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Flowers Quotes

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Flowers Quotes

“Well, I must endure the presence of two or three caterpillars if I wish to become acquainted with the butterflies. It seems that they are very beautiful. And if not the butterflies– and the caterpillars– who will call upon me? You will be far away. . . as for the large animals– I am not at all afraid of any of them. I have my claws.” And, navely, she showed her four thorns. Then she added: “Don’t linger like this. You have decided to go away. Now go!” For she did not want him to see her crying. She was such a proud flower. . .”

PrideFlowersButterfliesCaterpillars
Book:The Little Prince
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“If it were not for collectors England would be full, so to speak, of rare birds and wonderful butterflies, strange flowers and a thousand interesting things. But happily the collector prevents all that, either killing with his own hands or, by buying extravagantly, procuring people of the lower classes to kill such eccentricities as appear. ... Eccentricity, in fact, is immorality--think over it again if you do not think so now--just as eccentricity in one's way of thinking is madness (I defy you to find another definition that will fit all the cases of either); and if a species is rare it follows that it is not Fitted to Survive. The collector is after all merely like the foot soldier in the days of heavy armour-he leaves the combatants alone and cuts the throats of those who are overthrown. So one may go through England from end to end in the summer time and see only eight or ten commonplace wild flowers, and the commoner butterflies, and a dozen or so common birds, and never be offended by any breach of the monotony.”

EnglandFlowersBirdsButterflies
Book:The Wonderful Visit
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“A butterfly fluttered from flower to flower in the old garden, gracing the silvery-blue tips of the crocuses and what remained of the icy-white petals of the lady's prized tulips. The yellow strands on the butterfly's wings shimmered in the fading light, and Libby watched the creature in its journey, mesmerized by the graceful rise and fall of its dance. Her arms outstretched, Libby twirled around like she had as a girl, embracing the last rays of sunlight. Here in this garden, she was as free as the butterfly. Here she didn't have to hide. The butterfly climbed above the flowers and soared toward the lily pond. Beyond the pond were more flowers, hundreds of them, and then the trees. Soon the butterfly would curl up under a rock or leaf and rest for the night, hiding in the darkness, alone and vulnerable until the sun powered her wings again at dawn. Libby trailed the creature around the pond to see where it would land. If the night stayed warm, she might curl up beside the butterfly to rest, but not now. She no longer had to hide in these gardens. Soon the moonlight would glaze the paths with gold, and she would explore for hours, enveloped in the shadows and the light.”

FlowersMoonlightButterfliesLibby Doyle
Book:Shadows of Ladenbrooke Manor
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“This time of year, the purple blooms were busy with life- not just the bees, but butterflies and ladybugs, skippers and emerald-toned beetles, flitting hummingbirds and sapphire dragonflies. The sun-warmed sweet haze of the blossoms filled the air. "When I was a kid," said Isabel, "I used to capture butterflies, but I was afraid of the bees. I'm getting over that, though." The bees softly rose and hovered over the flowers, their steady hum oddly soothing. The quiet buzzing was the soundtrack of her girlhood summers. Even now, she could close her eyes and remember her walks with Bubbie, and how they would net a monarch or swallowtail butterfly, studying the creature in a big clear jar before setting it free again. They always set them free. As she watched the activity in the hedge, a memory floated up from the past- Bubbie, gently explaining to Isabel why they needed to open the jar. "No creature should ever be trapped against its will," she used to say. "It will ruin itself, just trying to escape." As a survivor of a concentration camp, Bubbie only ever spoke of the experience in the most oblique of terms.”

MemoryBeesFlowersInsectsButterfliesSummertimeNature S BeautyIsabel JohansenBubbieMagnus JohansenEva Johansen
Book:The Beekeeper's Ball
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“...the reality of late summer and early autumn when Adelaide, more than any place on earth, and as simply as pouring tea from a pot, pours fourth from a lavish cornucopia into gardens and parks and markets and arcade stalls a cascade of carnations and grapes and melons, guavas and Michaelmas daisies and tomatoes, zinnias and belladonna lilies and tuberoses, lavender and quinces and cumquats and pomegranates, roses and roses and roses.”

