to Alvin Ailey and received Dunham, Horton, Graham technique there, but I could never take my eyes off of Balanchine doing 'Nutcracker'; to me he's the best who ever did it. ~ Laurieann Gibson

I'm not your destiny, or the Devil either!' I said. 'Look at you! Came to kill evil with your bare hands, and now away you go with no more glory than a man sideswiped by a Greyhound bus! And that's all the glory you deserve!' I said. 'That's all that any man at war with pure evil deserves. ~ Kurt Vonnegut

The Magyars were claimed to be descendants of the hideous Asiatic Scythians of legend, half men and half apes, a witches' brood begotten by devils. The sources - chronicles and annals - were all copied from one another, not on the basis of eyewitness accounts but following the characterisation of older chroniclers. Soon the "new barbarians" became identified with the Huns, who are remembered only too well in Europe. Attila had, after all, become in Western eyes the embodiment of barbarism, the anti-Christ, and at the time of the Renaissance he already appeared in Italian legends as the king of the Hungarians, constantly hatching plots, and depicted with dog ears, the bestial offspring of a greyhound and a princess locked up in a tower.12 ~ Paul Lendvai

Thank God and Greyhound you're gone. ~ Roy Clarke

Some men, when they do you a kindness, at once demand the payment of gratitude from you; others are more modest than this. However, they remember the favor, and look upon you as their debtor in a manner. A third sort shall scarce know what they have done. These are much like a vine, which is satisfied by being fruitful in its kind, and bears a bunch of grapes without expecting any thanks for it. A fleet horse or greyhound do not make a noise when they have done well, nor a bee neither when she has made a little honey. And thus a man that has done a kindness never proclaims it, but does another as soon as he can, just like a vine that bears again the next season. Now we should imitate those who are so obliging as hardly to reflect on their beneficence (v. 6). ~ Marcus Aurelius

Greyhound racing is a self-regulating gambling business that depends on the uncontrolled breeding and unaccountable disappearance of thousands of dogs every year. That is a situation that is unacceptable and indefensible ~ Annette Crosbie

I was washing dishes at the Greyhound bus station at the time and I said, 'Awap bop a lup bop a wop bam boom, take 'em out!' ~ Little Richard

Ter refused to ride buses. The people depressed him, sitting there. He liked Greyhound stations though. We used to go to the ones in San Francisco and Oakland. Mostly Oakland, on San Pablo Avenue. Once he told me he loved me because I was like San Pablo Avenue. He was like the Berkeley dump. I wish there was a bus to the dump. We went there when we got homesick for New Mexico. It is stark and windy and gulls soar like nighthawks in the desert. You can see the sky all around you and above you. Garbage trucks thunder through dust-billowing roads. Gray dinosaurs. ~ Lucia Berlin

Fuck hope and all the tiny little towns, one-horse towns, the one-stoplight towns, three-bars country-music jukebox-magic parquet-towns, pressure-cooker pot-roast frozen-peas bad-coffee married-heterosexual towns, crying-kids-in-the-Oldsmobile-beat-your-kid-in the-Thriftway-aisles towns, one-bank one-service-station Greyhound-Bus-stop-at-the-Pepsi-Cafe towns, two-television towns, Miracle Mile towns, Viv's Double Wide Beauty Salon towns, schizophrenic-mother towns, buy-yourself-a-handgun towns, sister-suicide towns, only-Injun's-a-dead-Injun towns, Catholic-Protestant-Mormon-Baptist religious-right five-churches Republican-trickle-down-to-poverty family-values sexual-abuse pro-life creation-theory NRA towns, nervous-mother rodeo-clown-father those little-town-blues towns. ~ Tom Spanbauer

I climbed aboard a Greyhound bus and rode it to New York without telling anyone, without so much as a goodbye. What was I thinking? I wasn't. I was young and stupid and broken. I knew from watching movies that broken people hopped on buses and disappeared. New York seemed far away, geographically, mentally. ~ Ken Wheaton

Somewhere in la Mancha, in a place whose name I do not care to remember, a gentleman lived not long ago, one of those who has a lance and ancient shield on a shelf and keeps a skinny nag and a greyhound for racing. ~ Miguel De Cervantes Saavedra

I mumble my vows, Shad mutters his, and I wonder what would happen if I lunged for the door like a wild animal seeking its freedom. I could probably outrun his one-legged friend, but Shad has something of the greyhound about him. ~ Janet Mullany

Sometimes, too, she told him of what she had read, such as a passage in a novel, of a new play, or an anecdote of the "upper ten" that she had seen in a feuilleton; for, after all, Charles was something, an ever-open ear, and ever-ready approbation. She confided many a thing to her greyhound. She would have done so to the logs in the fireplace or to the pendulum of the clock. ~ Gustave Flaubert

You look sad even though we just met No need to get upset But I got a show, gotta go, so I thank you And if you wanna still get sexed down You could catch the next Greyhound But until then, I gotta go, so I thank you ~ Eamon

Inspiration.
five minutes in the back of a greyhound bus;
the world passing by.
a gateway to freedom.
the american dream.
from the american dream ~ K.R. Albers

