Morning Musings Quotes

I only wanted books - nothing more - only books, only words, it was never anything but words - give them to me, I don't have any! Look, see, I don't have any! Look, I'm naked, barefoot, I'm standing before you - nothing in my pants pockets, nothing under my shirt or under my arm! They're not stuck in my beard! Inside - look - there aren't any inside either - everything's been turned inside out, there's nothing there! Only guts! I'm hungry! I'm tormented!...
What do you mean there's nothing? Then how can you talk and cry, what words are you frightened with, which ones do you call out in your sleep? Don't nighttime cries roam inside you, a thudding twilight murmur, a fresh morning shriek? There they are words - don't you recognize them? They're writhing inside you, trying to get out! There they are! They're yours! From wood, stone, roots, growing in strength, a dull mooing and whining in the gut is trying to get out; a piece of tongue curls, the torn nostrils swell in torment. That's how the bewitched, beaten, and twisted snuffle with a mangy wail, their boiled white eyes locked up in closets, their vein torn out, backbone gnawed; that's right, that's how your pushkin writhe, or mushkin - what is in my name for you? - pushkin-mushkin, flung upon the hillock like a shaggy black idol, forever flattened by fences, up to his ears in di, the pushkin-stump, legless, six-fingered, biting his tongue, nose in his chest - and his head can't be raised! - pushkin, tearing off the pois ~ Tatyana Tolstaya

I think of the moment in time when everything changed. A moment that caused so much evil. The moment the Star fell from the sky. Then, I picture it never falling, disappearing, vanishing into thin air. I concentrate on that moment as warmth spreads throughout my body and I feel time fading, like the morning mist. Evanescence. ~ Jessica Sorensen

My dearest Lydia
I do not wish to disturb your thoughts with sad tidings, and yet to do otherwise than write to you at this time with an honest heart would give cause for you to reproach me in years to come, years when you will live and breathe the warm air while I rest beneath the turf, and the very thought of such reproach grieves my heavy heart as it prepares to beat its last. For I am fading, and henceforth you will not hear word of this frail shell whom once you graced with friendship, except, perhaps, through another's report or distant memory.
Whether our encounter in this life has brought me more joy than pain is a question that once I asked myself, but now see as a thing of no concern. My love for you is not to be judged by degrees of pleasure. It is not of the world of matter to be placed on the scale or weighed in the balance. Our flesh, the deeds we commit and things we created may be subject to the measure, but not a love like this. Joy and pain are but the distant resonance, while my love for you is the present song; they are but patterns of dust caught on the edge of the morning light, while my love is the blazing sun that illuminates them. My love abides, my love existed before we met, and my love will continue as the centuries roll by when we and our story are shades forgotten. But my love must perforce now return to its cave, to its sleeping state, whence it emerged that morning long ago by the water's edge, when our eyes met and the spirit took ~ Roland Vernon

Death can come at any moment. You could die this afternoon; you could die tomorrow morning; you could die on your way to work; you could die in your sleep. Most of us try to avoid the sense that death can come at any time, but its timing is unknown to us. Can we live each day as if it were our last? Can we relate to one another as if there were no tomorrow? ~ Joan Halifax

The slow turning of his affection wasn't completed that night, or the next morning, but the beginning of Mack and Maisy's summer romance began at the exact moment that Mack and Riley's ended. Of course Riley pretended it had never begun, that his preoccupation with Maisy was of no concern to her. They'd been friends and always would be. Yet inside, her heart broke in places that remained permanently jagged, places the most casual graze of memory catches in pain. ~ Patti Callahan Henry

I don't know, but I always loved that image of a girl putting toenail polish on a guy - her boyfriend, or something like that. Or a guy waking up in the morning and reaching over and putting on his girlfriend's shirt. Like Keith Richards putting on one of Anita Pallenberg's blouses, or Courtney Love putting nail polish on Kurt Cobain. ~ Marc Jacobs