SummerFruitAustraliaAutumnFlowersSuburbsBackyardsAdelaide
Book:Paper Chase
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“With the first jolt he was in daylight; they had left the gateways of King’s Cross, and were under blue sky. Tunnels followed, and after each the sky grew bluer, and from the embankment at Finsbury Park he had his first sight of the sun. It rolled along behind the eastern smokes — a wheel, whose fellow was the descending moon — and as yet it seemed the servant of the blue sky, not its lord. He dozed again. Over Tewin Water it was day. To the left fell the shadow of the embankment and its arches; to the right Leonard saw up into the Tewin Woods and towards the church, with its wild legend of immortality. Six forest trees — that is a fact — grow out of one of the graves in Tewin churchyard. The grave’s occupant — that is the legend — is an atheist, who declared that if God existed, six forest trees would grow out of her grave. These things in Hertfordshire; and farther afield lay the house of a hermit — Mrs. Wilcox had known him — who barred himself up, and wrote prophecies, and gave all he had to the poor. While, powdered in between, were the villas of business men, who saw life more steadily, though with the steadiness of the half-closed eye. Over all the sun was streaming, to all the birds were singing, to all the primroses were yellow, and the speedwell blue, and the country, however they interpreted her, was uttering her cry of “now. ” She did not free Leonard yet, and the knife plunged deeper into his heart as the train drew up at Hilton. But remorse had become beautiful.”

AtheismTravelBlueFlowersRemorse
Book:Howards End
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“We need to spread more seeds and fill this Planet with love to be surrounded by flowers just everywhere! It starts by simply opening up our hearts and hands to one another. It's in simple things where true Happiness may flourish.”

LoveEarthHappinessHumanityCompassionKindnessCharityGenerositySustainabilityFlowers
Book:A-Z of Happiness: Tips for Living and Breaking Through the Chain that Separates You from Getting That Dream Job
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“I still dream in pictures and color, always the world of my childhood. I see the purple Judas trees at Easter lighting up the roadsides and terraces of the town. Ochre cliffs made of cinnamon powder. Autumn clouds rolling along the ground of the hills, and the patchwork of wet oak leaves on the grass. The shape of a rose petal. And my parents' faces, which will never grow any older. "But it is strange how scent brings it all back too. I only have to smell certain aromas, and I am back in a certain place with a certain feeling." The comforting past smelled of heliotrope and cherry and sweet almond biscuits: close-up smells, flowers you had to put your nose to as the sight faded from your eyes. The scents of that childhood past had already begun to slip away: Maman's apron with blotches of game stew; linen pressed with faded lavender; the sheep in the barn. The present, or what had so very recently been the present, was orange blossom infused with hope.”

ChildhoodFlowersVisionsNatures BeautyScentsSmellsColors Of LifeMarthe Lincel
Book:The Sea Garden
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“THE LILIES This morning it was, on the pavement, When that smell hit me again And set the houses reeling. People passed like rain: (The way rain moves and advances over the hills) And it was hot, hot and dank, The smell like animals, strong, but sweet too. What was it? Something I had forgotten. I tried to remember, standing there, Sniffing the air on the pavement. Somehow I thought of flowers. Flowers! That bad smell! I looked: down lanes, past houses-- There, behind a hoarding, A rubbish-heap, soft and wet and rotten. Then I remembered: After the rain, on the farm, The vlei that was dry and paler than a stone Suddenly turned wet and green and warm. The green was a clash of music. Dry Africa became a swamp And swamp-birds with long beaks Went humming and flashing over the reeds And cicadas shrilling like a train. I took off my clothes and waded into the water. Under my feet first grass, then mud, Then all squelch and water to my waist. A faint iridescence of decay, The heat swimming over the creeks Where the lilies grew that I wanted: Great lilies, white, with pink streaks That stood to their necks in the water. Armfuls I gathered, working there all day. With the green scum closing round my waist, The little frogs about my legs, And jelly-trails of frog-spawn round the stems. Once I saw a snake, drowsing on a stone, Letting his coils trail into the water. I expect he was glad of rain too After nine moinths of being dry as bark. I don't know why I picked those lilies, Piling them on the grass in heaps, For after an hour they blackened, stank. When I left at dark, Red and sore and stupid from the heat, Happy as if I'd built a town, All over the grass were rank Soft, decaying heaps of lilies And the flies over them like black flies on meat...”