Three days later on October 29, 1959, the Pontiac registered in the name of Niles Tignor would be discovered, gas tank near-empty, keys on the floorboards beneath the front seat, in a parking lot close by the Greyhound bus station in Rome, New York. ~ Joyce Carol Oates

I understood in a flash why, on the Greyhound sign, Arrivals and Departures were right next to each other. Because sometimes, like in that moment, they can mean exactly the same thing. ~ Morgan Matson

If one is a greyhound, why try to look like a Pekingese? ~ Edith Sitwell

If you want to feel like your life isn't too bad, take a Greyhound bus, Aleah. We should all take Greyhound buses. ~ Geoff Herbach

So he bought tickets to the Greyhound and they climbed, painfully, inch by inch and with the knowledge that, once they reached the top, there would be one breath-taking moment when the car would tip precariously into space, over an incline six stories steep and then plunge, like a plunging plane. She buried her head against him, fearing to look at the park spread below. He forced himself to look: thousands of little people and hundreds of bright little stands, and over it all the coal-smoke pall of the river factories and railroad yards. He saw in that moment the whole dim-lit city on the last night of summer; the troubled streets that led to the abandoned beaches, the for-rent signs above overnight hotels and furnished basement rooms, moving trolleys and rising bridges: the cagework city, beneath a coalsmoke sky. ~ Nelson Algren

Don't get me wrong. Sacramento is a lovely place, particularly for those with a fondness for methamphetamines. For the meth-addled, Sacramento had conveniently placed a Greyhound bus station just yards from the statehouse where Austria's finest was sworn in as governor of the great state of California. ~ J. Maarten Troost

You did not leave Crazytown for Boo-hooville. Boo-hooville is a layover. It is a temporary stop. It is the dismal Greyhound bus station in the first leg of your trip to Kauai. It is a place you must visit on your way to peace and calm. It is a rough stone that you will use to scrape away the old skin so that you can be made new again. And yes, that scraping hurts. And yes, you look terrible while it's happening. Everything is dropping off, wrinkling, sagging, and flaking; it's dull-colored. But underneath? On the other side of that? It's beautiful. ~ Stephanee Killen

My face was burning, and I knew I must look like a gorilla on a greyhound. ~ Stephenie Meyer

To distract himself he started making a mental list of all the ways he could leave Chapel Bluff.
He could go by train. Plane. Motorcycle.
Last night Beverly had invited all three of them - him, Ryan, and Tyler - to stay for dinner. Matt had refused. Ryan had likewise refused because his wife had dinner waiting for him at home. Tyler had leapt at the chance.
Matt had been the one who'd decided to put distance between himself, Kate, and Beverley. Even so, it rankled that Tyler had slipped right into his empty spot at the dinner table. That Kate had found someone so much more charming than him to talk to. That Kate seemed so delighted to turn her back on him.
He could leave by four-wheeler. Mountain bike. Skateboard.
"You're a design genius, young lady." Tyler said to Kate. "That's a perfect place for that sideboard."
"Why thank you," Kate replied.
Matt ground his teeth and imagined leaving by Greyhound bus.
He'd even have settled for a horse.
Hot air balloon.
Donkey cart. ~ Becky Wade

I had this funny family. At one end, they were breeding dogs in south-east London - for greyhound racing - and at the other, my uncle was living in Downing Street. And I would actually go to Downing Street, which didn't strike me as funny. I'd get on the number 15 bus. ~ Michael Moorcock

I began to count mile markers, made mental lists of everything I really needed: a new pair of shoes, a winter coat for the baby, a ticket for a Greyhound traveling back or ahead five hundred years. ~ Sherman Alexie

In a village of La Mancha, the name of which I have no desire to call to mind, there lived not long since one of those gentlemen that keep a lance in the lance-rack, an old buckler, a lean hack, and a greyhound for coursing. ~ Miguel De Cervantes Saavedra

Ive fostered five dogs for the Best Friends Program, which is an amazing no-kill sanctuary for animals, as well as a greyhound named Natasha from the greyhound rescue. All of my fosters have taught me great lessons like patience, nurture, and responsibility. My last foster dog was a Cocker Spaniel, and I couldnt let him go. I adopted him! ~ Olesya Rulin

I tell everyone very plainly that I take bribes, but what kind of bribes? Why, greyhound puppies. That's a totally different matter. ~ Nikolai Gogol

Buckler, a lean hack, and a greyhound for coursing. An olla ~ Miguel De Cervantes Saavedra

Some folks like to get away Take a holiday from the neighborhood. Hop a flight to Miami Beach Or to Hollywood But I'm talking a Greyhound On the Hudson River Line. I'm in a New York state of mind. ~ Billy Joel

Why not be oneself? That is the whole secret of a successful appearance. If one is a greyhound why try to look like a Pekinese? ~ Edith Sitwell

You know what's really good is a greyhound in the shower. ~ Nick Thune

It was just past midnight and I was trudging through the St. Louis Greyhound station, a grim building obviously brought to you by the people who design high school bathrooms. ~ Jordan Weisman

