W Quotes
Browse famous quotes beginning with W. This page is a child index of the full Popular Quotes A-Z directory.
“We stood by and allowed what happened to the Great Plains a century ago, the destruction of one of the ecological wonders of the world. In modern America, we need to see this with clear eyes, and soberly, so that we understand well that the flyover country of our own time derives much of its forgettability from being a slate wiped almost clean of its original figures.”
Source: American Serengeti: The Last Big Animals of the Great Plains
“We stood for a moment, the brackish canal water teething at the stone,the last of the stars fading as the sky transformed from black to indigo. A pair of swans like large white clouds floated on the water, their heads tucked under their wings, as a gondola pulled up, a lantern on the prow, the gondolier on the stern, rubbing his sleepy eyes.”
“We stood, holding each other's faces, memorising every last detail. I was deperate with my own need to capture this last, lingering moment, desperate to forget the horrible sink at the pit of my stomach telling me all this would be lost forever once they pulled the chip out. Please don't let me forget.”
Source: Glitch
“We stood in the graveyard, among the tombstones, forty-some dead people and me. A couple of my fellow funeral-goers had even been in their own coffins, deep under several feet of French soil.”
Source: Until I Die
“We stood in the sunlight, staring into the room. The fountain looked dulled, more bone than pearl, more wear and tear than contortion--puppets lose their charm when the master is in view.”
Source: The Triangle Age
“We stood in the wings together, side by side. Reed's mouth was still agape.
"It makes sense when you think about it," I mused. "You get two people together who have you-know-what, and sparks are going to fly."
Reed's cue was about to start. He pointed at me and said, "Tonight. There's a party. And we're going to talk."
"Yes"
"Because this is crazy."
"Totally."
"Okay. Well." He tugged a strand of my hair. "Good luck out there."
"You're not supposed to say that."
"Fine. How about..." He squinted at me. "Here's looking at you kid."
The smile melted off my face. "What did you say?"
"It's a line. From a movie." He shrugged and burst onto the stage with a hee-haw.
It was a line. From Casablanca. The same line KARL had said to me when I was Elsa. The same like Karl didn't recognize when I said it to him as Floressa. Which meant... nothing. Right? Lots of people know that line. Just because Reed said it, and Reed was a sub, it didn't mean he was... he was...
"You're on," the stage manager whispered.
I stumbled onto the stage. The lights were too bright. The theater was packed. Reed gave me a quick, crooked smile, and I knew.
My crush on Karl was less complicated than I thought, because it wasn't Karl I'd been with that day in the garden.
Now my crush on Reed... ?
THAT was a scandal all on its own.”
Source: The Royal Treatment
“We stood like two trees beside, intertwined into one. And when the winds blew against us, we would laugh at it, as leaves clapping hands to our strength. Always day. We had all the stars, but no sky to hang them onto. We were brave, but not strong. Bare, but not skeleton. We had song, but no dance. Time slipped as a blessed curse. We knew the pennies were slipping from our pockets, and we left them there on the ground as worthless cents. In wordless sense, we finally found our darkness, but the stars had all faded by then.”
“We stood near something that wanted to become revelation but lacked the discipline.”
Source: Nearly: Poems
“We stood, separated by space, certainly, in identical conditions of pleasant uncertainty and anticipation, and we both held our heart in our hands, all pink and palpitating and ready for pleasure and pain, and we were about to throw these hearts in each other's faces like snowballs, or cricket balls (How's that?) or, more accurately, like great bleeding wounds: "Take my wound". Because the last thing one ever thinks at such moments is that he (or she) will say: Take my wound, please remove the spear from my side. No, not at all; one simply expects to get rid of one's one.”
Source: A Man and Two Women: Stories
“We stood side by side, and for that minute, in the stillness of that room, he was not the King. I was not not the Princess, taken against her will to the City. We were two people trying to forget.”
Source: Once
“We stood still, the tenderness between us almost tangible. The scent of the spices, human empathy, and plain old muscle memory combined to re-create the gooey magnetism of being near Marvina again. Felt like macaroni and cheese---the kind with a bubbly brown crust on top--- in my soul. Mmm mmm good.”
Source: Sisters with a Side of Greens
“We stood there for a few seconds where my father and I had spoken of Oliver once. Now he and I were speaking of my father. Tomorrow, I'll think back on this moment and let the ghosts of their absence maunder in the twilit hour of the day.”
