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Trees Quotes

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Trees Quotes

“I imagine what it must be like to stay hidden, disappear in the dusky nothing and stay still in the night. It’s not sadness, though it may sound like it. I’m thinking about people and trees and how I wish I could be silent more, be more tree than anything else, less clumsy and loud, less crow, more cool white pine, and how it’s hard not to always want something else, not just to let the savage grass grow.”

“To Tree’s surprise, e could still feel the blade of Univervia that was on the deer’s tongue. And the feelings that came at Tree were fast, intense and surprising. The whole blade lay languid, surrendering as the tongue mashed the strands of grass up to the roof of the doe’s mouth. Then the deer twisted the grass sideways and ground teeth into the grass. As the grass was destroyed, each cell popped and gave shots of grass life-force into the hungry deer, in little pops of ecstatic release. The whole thing happened as swiftly as a string of firecrackers going off into light and smoke, leaving behind a dull residue that gave no sense of the evanescent beauty that had been enchanting the air only moments before. Tree felt this chunk of Univervia embrace willful dissolution and then suddenly all these little pieces that had been integrated into Univervia were separated into something like ananda, the joy which powers the universe and then... then the grass was deer.”

“The image of a wood has appeared often enough in English verse. It has indeed appeared so often that it has gathered a good deal of verse into itself; so that it has become a great forest where, with long leagues of changing green between them, strange episodes of poetry have taken place. Thus in one part there are lovers of a midsummer night, or by day a duke and his followers, and in another men behind branches so that the wood seems moving, and in another a girl separated from her two lordly young brothers, and in another a poet listening to a nightingale but rather dreaming richly of the grand art than there exploring it, and there are other inhabitants, belonging even more closely to the wood, dryads, fairies, an enchanter's rout. The forest itself has different names in different tongues- Westermain, Arden, Birnam, Broceliande; and in places there are separate trees named, such as that on the outskirts against which a young Northern poet saw a spectral wanderer leaning, or, in the unexplored centre of which only rumours reach even poetry, Igdrasil of one myth, or the Trees of Knowledge and Life of another. So that indeed the whole earth seems to become this one enormous forest, and our longest and most stable civilizations are only clearings in the midst of it.”

“One of the most fascinating and unexpected findings was the role of wind in a tree’s life. Before reaching maturity, many trees in the biosphere snapped under their own weight. Researchers learned later this was caused by lack of stress wood—a wood that forms in place of normal wood as a response to external forces. This necessary mechanical acclimation was lacking in the biosphere trees, preventing them from surviving. There’s an underlying principle at work here. Stress creates resilience. Lack of stress creates weakness. In the case of the biosphere trees, the stress they were missing was wind. Wind doesn’t just blow in one direction, or at one speed. It’s constantly changing directions, slowing down, speeding up—creating an infinite array of forces for the trees to counterbalance against. Ironically, the lack of varied movement and counterforce is what felled the trees. p.151”

“The mind is doubt. Doubt leaves you tired and exhausted. That is why so many people in the world look so sad and serious. Existence is not serious. Look at the trees, the birds, the flowers, the animals, the rivers and the stars. The whole existence is joy and celebration, except for man because only man has the freedom to choose between living in the mind or living in the heart. And man has chosen to live in the mind, because the mind helps in the world to have money, power, position and possessions. But it destroys everything that is really worth having in life. We have to choose the heart. Once we have chosen the heart, trust, silence, truth, friendship, trust, compassion, creativity and freedom starts flowering. And just as you bring light into a dark room and the darkness disappears, the same happens with the heart. Suddenly your life is full of life, light, joy and truth. And then all doubts disappear. The heart never doubts, the heart simply knows. God is self-evident for the heart. The heart has its own approach towards reality. The heart has a direct, immediate connection with reality, with God. Be in the heart, live through the heart. Nourish the dimension of the heart.”

“For me, you are fresh water that falls from trees when it has stopped raining. For me, you are cinnamon that lingers on the tongue and gives bitter words sweetening. For me, you are the scent of violins and vision of valleys smiling. And still, for me, your loveliness never ends. It traverses the world and finds its way back to me. Only me.”

“All that your mother wanted was to give you education and to fulfill your dreams. She’s not here anymore – but her memories still live. Her art works still live and some of them are in the national museum. Her trees still live – and still blossom in spring. And more than everything, her passion still lives in the heart of her son – who loves to paint just like his mother.”

“I drank from the crisp mountain stream, tasting filtered sky with a mossy undertone. I’ve never understood how being loved fully could change your entire perspective of the world. I only ever understood the wistfulness of it, and the longing and the frothy, violent bits. The mixed up, rained on parts. The escaped bits that smudge and bleed through. Slowly, I am coming to terms with how vulnerable I am to you, flat on my back like a submissive wolf pup. Daisy petals line your eyelashes, juice of a nectarine flavors your tongue. The side of your mouth twitches, hazy dreamscapes overtaking your mind while we bathe in the glorious autumn devastation.”