I miss my dog."
...
"What was his name again?"
"Mouse."
"That was very unkind of you."
"Naming him mouse?"
"Isn't he a greyhound?"
"I could have named hum Turtle."
"Frederick!" ...
"It's better than Frederic," Annabel said, "Good heavens, that's my brother's name. ~ Julia Quinn

We commend a horse for his strength, and sureness of foot, and not for his rich caparisons; a greyhound for his share of heels, not for his fine collar; a hawk for her wing, not for her jesses and bells. Why, in like manner, do we not value a man for what is properly his own? He has a great train, a beautiful palace, so much credit, so many thousand pounds a year, and all these are about him, but not in him. ~ Michel De Montaigne

As to the old history of Ireland, the first man ever died in Ireland was Partholan, and he is buried, and his greyhound along with him, at some place in Kerry. ~ Lady Gregory

During the last two decades of the nineteenth century and the first of the twentieth, France enjoyed an upsurge of artistic flourishing that became known as La Belle Epoque. It was a time of change that heralded both art nouveau and post impressionism, when painters as diverse as Monet, Cezanne and Toulouse Lautrec worked. It was an age of extremes, when Proust and Anatole France were fashionable along with the notorious Monsieur Willy, Colette's husband. On the decorative arts, Mucha, Gallé and Lalique were enjoying success; and the theatre Lugné-Poe was introducing the grave works of Ibsen at the same time as Parisians were enjoying the spectacle of the can-can of Hortense Schneider. Paris was the crossroads of a new and many-faceted culture, a culture that was predominately feminine in form, for, above all, la belle Epoque was the age of women. Women dominated the cultural scene. On the one hand, there was Comtesse Greffulhe, the patron of Proust and Maeterlinck, who introduced greyhound racing into France; Winaretta Singer, Princesse de Polignac, for whom Stravinsky wrote Renard; Misia Sert, the discoverer of Chanel and Diaghilev's closest friend. On the other were the great dancers of the Moulin Rouge, immortalised by Toulouse lautrec - Jane Avril, Yvette Guilbert, la Goulue; as well as such celebrated dramatic actresses as the great Sarah Bernhardt. It would not be possible to speak of La belle Epoque without the great courtesans who, in many ways, perfectly symbolize ~ Charles Castle

My feet walked me down the aisle of the Greyhound bus, all the way to the back. My butt sat me in a seat.
My butt's accomplished a lot since then.
My butt's a movie star. ~ Chuck Palahniuk

I thought I was going to die a few times. On the Freedom Ride in the year 1961, when I was beaten at the Greyhound bus station in Montgomery, I thought I was going to die. On March 7th, 1965, when I was hit in the head with a night stick by a State Trooper at the foot of the Edmund Pettus Bridge, I thought I was going to die. I thought I saw death, but nothing can make me question the philosophy of nonviolence. ~ John Lewis

I've noticed that Henry needs an incredible amount of physical activity all the time in order to be happy. It's like hanging out with a greyhound. ~ Audrey Niffenegger

You may bury my body down by the highway side. So my old evil spirit can catch a Greyhound bus and ride. ~ Robert Johnson

Does God hang out in Greyhound bus stations?
I'd like to find him.
I'd like to make him cry. ~ Sara Sutterlin

The Terminal
I pace the Greyhound waiting room,
that famished void on the outskirts of Reno
between the Atavans and Ambiens,
filled with the stench of the homeless and
the suicide ticking of attoseconds.
It is a zombie casino with no clocks
partitioned with great walls of glass.
On the other side of the glass I see people
take tokens from Big Gulp sized cups
and feed them into the mute ears of bandits.
They are the gamblers whose tokens
are redeemed into winnings. They breathe
without conscious effort and board their buses.
On my side of the glass there are
no gamblers, no buses, no exits.
There are just Dixie cups of meds
to transport me through REMless dreams
to awaken another day
in the same terminal
waiting and breathing,
breathing and waiting
for the glass to shatter
so I may redeem
my fist full of tokens. ~ Beryl Dov

Relationships are physics. Time transforms things- it has to, because the change from me to we means clearing away the fortifications you'r put up around your old personality. Living with Susannah made me feel as if I started riding Einstein's famous theoretical bus. Here's my understanding of that difficult idea, nutshelled: if you're riding a magic Greyhound, equipped for light-speed travel, you'll actually live though less time than will any pedestrians whom the bus passes by. So, for a neighbor on the street with a stopwatch, the superfast bus will take two hours to travel from Point A to Point B. But where you're on that Greyhound, and looking at the wipe of the world out those rhomboidial coach windows, the same trip will take just under twenty-four minutes. Your neighbor, stopwatch under thumb, will have aged eighty-six percent more than you have. It's hard to fathom. But I think it's exactly what adult relationships do to us: on the outside, years pass, lives change. But inside, it's just a day that repeats. You and your partner age at the same clip; it seems not time has gone by. Only when you look up from your relationship- when you step off the bus, feel the ground under your shoes- do you sense the sly, soft absurdity of romance physics. ~ Darin Strauss

In his youth Michael Owen was literally a greyhound. ~ Jamie Redknapp