Headstone Quotes

Twilight drops her curtain down, and pins it with a star. ~ Lucy Maud Montgomery

The greatest attribute of Heaven is mercy. ~ Francis Beaumont

In the time that we're here today, more women and children will die violently in the Darfur region than in Iraq, Afghanistan, Palestine, Israel or Lebanon. So, after September 30, you won't need the UN - you will simply need men with shovels and bleached white linen and headstones. ~ George Clooney

I went back every evening, after work, for nearly a year. I learned the meaning of the cud of a leaf and the glisten of wet pebbles, and the special significance of curves and angles. A great deal of the writing was unwritten. Plot three dots on a graph and join them; you now have a curve with certain characteristics. Extend that curve while maintaining the characteristics, and it has meaning, up where no dots were plotted.

In just this way I learned to extend the curve of a grass-blade and of a protruding root, of the bent edges of wetness on a drying headstone. I quit smoking so I could sharpen my sense of smell, because the scent of earth after a rain has a clarifying effect on graveyard reading, as if the page were made whiter and the ink darker. I began to listen to the wind, and to the voices of birds and small animals, insects and people; because to the educated ear, every sound is filtered through the story written on graves, and becomes a part of it.

("The Graveyard Reader") ~ Theodore Sturgeon

A portrait is like an ornamental headstone. It is not for the subject, but for those who look upon it. For those you want to remember. ~ Julie Klassen

I walked behind my father on the way to her headstone, he looked like a house that was caving in. ~ Kyung-Sook Shin

This isn't how it should be, God.

Thousands of graves marking thousands of lives--so much focus on death. Did the gravediggers spend their lives just serving the dead? How many Numbers ticked away for the sake of carving headstones no one would read?

As I stare at this scene, I decide I don't want a headstone when I die. I don't even want to be buried. I want to disappear--save that chunk of earth for people to live on. This land I stand on is worthless now. No one can build a house here. No one can plant gardens or start a new village. Is that what the people buried beneath me would have wanted?

Earth wasn't intended to hold only dead bodies.

I stand. God, I need to live. ~ Nadine Brandes

A woman doesn't want to be told she looks nice,' Jude nuttered as she sat down beside maud's grave. She wants to be told she's beautiful, sexy. That she looks outrageous. It dosen't matter if its not true.' She sighed and laid the flowers against the headstone. 'Because for the moment, when the words are said and the words are heard, it's perfect truth. ~ Nora Roberts

All things considered, the happiest epitaph to have etched on one's headstone is this: 'He never knew what hit him'. ~ Thomas Ligotti

I never understood why when you died, you didn't just vanish, everything should just keep going on the way it was only you just wouldn't be there. I always thought I'd like my own tombstone to be blank. No epitaph, and no name. Well, actually, I'd like it to say 'figment'. ~ Andy Warhol

Generally, old media don't die. They just have to grow old gracefully. Guess what, we still have stone masons. They haven't been the primary purveyors of the written word for a while now of course, but they still have a role because you wouldn't want a TV screen on your headstone. ~ Douglas Adams

Fame - a few words upon a tombstone, and the truth of those not to be depended on. ~ Christian Nestell Bovee

Everything else, everything, is just human vanity, the dash on the headstone between the day we're born and the day we die. ~ Victor Bevine

Warm summer sun, shine friendly here
Warm western wind, blow kindly here;
Green sod above, rest light, rest light,
Good-night, Annette!
Sweetheart, good-night! ~ Robert Richardson

I told you I was ill. (On his headstone) ~ Spike Milligan

On Radcliffe's headstone, in smaller text beneath his name, was written, Here lieth one who sought truth and light and saw beauty in all things, 1842-1882. Leonard [Gilbert] found himself staring as he often did at the dash between the dates. Within that lichen-laced mark there lay the entire life of a man: his childhood, his loves, his losses and fears, all reduced to a single chiseled line on a piece of stone in a quiet churchyard at the end of a country lane. Leonard wasn't sure whether the thought was comforting or distressing; his opinion changed, depending on the day. ~ Kate Morton

Shadow inserted his coin. The drunk in the graveyard raised his bottle to his lips. One of the gravestones flipped over, revealing a grasping corpse; a headstone turned around, flowers replaced by a grinning skull. A wraith appeared on the right of the church, while on the left of the church something with a half-glimpsed, pointed, unsettlingly birdlike face, a pale, Boschian nightmare, glided smoothly from a headstone into the shadows and was gone. Then the church door opened, a priest came out, and the ghosts, haunts, and corpses vanished, and only the priest and the drunk were left alone in the graveyard. The priest looked down at the drunk disdainfully, and backed through the open door, which closed behind him, leaving the drunk on his own.