Source: Call Me by Your Name
“We stood there for a full half hour, like so many scarecrows, while they jeered at us from a distance, and one or two of us were shot down.”
Source: Flashman
“We stood there for a minute or two, with John swaying gently against my arm. 'I'm feeling better,' he announced. Then he looked up at the stars. 'Wow..' he intoned. 'Look at that! Isn't that amazing?".
I followed his gaze. The stars did look good but they didn't look that good. It was very unlike John to be over the top in that way. I stared at him. He was wired-pin-sharp and quivering, resonating away like a human tuning fork.
No sooner had John uttered his immortal words about the stars than George and Paul came bursting out on the roof. They had come tearing up from the studio as soon as they found out where we were.
They knew why John was feeling unwell. Maybe everyone else did, too - everyone except for father-figure George Martin here!
It was very simple. John was tripping on LSD. He had taken it by mistake, they said - he had meant to take an amphetamine tablet. That hardly made any difference, frankly; the fact was that John was only too likely to imagine he could fly, and launch himself off the low parapet that ran around the roof. They had been absolutely terrified that he might do so.
I spoke to Paul about this night many years later, and he confirmed that he and George had been shaken rigid when they found out we were up on the roof. They knew John was having a what you might call a bad trip. John didn't go back to Weybridge that night; Paul took him home to his place, in nearby Cavendish Road. They were intensely close, remember, and Paul would do almost anything for John. So, once they were safe inside, Paul took a tablet of LSD for the first time, 'So I could get with John' as he put it- be with him in his misery and fear.
What about that for friendship?”
Source: With A Little Help From My Friends: The Making of Sgt. Pepper
“We stood there, looking at each other, saying nothing. But it was the kind of nothing that meant everything. In his eyes, there was no trace of what had happened between us earlier and I could feel something inside me break.
So that was that. We were finally, finally over.
I looked at him, and I felt so sad, because this thought occurred to me: 'I will never look at you the same way again. I'll never be that girl again. The girl who comes running back every time you push her away, the girl who loves you anyway.'
I couldn’t even be mad at him, because this was who he was. This was who he’d
always been. He’d never lied about that. He gave and then he took away. I felt it in the pit of my stomach, the familiar ache, that lost, regretful feeling only he could give me. I never wanted to feel it again. Never, ever.
Maybe this was why I came, so I could really know. So I could say good-bye.
I looked at him, and I thought, 'If I was very brave or very honest, I would tell him.'
I would say it, so he would know it and I would know it, and I could never take it back. But I wasn’t that brave or honest, so all I did was look at him. And I think he knew anyway.
'I release you. I evict you from my heart. Because if I don't do it now, I never will.'
I was the one to look away first.”
Source: It's Not Summer Without You
“We stood there numbly, not knowing what to do or say, not knowing how to express the feelings that thickened our tongues, not knowing how to cry or what to say to a mother who had lost her one son for all time and a warrior who had lost his one son to war.”
Source: The Lords of Discipline
“We stood there, looking at each other, saying nothing. But it was the kind of nothing that meant everything.”
Source: It's Not Summer Without You
“We stood there, the three of us, our jaws firmly planted on the floor. Aunt Lil recovered first. She nudged me with her elbow and said with a cackle of delight, "I think you guys should make some more of those brownies, 'cause that boy looks hungry.”
Source: The Charley Davidson Series
“We stood up and bade each other farewell, but love and despair stood between us like two ghosts, one stretching his wings with his fingers over our throats, one weeping and the other laughing hideously. As I took Selma's hand and put it to my lips, she came close to me and placed a kiss on my forehead, then dropped on the wooden bench. She shut her eyes and whispered softly, "Oh, Lord God, have mercy on me and mend my broken wings!”
“We stood upon a hill, green and studded with pale stones. Below us was forest, bluebells undulating among the trees, a tide of purple dissolving into shadow. There was a lake-- no, two lakes, the second a mere line of glitter in the distance. At our back, behind the nexus and extending to the northern horizon, were mountains of indigo and layered shadow, some darkened to black by the moody sky overhead, some greyed and smudged by shafts of sunlight.
