Single Word Quotes

Words have a genealogy and it's easier to trace the evolution of a single word than the evolution of a language. ~ Daniel Dennett

In English-speaking countries, the connection between heresy and homosexuality is expressed through the use of a single word to denote both concepts: buggery ... Webster's Unabridged Dictionary (Third Edition) defines "buggery" as "heresy, sodomy. ~ Thomas Szasz

It is clear that something is seriously lacking in the way we humans are going about things. But what is it that we lack? The fundamental problem, I believe, is that at every level we are giving too much attention to the external, material aspects of life while neglecting moral ethics and inner values. By inner values, I mean the qualities that we all appreciate in others, and toward which we all have a natural instinct, bequeathed by our biological nature as animals that survive and thrive only in an environment of concern, affection, and warm-heartedness-or in a single word, compassion. The essence of compassion is a desire to alleviate the suffering of others and to promote their well-being. This is the spiritual principle from which all other positive inner value emerge. ~ Dalai Lama XIV

The first step in gaining the upper hand is always to seize the moral high ground, and to be able to do this with no more than a single word is nothing short of genius. I ~ Alan Bradley

I can kill with a single word. I can hurl a ball of fire into the midst of my enemies. I rule a squadron of skeletal warriors, who can destroy by touch alone. I can raise a wall of ice to protect those I serve. The invisible is discernible to my eyes. Ordinary magic spells crumble in my presence ... But I bow in the presence of a master.
Lord Soth to Raistlin Majere ~ Margaret Weis

You have no idea how difficult it was trying to listen to a single word you said today when all I could think about was how soft they are. How incredible they taste. How perfect they fit between mine. ~ Colleen Hoover

And immediately his leprosy was cleansed" (Mat 8:3). To one who had lain in the grave four days He cried, "Lazarus, come forth," and the dead came forth. The stormy wind and the angry waves were hushed at a single word from Him. A legion of demons could not resist His authoritative command. ~ Arthur W. Pink

She turned her head a fraction of an inch, her eyes very dark, pools of ink, silencing him. She did not say a word. In her eyes he read the answer to the question she had not allowed him to ask. No one had ever looked at him like that. Like he was every star shining down on them that night and the ground beneath her feet, and every other ridiculous phrase found in books that he'd never believed could possibly be true. And he knew she hated herself in
that moment and he knew she loved him precisely because she did not speak a single word. ~ Silvia Moreno-Garcia

The Buddhas speak the wondrous sound throughout the world; the Teachings spoken over countless ages can all be expounded in a single word. ~ Thomas Cleary

Beyond the clouds, above people, beneath the skin, inside people, we're waiting for you. We see you now, as you read. We'll see you when you stop thinking about these words. Above and inside your face, we know your secrets. We know what you hide from yourself. You can't escape us. We hold your heart in the palm of our hand. If we like, we can squeeze it. If we like, we can crush it. There's nothing you can do to stop us. Our gaze notices your every single move and your every single word. Say a word now. Make a move. We smile at your words, as we smile at your silence. No one will be able to protect you. No one can protect you now. You're even less than you imagine. We've seen a thousand generations of men like you. It was our pleasure to let them walk on the lines of our hands. It was our pleasure to take everything away from them. We guided entire generations of men through tunnels we built that led nowhere. And when they arrived at nothing, we smiled. You're just like them. We're waiting for you above and inside your face. Continue on your way. Follow that line of our hand. We know where that tunnel you walk through will end. Keep on walking. We see you and smile. Beyond the clouds, we are fear. Beneath the skin, we are fear. ~ Jose Luis Peixoto

And when Siddhartha was listening attentively to this river, this song of a thousand voices, when he neither listened to the suffering nor the laughter, when he did not tie his soul to any particular voice and submerged his self into it, but when he heard them all, perceived the whole, the oneness, then the great song of the thousand voices consisted of a single word, which was Om: the perfection. ~ Hermann Hesse

I cannot read a single word of the Hindoos without being elevated. ~ Henry David Thoreau

I would be speaking even with my silence, because at the moment I am nothing but a single word. ~ Franz Kafka

The word begone is a Russian doll. A small, single word, which contains so many others; and when all the smaller words inside line up, they look like a bridge: Be Beg Ego Go On One. ~ Craig Stone