The clockwork story was deeply unsettling. Much more unsettling, thought Shadow, than clockwork has any right to be.

"You know why I show that to you?" asked Czernobog.

"No."

"That is the world as it is. That is the real world. It is there, in that box. ~ Neil Gaiman

Headstone: death's bookmark. ~ Les Coleman

He's writing his name in water," I said. "What's that?" It was the half-regretful term - borrowed from the headstone of John Keats - that Crabtree used to describe his own and others' failure to express a literary gift through any actual writing on paper. Some of them, he said, just told lies; others wove plots out of the gnarls and elf knots of their lives and then followed them through to resolution. That had always been Crabtree's chosen genre - thinking his way into an attractive disaster and then attempting to talk his way out, leaving no record and nothing to show for his efforts but a reckless reputation and a small dossier in the files of the Berkeley and New York City police departments. ~ Michael Chabon

There is a holy story that tells of a man who was fulfilled by sowing his enemy's field one night. Bjartur's story is the story of a man who sowed his enemy's field all his life, day and night. Such is the story of the most independent man in the country. Moors; more moors. From the ravine there came an eerie echoing rumble as the headstone crashed its way down, and the bitch sprang to the brink, barking wildly. ~ Halldor Laxness

Left love behind many years ago. Now it rests under a cross in the cemetery in Tombstone. ~ Franco Nero

Safe in the hallowed quiets of the past. ~ James Russell Lowell

Till the master of all good workmen shall set us to work anew. ~ Rudyard Kipling

In the churchyard in Jaffrey, New Hampshire are two handsome headstones. The slate weathered well and William Farnsworth's chiseling is clearly readable. They say:

Sacred to the memory of Amos Fortune who was born free in Africa a slave in America he purchased liberty professed Christianity lived reputably and died hopefully
Nov. 17, 1801
Aet. 91

Sacred to the memory of Violate by sale the slave of Amos Fortune by marriage his wife by her fidelity his friend and solace she died his widow
Sept. 13 1802
Aet. 73 ~ Elizabeth Yates

Every man's life is a plan of God. ~ Horace Bushnell

ON THE FIFTIETH ANNIVERSARY OF D-Day, I was broadcasting from the American cemetery overlooking Omaha Beach at Colleville-sur-Mer in Normandy, one of the bloodiest battlefields in American history. The cemetery is at once haunting and beautiful, with 9,386 white marble headstones in long, even lines across the manicured fields of dark green, each headstone marking the death of a brave young American. The anniversary was a somber and celebratory ~ Tom Brokaw

No tongue can express the greatness of the love which Jesus Christ bears to our souls. He did not wish that between Him and His servants there should be any other pledge than Himself, to keep alive the remembrance of Him. ~ Peter Of Alcantara

That's going to be on my headstone: 'He came. He wrote 'In the Air Tonight.' He ... died.' ~ Phil Collins

Love, marriage, divorce, infidelity ... life was the same here as anywhere else, wasn't? She realized now wrong she'd been; the pali wasn't a headstone and Kalaupapa wasn't a grave. It was a community like any other, bound by ties deeper than most, and people here went to their deaths as people did anywhere: with great reluctance, dragging the messy jumble of their lives behind them. ~ Alan Brennert

The first shall be last and the last shall be first, ~ Killah Priest

When I remember you, Randy, I'm going to smile, not cry. You're a part of me. One of the best parts. I just wanted to tell you that." She stopp up, brushing the headstone once more. "And if you meet someone called Giselda," she whispered, "tell her she's still part of Spade, too. A beautiful part. Please thank her for that. ~ Jeaniene Frost

The older I get
the quicker Christmas comes,
but if I had to give up the heavenly
taste of Guinness dark, I couldn't
live another goddamn day. Darling,
you can chisel that into my headstone. ~ Yusef Komunyakaa

Most of us, at some time or other, get sucked into the lifeless vacuum of work; the cogs of the corporate machine that we keep turning until one day, when we depart this Earth, we may earn the word 'lubricant' on our headstone. ~ Fennel Hudson

I swear to you on any kind of sacred whateverthefuck you favor: if I live through this I will absolutely start taking your advice." "That'll look nice on your headstone. ~ Matthew Woodring Stover