Must I even say it? It was beautiful--- of course it was. The forest in particular, which glinted here and there with silver as the wind rode the branches, as if someone had clambered into the canopy to hang baubles. And yet I had the sense that I was not seeing the entirety of it, that the shadows were thicker here, more obscuring, than those in the mortal realm, and many of the details were clouded by a dreamlike haze. Even now, as I write these words--- I am still in Wendell's kingdom!--- I find the memory of that view trying to slip from my mind like a bird darting through the boughs, so that I catch only the flickering edge of it. Perhaps there is some enchantment embedded in the place, or perhaps it is simply too much for my mortal eyes to take in.
Where the Trees Have Eyes.”
Source: Emily Wilde’s Map of the Otherlands
“We stop at a petrol station on the road to Tehran. Not only do they have packets of the original custard creams, but orange and banana flavor too. The existence of banana-flavored custard creams is something I am rather pleased to know about.
The first thing I eat in Iran is white cheese, dry and crumbly, on white plates decorated with pink roses. A sheet of flatbread folded like a book. There are coarsely ground walnuts and a glass bowl of pomegranate molasses, sticky as treacle.”
Source: A Thousand Feasts: Small Moments of Joy… A Memoir of Sorts
“We stop at the door. I’m still smiling.
‘Well, bye,’ Noah says.
‘Don’t call us! We’ll call you!’ I say to Noah. And I shoot the air
with cowboy guns. Noah blinks.”
Source: Begin, End, Begin: A #LoveOzYA Anthology
“We stop for a snack, a couple of slices of prosciutto, some cheese, and the heel of a loaf of Italian bread. Because I'm training Chloe to have a sophisticated palate, I do not heed the butcher's maxim that prosciutto di Parma shouldn't be wasted on someone who has no teeth. Besides, she has four. Not that she needs them, anyway. The meat really does melt in your mouth.”
Source: Aftertaste: A Novel in Five Courses
“We stop practice every time we see one of our players not blocking out.”
“We stop the one who can't cease from seeking things outside, and practice with our bodies with a posture that seeks absolutely nothing. This is zazen.”
“We stop when we reach the top, climb out, shivering in the cold and ghostly mist under wind-blasted trees, to read the sign erected by the Public Works Department: “You have reached Trumseng La, Bhutan’s highest road pass. Check Your Brakes. Bash On Regardless. Thank you.””
Source: Beyond the Sky and the Earth: A Journey into Bhutan
“we stopped checking for monsters under the bed when we realised they were inside of us”
“We stopped eating meat many years ago. During the course of a Sunday lunch we happened to look out of the kitchen window at our young lambs playing happily in the fields. Glancing down at our plates, we suddenly realized that we were eating the leg of an animal who had until recently been playing in a field herself. We looked at each other and said, "Wait a minute, we love these sheep-they're such gentle creatures. So why are we eating them?" It was the last time we ever did.”
“We stopped looking in the shadows, when we realised that WE were the monsters that we are afraid of. I want to take these monsters, give them a voice and put them back under our beds, in our closets and in the shadows, back where we are most afraid of them.”
Source: The Grays Anatomy
“We stopped talking about Zampanô then. She paged her friend Christina who took less than twenty minutes to come over. There were no introductions. We just sat down on the floor and snorted lines of coke off a CD case, gulped down a bottle of wine and then used it to play spin the bottle. They kissed each other first, then they both kissed me, and then we forgot about the bottle, and I even managed to forget about Zampanô, about this, and about how much that attack in the tattoo shop had put me on edge. Two kisses in one kiss was all it took, a comfort, a warmth, perhaps temporary, perhaps false, but reassuring nonetheless, and mine, and theirs, ours, all three of us giggling, insane giggles and laughter with still more kisses on the way, and I remember a brief instant then, out of the blue, when I suddenly glimpsed my own father, a rare but oddly peaceful recollection, as if he actually approved of my play in the way he himself had always laughed and played, always laughing, surrendering to its ease, especially when he soared in great updrafts of light, burning off distant plateaus of bistre & sage, throwing him up like an angel, high above the red earth, deep into the sparkling blank, the tender sky that never once let him down, preserving his attachment to youth, propriety and kindness, his plane almost, but never quite, outracing his whoops of joy, trailing him in his sudden turn to the wind, followed then by a near vertical climb up to the angles of the sun, and I was barely eight and still with him and yes, that the thought that flickered madly through me, a brief instant of communion, possessing me with warmth and ageless ease, causing me to smile again and relax as if memory alone could lift the heart like the wind lifts a wing, and so I renewed my kisses with even greater enthusiasm, caressing and in turn devouring their dark lips, dark with wine and fleeting love, an ancient memory love had promised but finally never gave, until there were too many kisses to count or remember, and the memory of love proved not love at all and needed a replacement, which our bodies found, and then the giggles subsided, and the laughter dimmed, and darkness enfolded all of us and we gave away our childhood for nothing and we died and condoms littered the floor and Christina threw up in the sink and Amber chuckled a little and kissed me a little more, but in a way that told me it was time to leave.”