NatureChildhoodFlowersAfrica
Book:Going Home
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“By the time he planted his first seed and watched it bloom into a bright white daisy, Hart began to feel what he suspected his mom felt every time she was out in the gardens. The joy sprouted on the stem, and in his soul. While other boys were becoming interested in video games, or sports, or breaking rules, Hart got really into flowers. There were some areas in the garden where the flowers grew so high and bountiful that you could walk through them and get lost in tiny worlds. Whole colorful planets at his fingertips. To Hart, there was nothing like it. Cupping a sorbet-colored ball of dahlia in the palm of his hand, breathing in the musky-sweet notes of jasmine, watching the pollen-dressed bees buzzing in the fluff. The flowers made something in Hart's soul stir. Or settle. Or float. He wasn't sure what, but it felt like he'd discovered a secret that no one else knew about. That all you needed to feel perfectly in balance with the world were flowers.”

ChildhoodFlowersOne With NatureHorticulturalist
Book:Of Earthly Delights
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“One goes forth to search for the blooming bushes of childhood and finds autumnal creeper growing rampant where one left behind blooming roses. Fortunate is he who is able to take delight in the blaze of color of the leaves when he has overcome his disappointment. However, many set forth in search of roses and forget that winter has set in. It is those people whose souls bleed when they search for their childhood. The wind has caused the rose to shed its petals, and those people grasp at thorns. (p.16,17)”

NatureChildhoodNostalgiaLgbtqFlowers
Book:Memoirs of a Man's Maiden Years
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“Afterward she remembered the times when she had felt the happiest. The first time was when she and Dick danced together and she felt her beauty sparkling bright against his tall, strong form as they floated, hovering like people in an amusing dream—he turned her here and there with such a delicacy of suggestion that she was like a bright bouquet, a piece of precious cloth being displayed before fifty eyes.”

DreamHappinessBeautyDancingFlowersBouquet
Book:Tender is the Night
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“The Remnants We carry small membranes of memories Within us As do trees, flowers, stones, All life force around us Fragments of memories Engraved in chips of iron, copper, silver... Interlaced in the workings of men Intertwined into the streets, buildings The networks around us Pathways between ages Each carrying their Remnants of the past”

LifeAgeMemoryFlowersTreesPast QuotesMemories QuotesRemnantsRemnant
Book:The Dreaming Doors: Through the Soul Gateways
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“She took me through the parlors and the kitchen, and I marveled at the beautiful ceiling molding, the wooden banisters up to the second floor, the crystalline chandelier in the dining room. The furniture was tasteful and sparse, plastic over the fainting couches and coffee tables and wingback chairs, so that as they stood in stasis they wouldn't collect dust. The second floor was just as gorgeous, the rooms all themed in different flowers. The yellow daffodil room was my favorite. The wall with the headboard had an entire mural of huge daffodils blooming across it. Junie's handiwork, I was sure. Just like the mural on the side of Frank's Auto Shop, and the logo for the Grumpy Possum, and even Gail's bar scene. She showed me all the different rooms, each with a different flower theme and a different focal color--- lavender and coral and sage. The pink ones--- roses--- matched Junie's pastel hair.”

RoomsThemeFlowersFurnitureDaffodilsInnBed And BreakfastInterior Decor
Book:A Novel Love Story
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“What a lovely thing a rose is!" He walked past the couch to the open window and held up the drooping stalk of a moss-rose, looking down at the dainty blend of crimson and green. It was a new phase of his character to me, for I had never before seen him show any keen interest in natural objects. "There is nothing in which deduction is so necessary as religion," said he, leaning with his back against the shutters. "It can be built up as an exact science by the reasoner. Our highest assurance of the goodness of Providence seems to me to rest in the flowers. All other things, our powers, our desires, our food, are all really necessary for our existence in the first instance. But this rose is an extra. Its smell and its color are an embellishment of life, not a condition of it. It is only goodness which gives extras, and so I say again that we have much to hope from the flowers.”