I would pretend that I was in a glass box - that I was in this glass container that no one could see, and it protected me. At night I would open the door and get out of the box to go to bed. In the morning, I stepped into it and closed the latch. I dreamed that I would somehow be transported - that all this sadness and fear would actually fuel this glass box and carry me home. ~ Sarah Silverman

Like the morning sun, you appeared in my cloudy sky and filled my world with light, love, beauty, and joy. ~ Debasish Mridha

This love was a torment, and he resented bitterly the subjugation in which it held him; he was a prisoner and he longed for freedom.
Sometimes he awoke in the morning and felt nothing; his soul leaped, for he thought he was free; he loved no longer; but in a little while, as he grew wide awake, the pain settled in his heart, and he knew that he was not cured yet. ~ W. Somerset Maugham

Must love decorating for holidays, mischief, kissing in cars, and wind chimes. No specific height, weight, hair color, or political affiliation required but would prefer a warm spirited non racist. Cynics, critics, pessimists, and "stick in the muds" need not apply. Voluptuous figures a plus. Any similarity in look, mind set, or fashion sense to Mary Poppins, Claire Huxtable, Snow White, or Elvira wholeheartedly welcomed. I am dubious of actresses, fellons and lesbians but dont want to rule them out entirely. Must be tolerant of whistling, tickle torture, James Taylor, and sleeping late. I have a slight limp, eerily soft hands, and a preternatural love of autumn. I once misinterpreted being called a coal-eyed dandy as a compliment when it was intended as an insult. I wiggle my feet in my sleep, am scared of the dark, and think the Muppets Christmas Carol is one of the greatest films of all time. All I want is butterfly kisses in the morning, peanut butter sandwiches shaped like a heart, and to make you smile until it hurts. ~ Matthew Grey Gubler

I used to smoke marijuana. But I'll tell you something: I would only smoke it in the late evening. Oh, occasionally the early evening, but usually the late evening – or the mid-evening. Just the early evening, midevening and late evening. Occasionally, early afternoon, early midafternoon, or perhaps the late-midafternoon. Oh, sometimes the early-mid-late-early morning. . . . But never at dusk. ~ Steve Martin

It was my job to interest them in everything that was happening, to make the arrival of the Daily Express each morning an event, to show them the world outside Bolton and Bacup, to give them courage and confidence to overcome the drabness of their lives. ~ Arthur Christiansen

I'm awesome, Sam. Have you not gotten the memo recently? It's supposed to go out every Friday morning with Twitter alerts. #Logansawesomenooneforgetit. ~ Tijan

His master plan to get them all out the door early met its first check of the day when he opened his closet door to discover that Zap the Cat, having penetrated the security of Vorkosigan House through Miles's quisling cook, had made a nest on the floor among his boots and fallen clothing to have kittens. Six of them.
Zap ignored his threats about the dire consequences of attacking an Imperial Auditor, and purred and growled from the dimness in her usual schizophrenic fashion. Miles gathered his nerve and rescued his best boots and House uniform, at a cost of some high Vor blood, and sent them downstairs for a hasty cleaning by the overworked Armsman Pym. The Countess, delighted as ever to find her biological empire increasing, came in thoughtfully bearing a cat-gourmet tray prepared by Ma Kosti that Miles would have had no hesitation in eating for his own breakfast. In the general chaos of the morning, however, he had to go down to the kitchen and scrounge his meal. The Countess sat on the floor and cooed into his closet for a good half-hour, and not only escaped laceration, but managed to pick up, sex, and name the whole batch of little squirming furballs before tearing herself away to hurry and dress. ~ Lois McMaster Bujold

By day we may deal with the airy superstructure of our emotions, but, at three in the morning, we get down to the foundation. At night the soul claims the right to stand face to face with itself, as before some mirror placed in a pitiless light and, with unsparing eyes, seek the truth. ~ Myrtle Reed

In the cave of black Despair: He only looked upon the sun, And drank the morning air. ~ Oscar Wilde