She hadn't heard anything from him, not a single word. Really, she hadn't expected to, but knowing it and then living it were two totally different things. ~ Ella Frank

Learning starts with single word "WHY". ~ Saadshah

When we were in New York, you cried for two days and passed out. You said a word in your sleep, over and over. Akinli." Elizabeth stared down at the drawing.
"At first I thought it was gibberish. And then I thought it was the name of a town or a building. . . . I didn't figure out it belonged to a person until you made that." Elizabeth pointed down to the paper, worn from being folded and unfolded who knew how many times.
"When Elizabeth came to me, I had to tell her the truth, and we decided to find him. You gave us the name of the town. We went there looking for someone answering to that name, fitting this image." Miaka smiled ruefully. "Very small town. It wasn't hard."
Tears pooled in my eyes. "You've really seen him?"
They both nodded. I thought about all those trips they had taken, making up ridiculous stories so they could get to him without me knowing.
"How is he?" I asked, unable to contain my curiosity. "Is he okay? Has he gone back to school? Is he still with Ben and Julie? Is he happy? Could you tell? Is he happy?"
The questions tumbled out without me being able to hold them in. I was desperate to know. I felt a single word would put my soul at ease.
Elizabeth swallowed hard. "That's the thing, Kahlen. We're afraid he's dying. ~ Kiera Cass

There is an air of grace and tradition The South takes pride in upholding. When all hell is breaking loose, southerners face the world with a smile. All anger, resentment, and feelings of hierarchy only flutter in bits of passive aggressive, light-hearted gossip. In southern culture, it is a cardinal sin to utter a single word without a sweet layer of sugarcoating. ~ Maggie Young

It'll always be easier to fight others if you reduce them to a single word or look at them just one way. ~ Guy Delisle

Kershaw had long ago realized, apparently, that dealing with Brits was tricky. You had to listen to what a Brit was saying - which was invariably that he thought XYZ was a terrific idea and he hoped it went very well for you - while at the same time paying heed to the greasy, nauseous suspicion you had that, although every word and phrase indicated approval, somehow the sum of the whole was that you'd have to be a mental pygmy to come up with this plan and a complete fucking idiot to pursue it. After six years working with the Brits in various theatres he'd come to the conclusion that they didn't do it on purpose. The thing was, Brits actually thought that subtext was plain text. To a Brit, the modern English language was vested with hundreds of years of unbroken history and cultural nuance, so that every single word had a host of implications depending on who said it to whom, when, and how. British soldiers, for example, gave entire reports to their commanders by the way they said 'good morning, sir' and then had to spend half an hour telling them the detail, which was why the Brits always looked bored in briefings. They could sense the trajectory of the conversation, knew the bad news was coming now and the good news now and that there was a question on the end which needed thinking about. With a bit of work they could deduce the question, too, but they always waited politely for it to be asked so that no one felt rushed. ~ Nick Harkaway

In the confusion we stay with each other, happy to be together, speaking without uttering a single word. ~ Walt Whitman

The next morning I had Twentieth-Century American Poetry at MCC. This old woman gave a lecture wherein she managed to talk for ninety minutes about Sylvia Plath without ever once quoting a single word of Sylvia Plath. ~ John Green

When I was a child, all problems had ended with a single word from my father. A smile from him was sunshine, his scowl a bolt of thunder. He was smart, and generous, and honorable without fail. He could exile a trespasser, check my math homework, and fix the leaky bathroom sink, all before dinner. For the longest time, I thought he was invincible. Above the petty problems that plagued normal people.
And now he was gone. ~ Rachel Vincent

It's 5:22pm you're in the grocery checkout line. Your three-year-old is writhing on the floor, screaming, because you have refused to buy her a Teletubby pinwheel. Your six-year-old is whining, repeatedly, in a voice that could saw through cement, "But mommy, puleeze, puleeze" because you have not bought him the latest "Lunchables," which features, as the four food groups, Cheetos, a Snickers, Cheez Whiz, and Twizzlers. Your teenager, who has not spoken a single word in the past foor days, except, "You've ruined my life," followed by "Everyone else has one," is out in the car, sulking, with the new rap-metal band Piss on the Parentals blasting through the headphones of a Discman. To distract yourself, and to avoid the glares of other shoppers who have already deemed you the worst mother in America, you leaf through People magazine. Inside, Uma thurman gushes "Motherhood is Sexy." Moving on to Good Housekeeping, Vanna White says of her child, "When I hear his cry at six-thirty in the morning, I have a smile on my face, and I'm not an early riser." Another unexpected source of earth-mother wisdom, the newly maternal Pamela Lee, also confides to People, "I just love getting up with him in the middle of the night to feed him or soothe him." Brought back to reality by stereophonic whining, you indeed feel as sexy as Rush Limbaugh in a thong. ~ Susan J. Douglas