ReasonReligionHopeNatureGoodnessProvidenceFlowersRosesDeduction
Book:The Naval Treaty - a Sherlock Holmes Short Story
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“The New York sidewalk led us along a little corner park rimmed with yellow-orange and violet pansies that seemed to be smiling, their faces upturned, and past a bagel shop that smelled of sesame and salt, delicious warm air. We passed an empty wine bar with a pink chandelier, whimsical and dim inside, and a neighborhood diner with its blue neon sign huge and lit up, little white line-cook hats—the city seemed in my vision like a multifaceted gem, spectacular. I wished I could keep everything I witnessed like a photograph, to forever hold this electric aliveness. The colors of the flowers and the clothing were crisp and rosy, hyper-bright against the subdued sun-drenched pigments of the streets and the brick buildings, all seeming faded, softer than real. Pops of coral and red—a scarf, a lady’s lips—were pops of life.”

PhotographNew York CityFlowersDeliciousSidewalkPansiesGemParkDinerChandelier
Book:Your Blue Is Not My Blue: A Missing Person Memoir
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“But the crown jewel was the columned Greek Revival mansion, which dated from the mid-1800s, along with the manicured boxwood gardens that would serve as the backdrop for the couple's ceremony. Of course, everything was not only very traditional but also a standard to what one might imagine an over-the-top Southern wedding to be. As I said, "Steel Magnolias on steroids." The ceremony would take place outdoors in the garden, but large custom peach-and-white scalloped umbrellas were placed throughout the rows of bamboo folding chairs to shade the guests. Magnolia blossoms and vintage lace adorned the ends of the aisles. White, trellis-covered bars flanked the entrance to the gardens where guests could select from a cucumber cooler or spiked sweet tea to keep cool during the thirty-minute nuptials. It was still considered spring, but like Dallas, Nashville could heat up early in the year, and we were glad to be prepared. By the time we arrived the tent was well on its way to completion, and rental deliveries were rolling in. The reception structure was located past the gardens near the enormous whitewashed former stable, and inside the ceiling was draped in countless yards of peach fabric with crystal chandeliers hanging above every dining table. Custom napkins with embroidered magnolias on them complemented the centerpieces' peach garden roses, lush greenery, and dried cotton stems. Cedric's carpentry department created floor-to-ceiling lattice walls covered in faux greenery and white wisteria blooms, a dreamy backdrop for the band.”

WeddingFlowersNashvilleMagnoliasCarpentryMansionPeach
Book:Without a Hitch
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“The crown was a circle of woven branches, thick with color--- fragile huckleberry stalks, blooming twigs from chokecherry bushes, thimbleberry branches heavy with red fruit and star-shaped leaves. Tucked into the branches were flowers. Yellow glacier lilies, blue camas flowers and pink bitterroots. Everything was fresh and ripe, bursting with life and potential.”

BranchesFlowersDecorTwigsCrownFaerie King
Book:The Tricky Business of Faerie Bargains
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“They made their way to the dining room, where the air was blossom-scented and gilded with candlelight. The mammoth Jacobean table, with its legs and support rails carved like twisted rope, had been covered with pristine white linen. A row of broad silver baskets filled with billows of June roses rested on a long runner of frothy green maidenhair ferns. The walls had been lined with lush arrangements of palms, hydrangeas, azaleas and peonies, turning the room into an evening garden. Each place at the table had been set with glittering Irish crystal, Sèvres porcelain, and no fewer than twenty-four pieces of antique Georgian silver flatware per guest.”

