Scab Quotes

If you keep picking at that scab on your heart, it won't heal. ~ Antonia Perdu

My grief had become a thick scab; I picked at it from time to time, but mostly I left it alone. I didn't want to know what was underneath. ~ Marshall Thornton

Then the lion said – but I don't know if it spoke – You will have to let me undress you. I was afraid of his claws, I can tell you, but I was pretty nearly desperate now. So I just lay flat down on my back to let him do it.

"The very first tear he made was so deep and I thought it had gone right into my heart. And when he began pulling the skin off, it hurt worse than anything I've ever felt. The only thing that made me able to bear it was just the pleasure of feeling the stuff peel off. You know – if you've ever picked the scab of a sore place. It hurts like billy-oh but it is such fun to see it coming away. ~ C.S. Lewis

I had started trying - it for the first time, really - it to remember what had happened in that wood. I prodded tentatively around the edges of it, barely acknowledging even to myself what I was doing, like a kid picking at a scab but afraid to look. ~ Tana French

The itch of disputation will prove the scab of the Church. ~ Henry Wotton

Or else the cloud hovered, having barely left the lips, dense and slow, and suggested another vision: the exhalations that hang over the roofs of the metropolises, the opaque smoke that is not scattered, the hood of miasmata that weighs over the bituminous streets. Not the labile mists of memory nor the dry transparence, but the charring of burned lives that forms a scab on the city, the sponge swollen with vital matter that no longer flows, the jam of past, present, future that blocks existences calcified in the illusion of movement: this is what you would find at the end of your journey. ~ Italo Calvino

Analysts keep having to pick away at the scab that the patient tries to form between himself and the analyst to cover over his wounds. The analyst keeps the surface raw, so that the wound will heal properly. ~ Janet Malcolm

He has entertained the thought that his neighbours like having one of him in the district, having their own Englishman, although he will insist that he is as South African as they are. But perhaps his presence is more in the nature of a provocation, and his actions: he pretends ignorance but he knows what those spindly pink and white flowers mean to men who still punish themselves with every detail of their war, picking at it like the scab of the miniature Union Jack in the middle of the flag. ~ Claire Robertson

It occurs to me if we kissed now, we'd be like a folded map of America. My Pennsylvania scab next to her New Jersey black eye. I wonder, then, how many other kids could join in. Where are the Montanas and the Colorados? Where is the Vermont? Florida? How many maps would we make? ~ A.S. King

My poems covered the bare places in my childhood like the fine, new skin under a scab that hasn't yet fallen off completely. ~ Tove Ditlevsen

Beneath this mask of selfish tranquility nothing exists except bitterness and boredom. I am one of those whom suffering has made empty and frivilous: each night in my dreams I pull the scab off a wound; each day, vacuous and habit ridden, I let it reform. ~ Cyril Connolly

At some point during a celebrity tour of the ice fields, or first-growth forest - lately, the Amazon - he always phoned Holly in an agony of scab-picking, telling her that a respectable media would cover an issue on its merits, not because some overwrought self-involved actress had helicoptered in and aimed her affectations at the camera. ~ Lesley Krueger

It doesn't get better," I said. "The pain. The wounds scab over and you don't always feel like a knife is slashing through you. But when you least expect it, the pain flashes to remind you you'll never be the same. ~ Katie McGarry

He referred to Pope Paul III as "His Hellishness." Were not the pope and his associates at least members of the church? Yes, as much as spit, snot, pus, feces, urine, stench, scab, smallpox, ulcers, and syphilis are members of the body. Luther was never one to mince words. ~ Timothy George

It was, for the most part, your typical large city: a scab of nobles, wealthy merchants, and shipping tycoons crusted over a great messy wound of laborers and peons. ~ Edward W. Robertson

It was entirely possible that one song could destroy your life. Yes, musical doom could fall on a lone human form and crush it like a bug. The song, that song, was sent from somewhere else to find you, to pick the scab of your whole existence. The song was your personal shitty fate, manifest as a throb of pop floating out of radios everywhere. ~ Jonathan Lethem

She had been tied to an incubus, the memory of a love that had been rejected and had had nowhere to go; she had been locked into a dead relationship and now the last dried skin of it had fallen away, like the scab on a wound, and she was free. ~ Alexander McCall Smith