A picture's worth a thousand words. But a single word can make you think of over a thousand pictures in your mind, over a thousand moments, a thousand memories. ~ Rebecca McNutt

The five most important words a leader can speak are - 'I am proud of you'
The four most important are - 'What is your opinion?'
The three most important are - 'If you please'
The two most important are - 'Thank You'
And the most important single word of all is - 'You' ~ Denis Waitley

But the lawyer he jumps on the table and yells, and says: "Gentlemen - gentlemen! Hear me just a word - just a single word - if you please!

There's one way yet - let's go and dig up the corpse and look. ~ Mark Twain

Siddhartha listened. He was now completely and utterly immersed in his listening, utterly empty, utterly receptive; he felt he had now succeeded in learning how to listen. He had heard all these things often now, these many voices in the river; today it sounded new. Already he could no longer distinguish the many voices, could not distinguish the gay from the weeping, the childish from the virile; they all belonged together, the yearning laments and the wise man's laughter, the cry of anger and the moans of the dying; they were all one, all of them interlinked and interwoven, bound together in a thousand ways. And all of this together - all the voices, all the goals, all the longing, all the suffering, all the pleasure, everything good and everything bad - all of it together was the world. All of it together was the river of occurrences, the music of life. And when Siddhartha listened attentively to this river, to this thousand-voiced song, when he listened neither for the sorrow nor for the laughter, when he did not attach his soul to any one voice and enter into it with his ego but rather heard all of them, heard the whole, the oneness - then the great song of the thousand voices consisted only of a single word: Om, perfection. ~ Hermann Hesse

As a reminder to himself and anyone who visited his office in the shanty, Burnham posted a sign over his desk bearing a single word: RUSH. ~ Erik Larson

If only I was as eloquent as Demosthenes, I would have to do no more than repeat a single word three times. ~ Johann Georg Hamann

Those are rare who fall without becoming degraded; there is a point, moreover, at which the unfortunate and the infamous are associated and confounded in a single word, a fatal word, Les Misérables. ~ Victor Hugo

The skill, the art of literacy is a gift. To read is to watch in your mind as a single word explodes into a confetti of images. Truly, of all the gifts given to man, reading is most sacred, For from words come dreams and from dreams come great tomorrows. ~ Stephen Cosgrove

The Oxford Classical Dictionary firmly states: "No word in either Greek or Latin corresponds to the English 'religion' or 'religious.' "6 The idea of religion as an essentially personal and systematic pursuit was entirely absent from classical Greece, Japan, Egypt, Mesopotamia, Iran, China, and India.7 Nor does the Hebrew Bible have any abstract concept of religion; and the Talmudic rabbis would have found it impossible to express what they meant by faith in a single word or even in a formula, since the Talmud was expressly designed to bring the whole of human life into the ambit of the sacred.8 ~ Karen Armstrong

Sometimes at the best moments a single word or a look is enough.' ~ Honore De Balzac

Her seven-year-old self had decided that stealing books was morally bankrupt, but since the books hadn't actually left the library - they'd merely been relocated - it wasn't technically stealing. Echo looked around at her sea of tomes, and a single word came to mind: Tsundoku. It was the Japanese word for letting books pile up without reading them all. ~ Anonymous

And we're losing something of great value, a way of thinking and moving through time that can be summed up in a single word: depth. Depth of thought and feeling, depth in our relationships, our work and everything we do. Since depth is what makes life fulfilling and meaningful, it's astounding that we're allowing this to happen. ~ William Powers

My life, the most truthful one, is unrecognizable, extremely interior, and there is no single word that gives it meaning. ~ Clarice Lispector

Spinoza wrote the last indisputable Latin masterpiece, and one in which the refined conceptions of medieval philosophy are finally turned against themselves and destroyed entirely. He chose a single word from that language for his device: caute – 'be cautious' – inscribed beneath a rose, the symbol of secrecy. For, having chosen to write in a language that was so widely intelligible, he was compelled to hide what he had written. ~ Roger Scruton