“When you are in trouble or at your lowest point, and have no one in whom to confide, a hawthorn would be the right choice. There is a reason why hawthorns are home to fairies and known to protect pots of treasure. For wisdom, try a beech; for intelligence, a pine; for bravery, a rowan; for generosity, a hazel; for joy, a juniper; and for when you need to learn to let go of what you cannot control, a birch with its white-silver bark, peeling and shedding layers like old skin. Then again, if it's love you're after, or love you have lost, come to the fig, always the fig.”

“For me, trees have always been the most penetrating preachers. I revere them when they live in tribes and families, in forests and groves. And even more I revere them when they stand alone. They are like lonely persons. Not like hermits who have stolen away out of some weakness, but like great, solitary men, like Beethoven and Nietzsche. In their highest boughs the world rustles, their roots rest in infinity; but they do not lose themselves there, they struggle with all the force of their lives for one thing only: to fulfil themselves according to their own laws, to build up their own form, to represent themselves. Nothing is holier, nothing is more exemplary than a beautiful, strong tree. When a tree is cut down and reveals its naked death-wound to the sun, one can read its whole history in the luminous, inscribed disk of its trunk: in the rings of its years, its scars, all the struggle, all the suffering, all the sickness, all the happiness and prosperity stand truly written, the narrow years and the luxurious years, the attacks withstood, the storms endured. And every young farmboy knows that the hardest and noblest wood has the narrowest rings, that high on the mountains and in continuing danger the most indestructible, the strongest, the ideal trees grow. Trees are sanctuaries. Whoever knows how to speak to them, whoever knows how to listen to them, can learn the truth. They do not preach learning and precepts, they preach, undeterred by particulars, the ancient law of life. A tree says: A kernel is hidden in me, a spark, a thought, I am life from eternal life. The attempt and the risk that the eternal mother took with me is unique, unique the form and veins of my skin, unique the smallest play of leaves in my branches and the smallest scar on my bark. I was made to form and reveal the eternal in my smallest special detail. A tree says: My strength is trust. I know nothing about my fathers, I know nothing about the thousand children that every year spring out of me. I live out the secret of my seed to the very end, and I care for nothing else. I trust that God is in me. I trust that my labor is holy. Out of this trust I live. When we are stricken and cannot bear our lives any longer, then a tree has something to say to us: Be still! Be still! Look at me! Life is not easy, life is not difficult. Those are childish thoughts. Let God speak within you, and your thoughts will grow silent. You are anxious because your path leads away from mother and home. But every step and every day lead you back again to the mother. Home is neither here nor there. Home is within you, or home is nowhere at all. A longing to wander tears my heart when I hear trees rustling in the wind at evening. If one listens to them silently for a long time, this longing reveals its kernel, its meaning. It is not so much a matter of escaping from one's suffering, though it may seem to be so. It is a longing for home, for a memory of the mother, for new metaphors for life. It leads home. Every path leads homeward, every step is birth, every step is death, every grave is mother. So the tree rustles in the evening, when we stand uneasy before our own childish thoughts: Trees have long thoughts, long-breathing and restful, just as they have longer lives than ours. They are wiser than we are, as long as we do not listen to them. But when we have learned how to listen to trees, then the brevity and the quickness and the childlike hastiness of our thoughts achieve an incomparable joy. Whoever has learned how to listen to trees no longer wants to be a tree. He wants to be nothing except what he is. That is home. That is happiness.”

“স্রষ্টা ফল দিয়েছেন যেন আমরা ক্ষুধা নিবারণ করতে পারি। একইভাবে তিনি ফুল দিয়েছেন যেন প্রয়োজনে তা কাজে লাগানো যায়। ফল যেমন গাছে সুন্দর আবার ঝুড়িতেও সুন্দর, তেমনি ফুল গাছে সুন্দর আবার প্রেমিক বা প্রেমিকার হাতেও সুন্দর! আমি বিনীতভাবে দ্বিমত পোষণ করি যারা বলেন যে ফুল শুধু গাছেই শোভা পায়। ফল যেমন গাছেই রেখে দিলে নষ্ট হয়ে যাবে, তেমনি ফুলও ব্যবহৃত না হলে অযথাই নষ্ট হবে!”

“God has given fruits so that we can satisfy hunger. Similarly, He has given flowers so that they can be used if necessary. Just as the fruits are beautiful in the tree and also in the basket, likewise, the flowers are beautiful in the tree and also in the lover or beloved’s hands. I humbly disagree with those who say that flowers adorn only the trees. As leaving the fruits in the tree will destroy them, equally, if the flowers are not used, they will be pointlessly wasted!”