Ideas rise with new mornings but never die. ~ Frank Marshall Davis

And God said: Let there be light, and there was light. Lena opened her eyes, feeling as if someone had been reading this verse out loud in the room. She looked around. Another morning dawned, and the sky glowed. Why did God say the word light out loud? Wasn't it enough for him just to think of light for there to be light? And did he summon the light to one specific place? Or only to some places? Perhaps he summoned the light everywhere. Her eyes followed the sun's beams that poured through the shutter slats, creating luminous flecks of gold that sparkled against the cabinet across from her. Tiny motes floated in the light and disappeared in the dark. Who did God created the light for? ~ Gala.J

Morning to ye! Morning to ye! ~ Herman Melville

A little bird'll be here with the morning." "Oh?" said the rose-petal lady. "Tomorrow morning?" "That's the only morning coming." "It can't be," the rose-petal lady said. "It's too soon." "No it ain't. Right on time. ~ Toni Morrison

Against such a background one can easily imagine the shock that must have gripped readers of The Times of London, who turned to their paper one morning in January 1882 and found a lengthy report on a parliamentary speech by the attorney general concluding with the unexpectedly forthright statement: "The speaker then said he felt inclined for a bit of fucking." Not surprisingly, it caused a sensation. The executives of The Times were so dumbstruck by this outrage against common decency that four full days passed before they could bring themselves to acknowledge the offense. ~ Anonymous

I write early in the morning at the computer, and people think I'm crazy, but I still use my Mac-Classic even though we have a state-of-the-art PC. There are just less distractions with the simpler machine. ~ Wendelin Van Draanen

Valuable and ingenious he might be, thought Jack, fixing him with his glass, but false he was too, and perjured. He had voluntarily sworn to have no truck with vampires, and here, attached to his bosom, spread over it and enfolded by one arm, was a greenish hairy thing, like a mat - a loathsome great vampire of the most poisonous kind, no doubt. 'I should never have believed it of him: his sacred oath in the morning watch and now he stuffs the ship with vampires; and God knows what is in that bag. No doubt he was tempted, but surely he might blush for his fall?'

No blush; nothing but a look of idiot delight as he came slowly up the side, hampered by his burden and comforting it in Portuguese as he came.

'I am happy to see that you were so successful, Dr Maturin,' he said, looking down into the launch and the canoes, loaded with glowing heaps of oranges and shaddocks, red meat, iguanas, bananas, greenstuff. 'But I am afraid no vampires can be allowed on board.'

'This is a sloth,' said Stephen, smiling at him. 'A three-toed sloth, the most affectionate, discriminating sloth you can imagine!' The sloth turned its round head, fixed its eyes on Jack, uttered a despairing wail, and buried its face again in Stephen's shoulder, tightening its grip to the strangling-point. ~ Patrick O'Brian

Myron reached for the phone and dialed Win's number. After the eighth ring he began to hang up when a weak, distant voice coughed. "Hello?"
Win?"
Yeah."
You okay?"
Hello?"
Win?"
Yeah."
What took you so long to answer the phone?"
Hello?"
Win?"
Who is this?"
Myron."
Myron Bolitar?"
How many other Myrons do you know?"
Myron Bolitar?"
No, Myron Rockefeller."
Something's wrong," Win said.
What?"
Terribly wrong."
What are you talking about?"
Some asshole is calling me at seven in the morning pretending to be my best friend."
Sorry, I forgot the time. ~ Harlan Coben

They chanted the psalms and praises, and as always the rhythm fastened itself to his heartbeat. It seemed unfair that the prayers could affect him this way, against his will; that he could scoff at the sentiments, yet find himself mouthing along. He imagined himself at ninety, toothless and doddering, unable to remember anything except for the morning prayers. They were his deepest memories, his first music. ~ Helene Wecker

Did it ever strike you on such a morning as this that drowning would be happiness and peace? ~ Charles Dickens

When we have attained success, we see how inferior it is to the hope, yearning and enthusiasm with which we started forth in life's morning. ~ John Lancaster Spalding