Officials are highly educated but one-sided; in his own department an official can grasp whole trains of thought from a single word, but let him have something from another department explained to him ... he won't understand a word of it. ~ Franz Kafka

I sing in Hungarian. I read Hungarian. I do not pretend to speak Hungarian, but I sing in languages that I have studied as languages. And I find that to be central and very, very helpful. I think if you're not really cognizant of what every single word means, I think that might be a little tricky. ~ Jessye Norman

I recall that, the first time I met a Geordie speaker, it was some days before I could understand a single word he was saying. ~ Larry Trask

It's when I'm around some people that my entire vocabulary goes on vacation. Like now, when Dave's walking next to me wearing an old black singlet and board shorts and the tattoo of a bird on his wrist, every single word in my head except "no" and "huh" is lying somewhere on a beack getting a suntan ~ Cath Crowley

Chronicler wiped the nib of his pen clean, "It's not really my place to comment on the story," he said placidly. "If you say you saw a dragon ... " He shrugged. Kvothe gave him a profoundly disappointed look. "This from the author of The Mating Habits of the Common Draccus? This from Devan Lochees, the great debunker?" "This from Devan Lochees who agreed not to interrupt or change a single word of the story he is recording." Chronicler lay his pen down and massaged his hand. "Because those were the only conditions under which he could get access to a story he very much desired. ~ Patrick Rothfuss

The qualities that make for excellence in children's literature can be summed up in a single word: imagination. And imagination as it relates to the child is, to my mind, synonymous with fantasy. Contrary to most of the propaganda in books for the young, childhood is only partly a time of innocence. It is, in my opinion, a time of seriousness, bewilderment, and a good deal of suffering. It's also possibly the best of all times. Imagination for the child is the miraculous, freewheeling device he uses to course his way through the problems of every day ... It's through fantasy that children achieve catharsis. ~ Maurice Sendak

Seven minutes is all you get to make a positive first impression. In the first seven minutes of contact with your church, your first-time guests will know whether or not they are coming back. That's before a single worship song is sung and before a single word of the message is uttered. ~ Nelson Searcy

This vocation of yours.
She knew that a hunger dwelled in her, in that place where happier emotions should reside, a hunger she could neither sate nor deny. While her compulsion to scratch that itch never faded, she knew that she performed a service to the world in these coll west London rooms. While it was work for which she would receive not a single word of thanks, its value, Etienne believed, could not be denied. ~ Stephen Lloyd Jones

She made one instinctive effort to resist and then yielded, slipping down on to the floor. Not a single word was exchanged. The act was silent and brutal ~ Emile Zola

Tabitha nods all throughout my sentences when I'm speaking to her, says "Right" after practically every single word, and even more annoyingly tries to finish my sentences for me, or join in with my last few words. The really annoying thing is that she always gets it wrong. She never fully catches the gist of what I'm saying, so I have to keep repeating the sentence while she keeps trying to guess what my last words will be. One of these days I'll just say "I'm a tramp" as my last words and she'll have to say that.
Ahern, Cecelia (2005-02-01). Love, Rosie (pp. 200-201). Hachette Books. Kindle Edition. ~ Cecelia Ahern

Geography and mileage mean nothing. Separate is a single word that covers all distances that aren't together. ~ Rivera Sun

Breathless I look up at him and find him gazing at me with a wonder that my deep-seated insecurity finds hard to believe. Then he does this thing. His fingers start moving on my face, tracing outlines. They trail along my eyebrows, the ridge of my nose, the apple of my cheeks and the line of my jaw. His touch is like feather but his eyes ... they blaze and just like that, without saying a single word, he makes me believe. ~ Rucy Ban

The perpetual free fall was no match for the way he made me feel.
I was still falling at unstoppable speeds – only, in his arms, as his body claimed me without a single word spoken, I was suddenly falling…up. ~ Aly Martinez

If I had to pick a single word to describe what my pictures are all about, I would say 'secrets.' As a child I always had a secret world and my favorite book was A Secret Garden. ~ Joyce Tenneson

Words evolve, perhaps more rapidly and tellingly than do their users, and the change in meanings reflects a society often more accurately than do the works of many historians. In he years preceding the first collapse of NorAm, the change in the meaning of one word predicted the failure of that society more immediately and accurately than did all the analysts, social scientists, and historians. That critical word? 'Discrimination.' We know it now as a term meaning 'unfounded bias against a person, group, or culture on the basis of racial, gender, or ethnic background.' Prejudice, if you will.