“I cannot hope to make you understand how the world is truly made,' he told her. 'Metaphor, then: the world is a weave, like threads woven into cloth.' His hand came out of his sleeve with a strip of his red ribbon. 'If you say so.' 'Everything, stone, trees, beasts, the sky, the waters, all are a weave of fabric,' he said patiently. 'But when you think, it is different. Your thinking snarls the fabric, knots it. If you were a magician, you could use the knot of your mind to pull on other threads. That is magic, and now you see how every simple it is. I wonder everyone does not become an enchanter.”

“Now tell me what you’re afraid of.” “Uncle Nathan is right about this tree. It’s got some kind of spirit in it. And it doesn’t want me to leave.” I saw my dad smile and shake his head. “I’m serious, Dad. You can’t send those guys up here again. The tree will try to kill them before it lets them take me down. Didn’t you see it happen?” “I saw a couple of accidents…” “And Ronnie fell yesterday, but somehow I’m able to be up in this tree no problem. I got up here without any ropes or ladders. Don’t you find that mysterious? Uncle Nathan doesn’t. Grandfather doesn’t.” “They are both superstitious, that’s all.” “I know,” I said. “And what about that, Dad? You’ve spouted all your legends and myths at me my whole life, and now you suddenly don’t care about them? That doesn’t make any sense.” He sighed so deeply I could hear it. “I study those legends to get to know our culture, our heritage. I don’t believe that they are literal truths.” “But what about the mermaids?” I pressed. “Remember the big story you told about the singing boat and the killer whale? It was you who told me that maybe the story was wrong and it wasn’t a singing boat; it was a mermaid under the boat.” “I remember, but I had a real mermaid staring me in the face at the time. There isn’t anything like that going on right now.” “I hear whispers coming from the tree. It moves on its own. It is warmer than it should be…” “You’ve been up there too long. You’re delirious.” I grunted at him. “It started before I climbed up! ” Dad rubbed a hand over his face. “I don’t know what you want me to do here.” I turned on the camera and flipped the digital pictures until I found that one with the face. I stuck it in the bucket and lowered it down to my dad and told him to take a look. “Is that as good as a mermaid right in front of you?” He studied the picture a moment and then replied, “I always see faces in the knots of trees. Who doesn’t? I think that’s why so many people create horror stories about them.”

“Philemon counselled with old Baucis first; and then discovered to the listening Gods their hearts' desire, ‘We pray you let us have the care of your new temple; and since we have passed so many years in harmony, let us depart this life together— Let the same hour take us both—I would not see the tomb of my dear wife; and let me not be destined to be buried by her hands!’ At once their wishes were fulfilled. So long as life was granted they were known to be the temple's trusted keepers, and when age had enervated them with many years, as they were standing, by some chance, before the sacred steps, and were relating all these things as they had happened, Baucis saw Philemon, her old husband, and he, too, saw Baucis, as their bodies put forth leaves; and while the tops of trees grew over them, above their faces, — they spoke each to each; as long as they could speak they said, ‘Farewell, farewell, my own’—and while they said farewell; new leaves and branches covered both at once.”

“It was Sunday, and Mumma had gone next door with Lena and the little ones. Under the pepper tree in the yard Pa was sorting, counting, the empty bottles he would sell back: the bottles going clink clink as Pa stuck them in the sack. The fowls were fluffing in the dust and sun: that crook-neck white pullet Mumma said she would hit on the head if only she had the courage to; but she hadn't.”

“Sebelum membaca Zorba, pepohonan di jalanan hanyalah kumpulan daun dan ranting tak Bernama. Tapi setelah membacanya, dia memberi pepohonan itu nama-nama berdasarkan engetahuan barunya: pohon tin liar, tamariska, semak alang-alang, dan tanaman Verbascum. Alam tercipta ulang di hadapannya, seolah-olah Big Bang baru terjadi dan dialah manusia pertama yang bertugas menamai benda-benda.”

“It turned out plant collecting was a solitary occupation. In the past Robert had enjoyed being alone, or so he thought. Actually he had rarely been alone for long: working in hotels, in stables, on ranches and farms, and as a miner, he had always been around others. Now, out in the woods or up in the hills or out on the flat central plain, he could go for days without speaking to anyone. His throat seemed to close up and he had to keep clearing it, singing songs aloud or reciting the Latin names of plants, just to check that he still had a voice. 'Araucaria imbricata. Sequoia sempervirens. Pinus lambertiana. Abies magnifica'. He was surprised at how much he missed people..”