I felt this lightness settling on me, which was new. It's not closure, because I will live with Matt's death and the pain of it every day and the grief will stay with me. I just felt that I was carrying it differently. It was a place inside me that was more contained, it wasn't all of me. It wasn't like raw, open grief. It was almost like the scab had grown over. Occasionally you pick at it, or it might come off when you're not expecting it and you start bleeding again. ~ Leigh Sales

Another world. Another life. And for me it was much longer than five measly years. A world with more darkness and less hope than I care to remember. Bleak and starless, full of diseased men. It's inside them there. In some ways it makes it worse. You don't know who's diseased and who isn't. You don't know when you've become a Scab. ~ Ted Dekker

I don't remember a time when I wasn't waiting for a scab either to grow or to fall off my knee. ~ Carol Burnett

The U.S.-Mexican border es un herida abierta where the Third World grates against the first and bleeds. And before a scab forms it hemorrhages again, the lifeblood of two worlds merging to form a third country - a border culture. ~ Gloria E Anzaldua

She was the scab he couldn't stop picking, the split lip he couldn't stop biting at, the loose thread he couldn't stop tugging ~ Joe Abercrombie

You broke my wrist, you bitch."

"She's not the one crying on the ground, son. So who's the bitch? ~ Ellis Leigh

One finds fortunes built on slave labor, indentured labor, prison labor, immigrant labor, female labor, child labor, and scab labor - backed by the lethal force of gun thugs and militia. 'Old money' is often little more than dirty money laundered by several generations of possession. ~ Michael Parenti

I dropped back onto Dad's stool with my mouth open. Gerald Whipplethorn? I wanted to babysit, but Gerald wasn't worth it. The kid annoyed me like an itchy scab you couldn't pick off. He was the worst. The absolute worst. I ~ A.W. Hartoin

But even more than I wanted to check out and give my emotional wounds time to scab over, I wanted to live. ~ Mike Mullin

Your heart is not a wound to be poked at to see if the scab is ready to come off. You can be healed of that very old pain, if you'll just let it happen. (Marianne) ~ Laurell K. Hamilton

I guess we all can't help peeking at our own imperfections, just like we can't help scratching a scab that keeps itching. When those imperfections are pasted across your face like that, exaggerated and magnified, it's hard to find all those good thoughts you have about yourself. If you believe those distorted reflections too deeply, you'll never get out of the maze. ~ Neal Shusterman

Roschach's Journal: October 12th, 1985
Dog carcass in alley this morning, tire tread on burst stomach. This city is afraid of me. I have seen its true face.
The streets are extended gutters and the gutters are full of blood and when the drains finally scab over, all the vermin will drown.
The accumulated filth of all their sex and murder will foam up about their waists and all the whores and politicians will look up and shout "Save us!" ... and I'll look down and whisper "No. ~ Alan Moore

I require of all my students ... that they are downy and pubescent, pimpled with sullen mistrust, and boiling away with private fury and ardor and uncertainty and gloom. I require that they wait in the corridor for ten minutes at least before each lesson, tenderly nursing their injustices, picking miserably at their own unworthiness as one might finger a scab or caress a scar. If I am to teach your daughter, you darling hopeless and inadequate mother, she must be moody and bewildered and awkward and dissatisfied and wrong. When she realizes that he body is a secret, a dark and yawning secret of which she becomes more and more ashamed, come back to me. You must understand me on this point. I cannot teach children. ~ Eleanor Catton

Ever since this day I have dreamt sometimes ... I, a street rat in my soul, dream even now ... that if it were possible to life this littered, paved Manhattan from the earth ... and all its torn and dripping pipes and conduits and tunnels and tracks and cables
all of it, like a scab from new skin underneath
how seedlings would sprout and freshets bubble up, and brush and grasses would grow over the rolling hills ... ~ E.L. Doctorow

The scab is a traitor to his God, his mother, and his class. ~ Jack London

I think we're all wounded, but some of us, when we experience the healing of those wounds, that they scar and scab over. ~ LeCrae

The U.S-Mexican border es una herida abierta where the Third World grates against the first and bleeds. And before a scab forms it hemorrhages again, the lifeblood of two worlds merging to form a third country - a border culture.
Borders are set up to define the places that are safe and unsafe, to distinguish us from them. A border is a dividing line, a narrow strip along a steep edge. A borderland is a vague and undetermined place created by the emotional residue of an unnatural boundary. It is in a constant state of transition. The prohibited and forbidden are its inhabitants. ~ Gloria E Anzaldua

Most women like to fuss around a wound of your past, pick at the thin scab, comfort you after they'd made it sting. Not Nell. ~ Lily King

I was betrayed, one more day, of my short life.
You were carried away, had no shame, to suffocate my being.