The previous meaning of this word was: 'to draw a clear distinction between good and evil, to differentiate, to recognize as different.' Moreover, the connotations once associated with discrimination were favorable. A person of discrimination was one of taste and good judgment. With the change of the meaning into a negative term of bias, the English language was left without a single-word term for the act of choosing between alternatives wisely, and more importantly, left with a subterranean negative connotation for those who attempted to make such choices.

In hindsight, the change in meaning clearly reflected and foreshadowed the disaster to come. Individuals and institutions abhorred making real choices. At one point more than three-quarters of the youthful population entered institutions of higher learning. Credentials, often paper ones, replaced meaning judgment ~ L.E. Modesitt Jr.

Syntax is complex, but the complexity is there for a reason. For our thoughts are surely even more complex, and we are limited by a mouth that can pronounce a single word at a time. ~ Steven Pinker

This should be interesting. If you're right, then what you're about to tell me is the secret to success for the average married man. I'd hate to miss a single word. ~ Jason Luke

What was it like then to witness the transformation wrought by this construction? A geometric idea of precision suddenly imposed on a landscape, lived on and in for centuries. The land itself like a body submitted to military discipline. Or like a mind, tutored along certain acceptable pathways, so that finally all that lies outside certain avenues of thought begins to assume an air of unreality.
The land of course is still there. Only now it has receded into the background. It is what you see in your peripheral vision as you speed down the highway. The complexity of it, the intricate presence of it, has been reduced now to a single word, jungle. If once you breathed its breath or slept surrounded by its dark or wakened with its light, you no longer remember. You tell yourself life has improved. The jungle is in the past. To enter it is to stray from the path, or to be pulled down into some unknown depth. It is an exotic place, intriguing but also unpredictable, uncontrolled, threatening the well-paved order of existence. ~ Susan Griffin

Never did Christ utter a single word attesting to a personal resurrection and a life beyond the grave. ~ Leo Tolstoy

The paradox of questioning is that simple questions can lead to detailed, on-target answers, but complicated questions get you single-word answers from a subject who doesn't want to talk, and unrestrained answers from a person who does. ~ James Pyle

She coughs and speaks into her hand. "What was that?" Lowering her hand, she admits, "They had to pack up and drive to Pennsylvania. No more strong cock for this girl. It's heartbreaking, really. Fernando was amazing. I didn't understand a single word he said because my Portuguese is nonexistent, but who needs words when you've got an eleven-inch cock with the girth of jumbo summer sausage? My pussy may never be the same again . . . but at least I'll have the memories. ~ Meghan March

My truest life is unrecognizable, extremely interior and there is not a single word that defines it. ~ Clarice Lispector

A single word often betrays a great design. ~ Jean Racine

When I was twenty-three I began seeing a psychotherapist because I couldn't bear the idea that, after the end of an affair, all our shared memories might be expunged from the mind of the other, that they might no longer exist outside my own belief they'd happened. I couldn't accept the possibility of being the only one who would remember everything about those moments as carefully as I tried to remember them. My life, which exists mostly in the memories of the people I've known, is deteriorating at the rate of physiological decay. A color, a sensation, the way someone said a single word - soon it will all be gone. In a hundred and fifty years no one alive will ever have known me. Being forgotten like that, entering that great and ongoing blank, seems more like death than death. ~ Sarah Manguso

I took a seat. The garden was bursting with people, again in all their alien ways. At that moment a strange loneliness took hold. Perhaps it was that I had not spoken a single word of English that entire day. Perhaps it was that I had never sat in a public garden before, had not even known it to be something that I'd want to do. And all around me there were people who did this regularly. It occurred to me that I really was in someone else's country and yet, in some necessary way, I was outside of their country. ~ Ta-Nehisi Coates

I am convinced that poets are toddlers in a cathedral, slobbering on wooden blocks and piling them up in the light of the stained glass. We can hardly make anything beautiful that wasn't beautiful in the first place. We aren't writers, but gleeful rearrangers of words whose meanings we can't begin to know. When we manage to make something pretty, it's only so because we are ourselves a flourish on a greater canvas. That means there's no end to the discovery. We may crawl around the cathedral floor for ages before we grow up enough to reach the doorknob and walk outside into a garden of delights. Beyond that, the city, then the rolling hills, then the sea. And when the world of every cell has been limned and painted and sung, we lie back on the grass, satisfied that our work is done. Then, of course, the sun sets and we see above us the dark dome of glittering stars.