I brought to mind the image of the stranger lying there in the first light of dawn: the slight growth of whiskers on his chin, strands of his red hair shifting gently on the faint stirrings of the morning breeze, the pallor, the extended legs, the quivering fingers, that last, sucking breath. And that word, blown into my face ... "Vale."
The thrill of it all!
Yes," I said, "it was devastating. ~ Alan Bradley

There are many ways of doing it but Mummy and I think this is the simplest for you to try. Put a cup of flour, an egg, a half cup of milk and a good shake of salt into a large bowl and beat altogether until it is the consistency of thick cream. Put in the frig for several hours. (It's best if you make it in the morning.) When you put your roast in the oven, put in an extra pan to heat. Half an hour before your roast is done, pour a bit of the roast grease into the baking pan, just enough to cover the bottom will do. The pan must be very hot. Now pour the pudding in and the roast and pudding will be ready at the same time. ~ Helene Hanff

Spend regularly and constantly two or three hours of the morning in study and retirement. I do not take upon me to prescribe what you shall employ yourself about. I only propose the passing two or three hours of the twenty-four in private. ~ David Berman

Is it possible that God says every morning, "Do it again" to the sun; and every evening "Do it again" to the moon." from Orthodoxy. ~ G.K. Chesterton

Axsem would say nothing more to any of them. No sooner had Fallon released him than he fled deep into the trees, staff in hand, with Hailos following after. Through the morning air, they heard the wail of his mourning. The scarred heart of the general was torn wide open by having to recall even one abbreviated story from his past. He needed time to coddle his mangled heart and push away the torturous memories. ~ S.R. Ford

Each morning when we wake up to life we see that we have a gift of twenty-four brand new hours. If ~ Thich Nhat Hanh

Delighted of course. It will only be a very scratch meal - just the sandwich crusts and broken meringue-shells and what's left over. Yes, isn't it a perfect morning? ~ Katherine Mansfield

But from the Parthenon and the Timaeus a specious logic leads to the tyranny which, in the Republic, is held up as the ideal form of government. In the field of politics the equivalent of a theorem is a perfectly disciplined army; of a sonnet or picture, a police state under a dictatorship. The Marxist calls himself scientific and to this claim the Fascist adds another: he is the poet - the scientific poet - of a new mythology. Both are justified in their pretentions; for each applies to human situations the procedures which have proved effective in the laboratory and the ivory tower. They simplify, they abstract, they eliminate all that, for their purposes, is irrelevant and ignore whatever they choose to regard as inessential; they impose a style, they compel the facts to verify a favorite hypothesis, they consign to the waste paper basket all that, to their mind, falls short of perfection. And because they thus act like good artists, sound thinkers and tried experimenters, the prisons are full, political heretics are worked to death as slaves, the rights and preferences of mere individuals are ignored, the Gandhis are murdered and from morning till night a million schoolteachers and broadcasters proclaim the infallibility of the bosses who happen at the moment to be in power. ~ Aldous Huxley

I love just going out; long drives, the ocean, my kids, new music, new gear, new plug-ins, coffee, and donuts at four in the morning. Even just waking up and writing. ~ John Feldmann

To this boy of New England the May morning was like faint music in the woods again, some unspeakably exciting foregathering of events far in the deep shade of morning pines, all of it stirring there. He could hear it all faintly in the woods from far away, from across the fields and pastures, in the cool misty morning air, and he wanted to go there too. ~ Jack Kerouac

Appreciation is a wonderful thing. It makes what is excellent in others belong to us as well. ~ Voltaire

They would congratulate themselves every morning on keeping their integrity, and blame themselves each night for that missed opportunity. ~ Paulo Coelho

She is a beautiful, powerful badass woman who sometimes falls apart inside after she drops her bags by the door and tosses her stilettos. Her vulnerability at night helps her to rise stronger in the morning. ~ J. Autherine