We always find that those who walked closest to Christ were those who had to bear the greatest trials. ~ Teresa Of Avila

It was in a stonecutter's house where I went to have a headstone made for Raftery's grave that I found a manuscript book of his poems, written out in the clear beautiful Irish characters. ~ Lady Gregory

Soon enough the days will close over their lives, the grass will grow over their graves, until their story is just an unvisited headstone. ~ M.L. Stedman

You were dropped as a child, weren't you?" Varen asked her.
"Maybe once or twice," Gwen said, "but at least I wasn't raised by highly literate vampires who, every night just before bed, fed me a steady diet of dark sarcasm and gothic horror fiction."
"Every morning before bed," Varen corrected. Stepping forward, he moved toward the headstone. "We slept during the day. ~ Kelly Creagh

The poets and philosophers I once loved had it wrong. Death does not come to us all, nor does the passage of time dim our memories and reduce our bodies to dust. Because while I was considered dead, and a headstone had been engraved with my name, in truth my life was just beginning. ~ Kevin Williamson

Life passes. Eternity comes to meet us with great strides. Soon we shall be living with the very life of Jesus. Having drunk deep at the source of all bitterness, we shall be deified in the very source of all joys, of all delights. ~ Therese Of Lisieux

I think a lot about something: Abe Rosenthal was once asked what he wanted on his headstone, and he said he wanted it just to say, 'He kept the paper straight.' And I think about that a lot. ~ Jill Abramson

His daily prayer, far better understood in acts than in words, was simply doing good. ~ John Greenleaf Whittier

There is an expression-walking with beauty. And I believe that this endless search for beauty in surroundings, in people and one's personal life, is the headstone of travel. ~ Juliette De Bairacli Levy

I grinned, and a burst of shocked laughter shoved out of me. I'd done it! I'd beaten that bitch, and could see again. I'd won. With only my blood.
I climbed to my feet, cradling my throbbing hand against my stomach, and looked out over the cemetery.
The first real thing I saw was Silla, stumbling toward me. Her hands left scarlet prints on every headstone she touched. ~ Tessa Gratton

Because I liked you better Than suits a man to say, It irked you, and I promised I'd throw the thought away. To put the world between us We parted stiff and dry: 'Farewell,' said you, 'forget me.' 'Fare well, I will,' said I. If e'er, where clover whitens The dead man's knoll, you pass, And no tall flower to meet you Starts in the trefoiled grass, Halt by the headstone shading The heart you have not stirred, And say the lad that loved you Was one that kept his word. ~ A.E. Housman

What?' Otto said as he finished soldering one of the contact points on the device in front of him. 'It's not like we're being trained to follow the rules here. If anything, I think Nero should reward us for our determination and initiative.'

'Can you fit "determination and initiative" on a headstone?' Laura asked as she leant in to examine Otto's handiwork. ~ Mark Walden

Those who in living fill the smallest space, In death have often left the greatest void. ~ Walter Savage Landor

Life's a voyage that's homeward bound. ~ Herman Melville

The Harelip had taken off her heavy shawl and draped it over a headstone. The grave was tilted and covered with moss, the name worn away by the weather. The person underneath had been forgotten and was no longer mourned by the world. But for a moment, Ren thought, the small black slate looked warmed, and grateful for being chosen. ~ Hannah Tinti

Death is not a foe, but an inevitable adventure. ~ Oliver Lodge

I hate that her headstone has a year on it for when she was born and another for when she died but only a dash for the life she lived in between. ~ Juliann Garey

His headstone said
FREE AT LAST, FREE AT LAST
But death is a slave's freedom
We seek the freedom of free men
And the construction of a world
Where Martin Luther King could have lived and
preached non-violence ~ Nikki Giovanni

He didn't scream hysterically or stand up and kick the headstone or any of that. He put his face on his knees and listened as the wind from the mountains mercilessly leveled everything in its path. He remembered the person who had helped him fly with the wind instead of being beaten down by it, and he cried quietly into his knees, finally knowing how the big of the sky could make a person feel as alone as a heartbeat in space. ~ Amy Lane