On and on it goes, all the way to the lightless borderlands of time and space, which we come to discover in some future age are but the beginnings or endings of a single word spoken from the mouth of God. Some nights, while I traipse down the hill, I imagine that word isn't a word at all, but a burst of laughter. ~ Andrew Peterson

At first Babel longed for the use of just two words: Yes and No. But he knew that just to utter a single word would be to destroy the delicate fluency of silence. ~ Nicole Krauss

I was already dozing off in the shade, dreaming that the rustling trees were my many selves explaining themselves all at the same time so that I could not make out a single word. My life was a beautiful mystery on the verge of understanding, always on the verge! Think of it! ~ Charles Simic

That was it. That was all of it. A grace so ordinary there was no reason at all to remember it. Yet I have never across the forty years since it was spoken forgotten a single word. ~ William Kent Krueger

If I had to use a single word to describe what is fundamentally wrong with government today, I would use the word fraud. ~ Robert Higgs

They didn't exchange a single word. But in the weeks that followed, Trip spent his days wandering the halls, hoping for Lux to appear, the most naked person with clothes on he had ever seen. Even in sensible school shoes, she shuffled as though barefoot, and the baggy apparel Mrs. Lisbon bought for her only increased her appeal, as though after undressing she had put on whatever was handy. In corduroys her thighs rubbed together, buzzing, and there was always at least one untidy marvel to unravel him: an untucked shirttail, a sock with a hole, a ripped seam showing underarm hair. She carted her books from class to class but never opened them. Her pens and pencils were as temporary as Cinderella's broom. When she smiled, her mouth showed too many teeth, but at night Trip Fontaine dreamed of being bitten by each one. ~ Jeffrey Eugenides

One single word and I swear I'll rip your tongue out. (Zephyra) ~ Sherrilyn Kenyon

She had been the source of all his wealth; she had peopled his plantation with slaves; she had become a great grandmother in his service. She had rocked him in infancy, attended him in childhood, served him through life, and at his death wiped from his icy brow the cold death-sweat, and closed his eyes forever. She was nevertheless left a slave - a slave for life - a slave in the hands of strangers; and in their hands she saw her children, her grandchildren, and her great-grandchildren, divided, like so many sheep, without being gratified with the small privilege of a single word, as to their or her own destiny. ~ Frederick Douglass

The universe cannot be read until we have learnt the language and become familiar with the characters in which it is written. It is written in mathematical language, and the letters are triangles, circles and other geometrical figures, without which means it is humanly impossible to comprehend a single word. Without these, one is wandering about in a dark labyrinth. This ~ Marcus Du Sautoy

All the scholastic scaffolding
falls, as a ruined edifice,
before one single word - faith. ~ Napoleon Bonaparte

Writing a story, regardless of length, begins always with a single word. ~ Don Roff

Every city has a single word that defines it, that identifies most poeple who live there. If you could read people's thoughts as they were passing you on the streets of any given place, you would discover that most of them are thinking the same thought. Whatever that majority thought might be - that is the word of the city. And if your personal word does not match the word of the city, then you don't really belong there. ~ Elizabeth Gilbert

He's on his knees.
I bite back the moan caught in my throat just before he lifts me up and carries me to the bed. He's on top of me in an instant, kissing me with a kind of intensity that makes me wonder why I haven't died or caught on fire or woken up from this dream yet. He's running his hands down my body only to bring them back up to my face and he kisses me once, twice, and his teeth catch my bottom lip for just a second and I'm clinging to him, wrapping my arms around his neck and running my hands through his hair and pulling him into me.
He tastes so sweet. So hot and so sweet and I keep trying to say his name but I can't even find the time to breathe, much less to say a single word. ~ Tahereh Mafi

I question every word; I write 'the' and immediately feel scorn. It's such an ordinary word - everybody uses it - why can't I come up with something original? In the sunlight, every single word seems hackneyed. ~ Jeff Lindsay

You know I want you?"