FlowersDecorTable SettingDining Room
Book:Devil's Daughter
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“The small pergola that Michael had built was covered in loops of jasmine, and Lara's flower beds were blazing with color. Blowsy white peonies, dusky purple irises with golden stripes, pale orange poppies with sooty centers. The first tea roses of the year were budding. Elinas, pink petals tipped with crimson, and the ivory Jeanne Moreaus that smelled faintly of lemons. Lara wanted to pick one and put it on the breakfast tray, but Michael hated cut flowers. She went back inside and began to set the tray. Her mother's blue Venetian glass dish filled with raspberries. Orange juice in a white jug. A honey pot with a wooden dipper. Sunshine streamed in through the window, warming the terra-cotta tiles beneath her bare feet. She could not have cut flowers in the house so she had pictures of them instead. Two huge framed Georgia O'Keefe poppy prints. An apron with a pattern of climbing roses. A wooden clock that Phil had given her with a pendulum in the shape of a red rose.”

GardenBreakfastFlowersDecorFlowery
Book:The Flower Arrangement
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“The walls behind the counter had deep floor-to-ceiling shelves for vases and jam jars and scented candles, and there was an old wrought-iron revolving stand for cards. But most of the space in the long, narrow shop was taken up with flowers and plants. Today there were fifty-two kinds of cut blooms, from the tiny cobalt-blue violets that were smaller than Lara's little fingernail to a purple-and-green-frilled brassica that was bigger than her head. The flowers were set out in gleaming metal buckets and containers of every shape and size. They were lined up on the floor three deep and stacked on the tall three-tier stand in the middle of the shop. The plants, huge leafy ferns and tiny fleshy succulents, lemon trees and jasmine bushes and freckled orchids, were displayed on floating shelves that were built at various heights all the way up to the ceiling. Lara had spent weeks getting the lighting right. There were a few soft spotlights above the flower displays, and an antique crystal chandelier hung low above the counter. There were strings of fairy lights and dozens of jewel-colored tea lights and tall, slender lanterns dotted between the buckets. When they were lit, they cast star and crescent moon shapes along the walls and the shop resembled the courtyard of a Moroccan riad- a tiny walled garden right in the middle of the city.”

FlowersPlantsDecorLightsShopInterior Decorating
Book:The Flower Arrangement
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“Little gusts of sunshine blew, strangely bright, and lit up the celandines at the wood's edge, under the hazel-rods, they spangled out bright and yellow. And the wood was still, stiller, but yet gusty with crossing sun. The first windflowers were out, and all the wood seemed pale with the pallor of endless little anemones, sprinkling the shaken floor. 'The world has grown pale with thy breath.' But it was the breath of Persephone, this time; she came out of hell on a cold morning. Cold breaths of wind came, and overhead there was an anger of entangled wind caught among the twigs. It, too, was caught and trying to tear itself free, the wind, like Absalom. How cold the anemones looked, bobbing their naked white shoulders over crinoline skirts of green. But they stood it. A few first bleached little primroses too, by the path, and yellow buds unfolding themselves.”

BeautifulNatureWoodsLovelyDescriptionFlowersAllusionD H LawrenceLady Chatterley S Lover
Book:Lady Chatterley’s Lover
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“It was a garden, a walled garden. Overgrown but with beautiful bones visible still. Someone had cared for this garden once. The remains of two paths snaked back and forth, intertwined like the lacing on an Irish dancing shoe. Fruit trees had been espaliered around the sides, and wires zigzagged from the top of one wall to the top of another. Hungry, wisteria branches had woven themselves around to form a sort of canopy. Against the southern wall, an ancient and knobbled tree was growing. Cassandra went closer. It was the apple tree, she realized, the one whose bough had reached over the wall. She lifted her hand to touch one of the golden fruit. The tree was about sixteen feet high and shaped like the Japanese bonsai plant Nell had given Cassandra for her twelfth birthday.”

GardenFlowersPathwaysFruit TreesApple TreeCassandra Ryan
Book:The Forgotten Garden
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“I lingered at the edge of an open field of lanky meadow buttercups. The vibrant green-and-yellow field was deserted. Behind me arose a gnarled crab apple tree in full, glorious bloom, the petals of its flowers littering the shaded bench on which I'd been about to sit. A breeze set the branches rustling, a waterfall of white petals flittering down like snow.”

Sarah J MaasFeyreFeyre ArcheronFlowersA Court Of Thorns And RosesPetalsFieldMeadowApple TreeButtercups
Book:A Court of Thorns and Roses
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