Source: House of Leaves
“We stopped to browse in the cases, and now that William - with his new glasses on his nose - could linger and read the books, at every title he discovered he let out exclamations of happiness, either because he knew the work, or because he had been seeking it for a long time, or finally because he had never heard it mentioned and was highly excited and titillated. In short, for him every book was like a fabulous animal that he was meeting in a strange land.”
Source: The Name of the Rose
“We store in memory only images of value. The value may be lost over the passage of time, but that's the implacable judgment of feeling.”
“We store up the world and expect our gates to be pearled”
“We straighten , bu our snickering is barely contained as we attempt to focus our attention on a picture of a discarded Coke can. "This guy's lady love is kind of a slob, don't you think?" he whispers.
I cover my mouth with my hands again.
"A reaaaaaaaal litterbug."
"Stop it," I hiss. My eyes are watering. "Ohmygod look at this one! How did he get her toenail clippings?"
"If you were my girl," he whispers, "I'd take creepy pictures of your trash when I knew you weren't looking."
"If you were my girl," I whisper back," I"d put the creepy pictures in a foreign museum so you wouldn't know that I take creepy pictures.”
Source: Isla and the Happily Ever After
“We strain hardest for things which are almost but not quite within our reach.”
“We strain to hear. But instead of hearing an answer we catch sight of God himself scraped and torn. Through our tears we see the tears of God”
“We strain to listen to the ghosts and echoes of our inexpressibly wise past, and we have an obligation to maintain these places, to provide these sanctuaries, so that people may be in the presence of forces larger than those of the moment.”
“We strain to tell Americans and aliens in this country that there's nothing unique about America, nothing unique about American civilization, nothing that requires their allegiance, nothing of great value that they should sacrifice for.”
“We stray the narrow way when we stubbornly refuse to discipline ourselves physically, morally, and mentally.”
“We strengthen in ourselves what we give to others.”
Source: Waldmeer
“We stress humanity, and this is done at considerable cost. We can't have a lot of dramatics that other shows get away with - promiscuity, greed, jealousy. None of those have a place in 'Star Trek.'”
“We stretch our bodies without letting go of each other's hands; we exorcise our grief. We twine and bend while the owls look on. I am reflected in Sami's eyes. I am not a girl in that moment, or a boy, but a person-shaped beam of light, and we see each other as we are, as energy that has willed itself into these bodies because the desire to dance is the first kind of longing.”
Source: The Thirty Names of Night
“We stretch ourselves when the impact we want to make and the life we want to create is bigger than the fear and challenges.”
Source: The Self-Employed Life: Business and Personal Development Strategies That Create Sustainable Success
“We stretch time when we suffer,
we compress time when we're joyful,
we expand space in empathy,
we collapse distance through memory.”
Source: Nazmahal: Palace of Grace
“We stretched the possibilities to the evident delight of others, who took my similar cries or used the business tool to move to fresh ground that stirred their own passions (or maybe demons), that gave their workforce a feeling of vitality and difference beyond 'let's turn up for next week's pay cheque'.”
“We strike our blow, even as Pierre has said. We strike at the coppice that you so desire. We strike there because it is the very heart of the forest. There the secret life of the forest runs at full tide. We know - and you know! Something that, destroyed, will take the heart out of the forest - will make it know us for its masters."
("Women Of The Woods")”
Source: Masters of Horror
“We strive all the time to give our life its form, but we do so by copying willy-nilly, like a drawing, the features of the person that we are and not of the person we should like to be.”
Source: In Search of Lost Time, Volume III: The Guermantes Way
“We strive always to have a beginner's mind.”
“We strive as hard to hide our hearts from ourselves as from others, and always with more success; for in deciding upon our own case we are both judge, jury, and executioner, and where sophistry cannot overcome the first, or flattery the second, self-love is always ready to defeat the sentence by bribing the third.”
Source: Remarks on the Talents of Lord Byron and the Tendencies of Don Juan
“We strive for beauty and balance, the sensual over the sentimental.”
Source: White Oleander