There never was night that had no morn. ~ Dinah

Are you persuaded of what you do or not? Do you need something to happen or not in order to do what you do? Do you need the correlations to coincide always, because the end is never in what you do, even if what you do is vast and distant but is always in your continuation? Do you say you are persuaded of what you do, no matter what? Yes? Then I tell you: tomorrow you will certainly be dead. It doesn't matter? Are you thinking about fame? About your family? But your memory dies with you,with you your family is dead. Are you thinking about your ideals? You want to make a will? You want a headstone? But tomorrow those too are dead, dead. All men die with you. Your death is an unwavering comet. Do you turn to god? There is no god, god dies with you. The kingdom of heaven crumbles with you, tomorrow you are dead, dead. Tomorrow everything is finished - your body, family, friends, country, what you're doing now, what you might do in the future, the good, the bad, the true, the false, your ideas, your little part, god and his kingdom, paradise, hell, everything, everything, everything. Tomorrow everything is over - in twenty four hours is death.

Well, then the god of today is no longer yesterday's, no longer the country, the good, the bad, friends, or family. You want to eat? No, you cannot. The taste of food is no longer the same; honey is bitter, milk is sour, meat nauseating, and the odor, the odor sickens you: it reeks of the dead. You want a woman to comfort you in y ~ Carlo Michelstaedter

Bradley Headstone, in his decent black coat and waistcoat, and decent white shirt, and decent formal black tie, and decent pantaloons of pepper and salt, with his decent silver watch in his pocket and its decent hair-guard round his neck, looked a thoroughly decent young man of six-and-twenty. He was never seen in any other dress, and yet there was a certain stiffness in his manner of wearing this, as if there were a want of adaptation between him and it, recalling some mechanics in their holiday clothes. He had acquired mechanically a great store of teacher's knowledge. He could do mental arithmetic mechanically, sing at sight mechanically, blow various wind instruments mechanically, even play the great church organ mechanically. From his early childhood up, his mind had been a place of mechanical stowage. The arrangement of his wholesale warehouse, so that it might be always ready to meet the demands of retail dealers history here, geography there, astronomy to the right, political economy to the left - natural history, the physical sciences, figures, music, the lower mathematics, and what not, all in their several places - this care had imparted to his countenance a look of care; while the habit of questioning and being questioned had given him a suspicious manner, or a manner that would be better described as one of lying in wait. There was a kind of settled trouble in the face. It was the face belonging to a naturally slow or inattentive intellect that had toiled hard to ~ Charles Dickens

Death leaves a heartache no one can heal, love leaves a memory no one can steal.
From an Irish headstone ~ Richard Puz

The very thing keeping me alive is also killing me - love. No wonder the rose symbolizes both love and death. They should have a deal where if you buy a dozen roses you get a free headstone. ~ Jarod Kintz

Let not a man guard his dignity, but let his dignity guard him. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

The grave is but the threshold of eternity. What a world were this, how unendurable its weight, If they whom death hath sundered, did not meet again! ~ Robert Southey

The inscription on his gravestone had felt so wholly insufficient the moment she saw it. Just a name and dates, carved by machine. Just the inadequate and impersonal. Loving Father and Husband, like every other headstone there, whether it was true or not. This was the tasteful way to do it, she knew, even though it showed none of the true shape of the man ~ Stuart Nadler

Now me and my brother go to see him some times but he don't have much to say anymore. So we sit on his headstone with a fifth of Jack D. Here's to a long line of sinners like me. ~ Eric Church

Visit the graveyards sometimes and read the headstone epitaphs! There is much to learn from the dark face of the life! ~ Mehmet Murat Ildan

A brick could be used as a headstone. Or the instrument that proves "until death do us part" is faster and cheaper than a divorce. ~ Jarod Kintz

Children bring their own love with them when they come. ~ Jean Ingelow

When I am dead and buried, on my tombstone I would like to have it written, 'I have arrived.' Because when you feel that you have arrived, you are dead. ~ Yul Brynner

Go to the cops then!" I shout. "But mind if I ask what you plan on telling them? Because saying two dead teenagers came to you in the middle of the night and told you something or someone is going to kill you is only going to get you locked in a cozy, padded cell."
"Well, it has to be better than spending another second with you."
"Make sure they put that on your headstone, will you? Right below 'Here lies Benedict Bartholomew Ford. He had no friends and a really stupid name'. ~ Rebecca Harris

By giving yourself to God, You not only receive Himself in exchange, but eternal life as well. ~ Saint Francis De Sales

Sleep, my little one, sleep. ~ Padraig Harrington

When we die, no one remembers us for what we weighed. Our weight isn't etched into our headstones. ~ Stephanie Klein