I was me, but you weren't you.
You were sticking to me like a scab.
So, I peeled you away...
Bled for days...
And stepped out of myself. ~ Pantera

I loved the hole in his jeans and the dirt on his bare feet and the scab on his elbow and the scar that laced through one eyebrow. ~ E. Lockhart

The whole world is a scab. The point is to pick it constructively. ~ Peter Beard

Elvis Jr. watches you with considerable gravitas. He is a piercingly cute carajito. He has all these mosquito bites on his legs and an old scab on his head no one can explain to you. You are suddenly overcome with the urge to cover him with your arms, with your whole body. Later, Elvis Sr. fills you in on the Plan. I'll bring him over to the States in a few years. I'll tell the wife he was an accident, a one-time thing when I was drunk and I didn't find out about it until now. And that's going to work? It will work out, he says testily. Bro, your wife ain't going to buy that. And what the fuck do you know? Elvis says. It ain't like your shit ever works. ~ Junot Diaz

Love is a festering wound; a scab I compulsively must dig at deeper than the grave which calls me Heaven bound, for each day the Reaper comes to bury me safe and sound. Madly for it, I die... ~ The Raveness

The physical healed quickly, but those of the spirit ran deep, and in most cases, could only be concealed. Wounds of the spirit may scab over, but they never fully heal. ~ J.K. Swift

It was love, and it hit me so hard I leaned against the screen door that still stood between us, just to stay vertical. The universe was good because he was in it. I loved the hole in his jeans and the dirt on his bare feet and the scab on his elbow and the scar that laces through one eyebrow. Gat, my Gat. ~ E. Lockhart

My youth is like a scab: under it there is a wound that every day leaks blood. It disfigures me. ~ Gottfried Benn

How does paying people more money make you more money?

It works like this. The more you pay your workers, the more they spend. Remember, they're not just your workers- they're your consumers, too. The more they spend their extra cash on your products, the more your profits go up. Also, when employees have enough money that they don't have to live in constant fear of bankruptcy, they're able to focus more on their work- and be more productive. With fewer personal problems and less stress hanging over them, they'll lose less time at work, meaning more profits for you. Pay them enough to afford a late model car (i.e. one that works), and they'll rarely be late for work. And knowing that they'll be able to provide a better life for their children will not only give them a more positive attitude, it'll give them hope- and an incentive to do well for the company because the better the company does, the better they'll do.

Of course, if you're like most corporations these days- announcing mass layoffs right after posting record profits- then you're already hemorrhaging the trust and confidence of your remaining workforce, and your employees are doing their jobs in a state of fear. Productivity will drop. That will hurt sales. You will suffer. Ask the people at Firestone: Ford has alleged that the tire company fired its longtime union employees, then brought in untrained scab workers who ended up making thousands of defective tires- and 203 dead customers later, ~ Michael Moore

Well, on the upside," said Ron finally, who was sitting watching the skin on his hands regrow, "we got the Horcrux. On the downside--"
"--no sword," said Harry through gritted teeth, as he dripped dittany through the singed hole in his jeans onto the angry burn beneath.
"No sword," repeated Ron. "That double-crossing little scab…"
Harry pulled the Horcrux from the pocket of the wet jacket he had just taken off and set it down on the grass in front of them. Glinting in the sun, it drew their eyes as they swigged their bottles of juice.
"At least we can't wear it this time, that'd look a bit weird hanging round our necks," said Ron, wiping his mouth on the back of his hand.
Hermione looked across the lake to the far bank, where the dragon was still drinking.
"What'll happen to it, do you think?" she asked. "Will it be all right?"
"You sound like Hagrid," said Ron. "It's a dragon, Hermione, it can look after itself. It's us we need to worry about."
"What do you mean?"
"Well, I don't know how to break this to you," said Ron, "but I think they might have noticed we broke into Gringotts."
All three of them started to laugh, and once started, it was difficult to stop. Harry's ribs ached, he felt lightheaded with hunger, but he lay back on the grass beneath the reddening sky and laughed until his throat was raw. ~ J.K. Rowling