"Yes." Though it sounded breathless, she was proud to be able to utter even a single word.

"I usually get what I want."

A slight smile tickled at her lips. "Do I have a say in the matter? ~ Christy Reece

The temptation, which consisted of a single word written on the cemetary of the defeated: Sleep. ~ Arthur Koestler

Ink flows like blood from a freshly cut vein. My soul bleeds onto the paper. Bleeds and bleeds and bleeds until there's nothing left. Not a single word. Only when I'm empty do I see how to fill myself again, how to start being a whole person for once. ~ S.F. Henson

My mind when the sounding bowls are in play. I also draw Angel Cards17 several times a day to help me stay focused on what I believe is important in life. The original Angel Cards come in sets of assorted sizes with each card having a single word written on them. Every morning when I first get up, I ritualistically invite an angel into my life and draw a card. I then focus my attention on that particular angel throughout my day. If I am feeling stressed or have an important phone call to make, I will often draw another angel to help me shift my mind. I am ~ Jill Bolte Taylor

Did you love me?" It was a pathetic question asked in a pathetic whisper.

"Oh, Fiona," The lips he pressed against my temple were anything but ecumenical. His hand on my back drifted to my waist. "My feelings for you cannot be reduced to a single word. You are my only temptation. ~ Kerrigan Byrne

Revolution." Just a single word that no one even understands, and yet it has the power to kill us all. Just one single word, sharper than any bullet or weapon, and more devastating. ~ Steven J. Carroll

I've always treasured empathy as the particular privilege of the invisible, the observers who are shy precisely because they sense so much--because it is overwhelming to say even a single word when you're sensitive to every last flicker of nuance in the room. ~ Leslie Jamison

Somewhat overly legibly, I wrote on a sheet of paper, "We're held up indefinitely by the parade. We're going to find a phone and have a cold drink somewhere. Will you join us?" I folded the paper once, then handed it to the Matron of Honor, who opened it, read it, and then handed it to the tiny old man. He read it, grinning, and then looked at me and wagged his head up and down several times vehemently. I thought for an instant that this was the full and perfectly eloquent extent of his reply, but he suddenly motioned to me with his hand, and I gathered that he wanted me to pass him my pad and pencil, I did so- without looking over at the Matron of Honor, from whom great waves of impatience were rising. The old man adjusted the pad and pencil on his lap with the greatest care, then sat for a moment, pencil poised, in obvious concentration, his grin diminished only a very trifle. Then the pencil began, very unsteadily, to move. An "i" was dotted. And then both pad and pencil were returned personally to me, with a marvellously cordial extra added wag of the head. He had written, in letters that had not quite jelled yet, the single word "Delighted." The Matron of Honor, reading over my shoulder, gave a sound faintly like a snort, but I quickly looked over at the great writer and tried to show by my expression that all of us in the car knew a poem when we saw one, and were grateful.

На едно листче - някак прекалено четливо - написах: „Парадът ще ни задържи неопреде ~ J.D. Salinger

Never oversimplify yourself by using a single word or category to describe who you are. Take the time to tell your story. ~ Derek Webb

People do judge books by their covers; it's human nature. They react to the way you look before they hear a single word that comes out of your mouth. ~ Jeff Garvin

Authors," he murmured with a grin. "You all think your work is flawless, and anyone who tries to change a single word is an idiot."

"And editors consider themselves the most intelligent people they know," Amanda shot back. ~ Lisa Kleypas

He was dangerous - she felt it down in her very soul. The price of this young man's freedom would be forged from pain, death, and fire. "Yes," she said. The single word sealed her fate. Standing there on the steep Limerian cliffs, she was ready to watch the world burn. ~ Morgan Rhodes

Miss Bridgerton," he said, "the devil himself couldn't scare you."

She forced her eyes to meet his. "That's not a compliment, is it?"

He lifted her hand to his lips, brushing a feather-light kiss across her knuckles. "You'll have to figure that out for yourself," he murmured.

To all who observed, he was the soul of propriety, but Hyacinth caught the daring gleam in his eye, and she felt the breath leave her body as tingles of electricity rushed across her skin. Her lips parted, but she had nothing to say, not a single word. There was nothing but air, and even that seemed in short supply.

And then he straightened as if nothing had happened and said, "Do let me know what you decide."

She just stared at him.