Of that first decade, Neil said
I would have this recurring fantasy in which there would be a knock on the door, and I would go down, and there would be somebody wearing a suit – not an expensive suit, just the kind of suit that showed they had a job – and they would be holding a clipboard, and they'd have a paper on the clipboard, and I'd open the door and they'd say, „Hello, excuse me, I'm afraid I am here on official business. Are you Neil Gaiman?" And I would say yes. „Well, it says here that you are a writer and that you don't have to get up in the morning at any particular time, that you just write each day as much you want." And I'd go „That's right." "And that you enjoy writing. And it says here that all the books you want – they are just sent to you and you don't have to buy them. And films: it says here that you just go to see films. If you want to see them you just call up the person who runs the films." And I say, „Yes, that's right." And that people like what you do and they give you money for just writing things down." And I'd say yes. And he'd say, „Well, I'm afraid we are on to you. We've caught up with you. And I'm afraid you are now going to have to go out and get a proper job." At which point in my fantasy my heart would always sink, and I'd go, „Okay," and I'd go and buy a cheap suit and I'd start applying to real jobs. Because once they've caught up with you, you can't argue with this: they've caught up with you. So that was the thing in my head. ~ Amy Cuddy

There's my girl," he said. "On her feet already. You'll be a military officer in no time with an attitude like that."
Kestrel sat. She gave him a slight, ironic smile.
He returned it. "What I meant to say is that I'm glad you're better, and that I'm sorry I can't go to the Firstwinter ball."
It was good that she was already sitting. "Why would you want to go to a ball?"
"I thought I would take you."
She stared.
"It occurred to me that I have never danced with my daughter," he said. "And it would have been a wise move."
A wise move.
A show of force, then. A reminder of the respect due to the general's family. Quietly, Kestrel said, "You've heard the rumors."
He raised a hand, palm flat and facing her.
"Father--"
"Stop."
"It's not true. I--"
"We will not have this discussion." His hand lifted to block his eyes, then fell. "Kestrel, I'm not here for that. I'm here to tell you that I'm leaving. The emperor is sending me east to fight the barbarians."
It wasn't the first time in Kestrel's memory that her father had been sent to war, but the fear she felt was always the same, always keen. "For how long?"
"As long as it takes. I leave the morning of the ball with my regiment."
"The entire regiment?"
He caught the tone in her voice. He sighed. "Yes."
"That means there will be no soldiers in the city or its surroundings. If there's a problem--"
"The city guard will be here. The emperor feels ~ Marie Rutkoski

I've never really resented hard work because I've always liked it. Up every morning for roadwork. Going to the gymnasium every day at 12 o'clock. I never change my pattern. ~ Muhammad Ali

What does a man live for but to have a girl, use his mind, practice his trade, drink a drink, read a book, and watch the martins wing it for the Amazon and the three-fingered sassafras turn red in October?
Art Immelmann is right. Man is not made for suffering, night sweats, and morning terrors. ~ Walker Percy

By the way, a Bulgarian I met lately in Moscow," Ivan went on, seeming not to hear his brother's words, "told me about the crimes committed by Turks and Circassians in all parts of Bulgaria through fear of a general rising of the Slavs. They burn villages, murder, outrage women and children, they nail their prisoners by the ears to the fences, leave them so till morning, and in the morning they hang them- all sorts of things you can't imagine. People talk sometimes of bestial cruelty, but that's a great injustice and insult to the beasts; a beast can never be so cruel as a man, so artistically cruel. The tiger only tears and gnaws, that's all he can do. He would never think of nailing people by the ears, even if he were able to do it.
These Turks took a pleasure in torturing children, -too; cutting the unborn child from the mothers womb, and tossing babies up in the air and catching them on the points of their bayonets before their mothers' eyes. Doing it before the mothers' eyes was what gave zest to the amusement. Here is another scene that I thought very interesting. Imagine a trembling mother with her baby in her arms, a circle of invading Turks around her. They've planned a diversion: they pet the baby, laugh to make it laugh. They succeed, the baby laughs. At that moment a Turk points a pistol four inches from the baby's face. The baby laughs with glee, holds out its little hands to the pistol, and he pulls the trigger in the baby's face and blows out its brains. A ~ Fyodor Dostoyevsky