I was four. _New and somewhat interesting_ applied to about ninety percent of my day, in everything from the development of a scab, to a cartoon I'd never seen, to an unexpected flavour of juice at lunch. It's difficult to assign value to discovery when you haven't sorted out the parameters of reality yet. ~ Becky Chambers

Time heals all wounds, or at least it causes them to scab. ~ Karina Halle

I have a big hole in my heart," I said. "But it'll close over."
I don't want to sound all Dr. Phil," she said. "But don't let the scab seal the pain in, okay?"
That's good advice," I said. "I hope I can manage it. ~ Charlaine Harris

To know a man properly, you must know the shape of his hurt - the specific wound around which his person has been formed like a scab. ~ Kei Miller

Jay insisted on carrying her up the back steps and into the kitchen, and this time Violet didn't complain when he lifted her. He set her down gently on the kitchen counter, and then he rummaged through the cupboard while Violet told him where the Band-Aids were. He came with bandages, gauze, cotton balls, antibacterial wash, and two tubes of ointment. It seemed like overkill to Violet, but she didn't say anything. She wanted to see what he planned to do.
"Okay, this is probably gonna sting," he warned as he leaned over and began cleaning her wounds.
It did sting, more than Violet let on, and she had to bite her lip as the tears came back all over again. But she let him keep working without even flinching, which was no small feat as he stripped away the layers of dirt from her skin.
The wounds were big, and round, and raw. She thought she looked like a little kid with the giant scrapes on her knees, and she imagined that they were going to scab over and possibly even scar. She felt like such an idiot for falling over her own two clumsy feet.
But Jay was gentle, and he took his time, being careful not to hurt her. She admired his patience and took perverse pleasure in his touch. He didn't look up to see how she was doing; he just kept working until he was satisfied that her scrapes were cleaned out. And then he picked up the antibacterial wash and some cotton balls.
Violet sucked in her breath when he brushed the soaked cotton ball against the angry red ~ Kimberly Derting

I bring my hand to my face and pull away tiny pieces of the jagged scab. My face reflects in the rounded airplane window, and I see it is now a tiny Massachusetts, with Cape Cod curling toward my ear. In only a few more days it will be gone. I feel the fresh, smooth parts and marvel at how soft they are. New skin amazes me. New skin is a miracle. It is proof that we can heal. ~ A.S. King

If you keep picking a scab it will bleed and never heal. If you keep dragging the pain of the past up, it will never heal. ~ Leon Brown

We are made to bleed and scab and heal and bleed again and turn every scar into a joke. We are made to fight and fuck and talk and fight again and sit around and laugh until we choke. ~ Ani DiFranco

Despair was strength. Despair was the scab and the scar. The walled city in a time of plague. A closed fortification. A sure thing, because it was always safer, less painful to stop trying than it was to repeatedly try and fail. Failure-disappointment-was a poison in my blood. Despair was the antidote. ~ Norah Vincent

Pride is a wound, and vanity is the scab on it. One's life picks at the scab to open the wound again and again. In men, it seldom heals and often grows septic. ~ Michael Ayrton

I think now that if all eight billion of us had just shut off the lights and gone to bed that night and left it alone we'd have all slept and the chalice would have passed us by. But let's be real. Whoever leaves anything alone? Life's a scab, and it's our nature to pick at it until it bleeds. ~ Adrian Barnes

The memory was so vivid that, like a fresh scab, he was sure he would start to bleed if he picked at it. ~ Miyuki Miyabe

I attribute a scab to the present state of society. The way the scab looks in its worst state is gross and chaotic and horrible, that's now, but when it breaks away, there's a brand new piece of skin that's stronger than before. It's like creation out of chaos. ~ Brandon Boyd

At the core of love is validation. It is what gives love power.
For when love is given away, validation seeps in and expands in the heart of the recipient, filling up every empty, dark corner. It is a wonderful, light, consuming feeling we long for, and once found, we hope - even expect - it will forever remain. But there are times when that most precious love is revoked, and a hard scab forms over the empty hole. Though this scab is both healing and protective, it is the reason why validation from future love may not seep in so easily, no matter how wanting the heart. ~ Richelle E. Goodrich

It was a flaking scab on a fleshy field of neglect. ~ Hunter Shea