"About the compliment," he added. "I am sure you will wish to let me know how I feel about you."

Her mouth fell open.

He smiled. Broadly. "Speechless, even. I'm to be commended."

"You - "

"No. No," he said, lifting one hand in the air and pointing toward her as if what he really wanted to do was place his finger on her lips and shush her. "Don't ruin it. The moment is too rare. ~ Julia Quinn

It's still horrible to wish the worst on anyone. I'm sure she had her reasons. Maybe people hurt her feelings, the same way I was hurt. A single word can feel like a rock being thrown at you. ~ Alice Hoffman

Wagner's philosophy had absolutely nothing to do with Bruckner. Bruckner hadn't written a single word against Jews. Wagner's book on the Jews was one of the most infamous books of the 19th century. ~ Zubin Mehta

I reach over and stroke her hair. When I do, a few of the strands fall off in my fingers. I pull my hand back and slowly wrap them around my finger as I walk to my room and pick my purple hair clip up off the floor. I open the clip and place the strands of hair inside and snap it shut. I place the clip under my bedroom pillow and I go back to my mother's room. I slide into the bed beside her and wrap my arms around her. She finds my hand and we interlock fingers as we talk without saying a single word. ~ Colleen Hoover

A single word can brighten the face
of one who knows the value of words.
Ripened in silence, a single word
acquires a great energy for work.
War is cut short by a word,
and a word heals the wounds,
and there's a word that changes
poison into butter
and honey.
Let a word mature inside yourself.
Withhold the unripened thought.
Come and understand the kind of word
that reduces money and riches to dust.
Know when to speak a word
and when not to speak at all.
A single word turns the universe of hell
into eight paradises.
Follow the Way. Don't be fooled
by what you already know. Be watchful.
Reflect before you speak.
A foolish mouth can brand your soul.
Yunus, say one last thing
about the power of words –
Only the word "I"
divides me from God. ~ Yunus Emre

I guess every single word I've ever said is going to be dissected now. ~ Joe Biden

The slow movement is not about doing everything at a snail's pace. Nor is it a Luddite attempt to drag the whole planet back to some pre-industrial utopia. The movement is made up of people who want to live better in a fast-paced, modern world. The slow philosophy can be summed up in a single word: balance. Be fast when it makes sense to be fast, and be slow when slowness is called for. Seek to live at what musicians call the tempo giusto - the right speed. ~ Carl Honore

Words are clamor-filled shells. There's many a story in the miniature of a single word! ~ Gaston Bachelard

The years have come and gone without a single word from you. Only the sky above us do we hold in common. I look at it often as if, somehow, reflected from its immensities, I will one day find myself gazing into your eyes. ~ Alice Walker

When I heard the book (Thomas Friedman's latest) was actually coming out, I started to worry. Among other things, I knew I would be asked to write the review. The usual ratio of Friedman criticism is 2:1, i.e., two human words to make sense of each single word of Friedmanese. Friedman is such a genius of literary incompetence that even his most innocent passages invite feature-length essays. ~ Matt Taibbi

What did it look like?"
"My watch? It was silver. Not expensive or anything. Just a regular watch."
"Shiny?"
"I guess."
"Raccoons."
Determined not to say anything stupid for at least the next ten minutes, she considered his single-word statement. Raccoons? Okay. He probably hadn't started a word-association game, so what did he mean?
Going with the safest response, she cautiously repeated, "Raccoons?"
"They like shiny things. Take off with them whenever they can."
"You're saying a raccoon stole my watch?"
"Probably."
She really wanted to point out that they couldn't possibly tell time, but knew instinctively that was a bad idea.
"Can I get it back?"
"Sure. If you can find it."
Could she? She glanced around at the underbrush, the trees, the stream.
"Is it safe for me to go exploring?" she asked.
"You're not likely to be attacked by raccoons, but you'll probably get lost, fall down a ravine, break your leg and starve to death. But if the watch is that important to you, have at it."
She felt herself deflating. "You don't like me much, do you?" she asked sadly.
She half expected Zane to stalk away, but instead he exhaled and shook his head.
"Sorry."
She blinked. "What?"
"I said I'm sorry."
Had the earth stopped turning, or had the taciturn hunky cowboy standing in front of her just apologized?
"I--you--" She paused for breath. "That's okay. I guess it was a stupid questi ~ Susan Mallery