Background Image

...

Perhaps This Was How The Sparrows Did It Too; Perhaps They Were Looking So Hard At The Peaks And Tips Of The New Rooftops Coated With Dew, And The Vast New Horizon, That They Only Forgot That They Did Not Know How To Fly Until They Were Already In Midair.

-Lauren Oliver

...

Please Wait....
Translating....

Perhaps This Was How

Lauren Oliver

...

Perhaps This Was How The Sparrows Did It Too; Perhaps They Were Looking So Hard At The Peaks And Tips Of The New Rooftops Coated With Dew, And The Vast New Horizon, That They Only Forgot That They Did Not Know How To Fly Until They Were Already In Midair.

Views: 9

Topic

More From Lauren Oliver

..in That Moment I Realize How Much I Love The Little Everyday Routines Of My Life..the Details That Are My Life's Special Pattern, Like How In Handwoven Rugs What Really Makes Them Unique Are The Tiny Flaws In The Stitching, Little Gaps And Jumps And Stutters That Can Never Be Reproduced. So Many Things Become Beautiful When You Really Look.

Everyday Routine

But If You Do Believe, Then You Already Know All About Magic.

No One Can Tell Us No. No One Can Make Us Stop. We Have Picked Each Other And The Rest Of The World Can Go To Hell.

Sometimes I Feel Like She Deserves A Best Friend Who Is Just A Little More Special.

The Salt Blowing Off The Sea Makes The Air Feel Textured And Heavy.

My First Kiss. A New Kind Of Kiss, Like The New Kind Of Music Still Playing, Softly, In The Distance - Wild And Arrhythmic, Desperate. Passionate.

Once Mo Had Closed The Gates, He Returned To His Little Stone Hut, And His Half-eaten Sandwich Of Butter And Canned Sardines, And His Mug Of Thick Hot Chocolate, Which Every Night He Poured Carefully Into A Thermos Labeled Coffee.

Love: A Single Word, A Wispy Thing, A Word No Bigger Or Longer Than An Edge.

This Is The World We Live In, A World Of Safety And Happiness And Order, A World Without Love. A World Where Children Crack Their Heads On Stone Fireplaces And Nearly Gnaw Off Their Tongues And The Parents Are Concerned. Not Heartbroken, Frantic, Desperate. Concerned, As They Are When You Fail Mathematics, As They Are When They Are Late To Pay Their Taxes.

Let Me Tell You Something About Dying: It's Not As Bad As They Says. It's The Coming-back-to-life Part That Hurts.

You Must Hurt, Or Be Hurt.

There's Still Always The Possibility That I've Gone Totally, Clinically Cuckoo. But Somehow I Don't Think So Anymore. An Article I Once Read Said That Crazy People Don't Worry About Being Crazy - That's The Whole Problem.

I'm Mesmerized By The Way His Fingers Move Confidently Along Her Skin, As Though Her Body Is His To Reat And Touch And Tend To. She Was Mine Before She Was Yours: The Words Are There, Unexpectedly, Surging From My Throat To My Tongue. I Swallow Them Back.

Like I Am Alice In The Wonderland And Have Gotten Too Big For The Room.

I Wish I Could Close My Eyes And Be Blown Into Dust And Nothingness, Feel All My Thoughts Disperse Like Dandelion Fluff Drifting Off On The Wind. But His Hands Keep Pulling Me Back: Into The Alley, And Portland, And A World That Has Suddenly Stopped Making Sense.

This Is The First Day Of My New Beginning. From Now On I'm Going To Do Things Right. I'm Going To Be A Different Person, A Good Person. I'm Going To Be The Kind Of Person Who Would Be Remembered Well, Not Just Remembered.

Things Change After You Die, Though, I Guess Because Dying Is The Loneliest Thing You Can Do.

Life Isn't Life If You Just Float Through It.

Are You Sure That Being Like Everybody Else Will Make You Happy?" "i Don't Know Any Other Way." "let Me Show You." And Then We're Kissing. Or At Least, I Think We're Kissing—i've Only Seen It Done A Couple Of Times, Quick Closed-mouth Pecks At Weddings Or On Formal Occasions. But This Isn't Like Anything I've Ever Seen, Or Imagined, Or Even Dreamed: This Is Like Music Or Dancing But Better Than Both.

For A Split Second, He Had Looked Almost Like My Alex Again.

Fear. Blame. Don't Forget. Mom. I Love You. -lauren Oliver, Delerium

Promise Me We'll Stay Together, Okay? His Eyes Are Once Again The Clear Blue Of A Perfectly Transparent Pool. They Are Eyes To Swim In, To Float In, Forever. "you And Me". "i Promise". I Say. Behind Us The Door Creaks Open, And I Turn Around, Expecting Raven, Just As A Voice Cuts Through The Air: "don't Believe Her.

I Used To Lie Here Like This All Summer Long,' I Tell Her. 'i'd Come Up Here And Just Stare At The Sky.' She Rolls Over On Her Back So She's Staring Up As Well. 'bet This View Hasn't Changed Much, Has It?' What She Says Is So Simple I Almost Laugh. She's Right, Of Course. 'no. This Looks Exactly The Same.' I Suppose That's The Secret, If You're Ever Wishing For Things To Go Back To The Way They Were. You Just Have To Look Up.

Eventually She Came. She Appeared Suddenly, Exactly Like She'd Done That Day- She Stepped Into The Sunshine, She Jumped, She Laughed And Threw Her Head Back, So Her Long Ponytail Nearly Grazed The Waistband Of Her Jeans. After That, I Couldn't Think About Anything Else. The Mole On The Inside Of Her Right Elbow, Like A Dark Blot Of Ink. The Way She Ripped Her Nails To Shreds When She Was Nervous. Her Eyes, Deep As A Promise. Her Stomach, Pale And Soft And Gorgeous, And The Tiny Dark Cavity Of Her Belly Button. I Nearly Went Crazy.

There Are No Happy Endings, Only Breaks In The Regular Action.

Here's Something Else You Might As Well Learn Now: If You Want Something, If You Take It For Your Own, You'll Always Be Taking It From Someone Else. That's A Rule Too. And Something Must Die So That Others Can Live.

For The First Time In My Life I Actually Feel Sorry For Carol. I'm Only Seventeen Years Old, And I Already Know Something She Doesn't Know: I Know That Life Isn't Life If You Just Float Through It. I Know That The Whole Point- The Only Point- Is To Find Things That Matter, And Hold On To Them, And Fight For Them, And Refuse To Let Them Go.

He’s Speaking In The Tone Of Voice That Everyone Uses When They’re About To Break You Apart. Gentle—kind, Even—like They Can Make The News Sound Better Just By Speaking In A Lullaby Voice.

In My Dream I Know I Am Falling. But There Is No Up Or Down, No Walls Or Sides Or Ceilings, Just The Sensation Of Cold And Darkness Everywhere. I Am So Scared I Could Scream. But When I Open My Mouth, Nothing Happens. And I Wonder If You Fall Forever And Never Touch Down, Is It Really Still Falling? I Think I Will Fall Forever.

I Said, I Prefer The Ocean When It's Gray. Or Not Really Gray. A Pale, In-between Color. It Reminds Me Of Waiting For Something Good To Happen.

"everyone Is Asleep. They've All Been Asleep For Years. You Seemed... Awake." Alex Is Whispering Now. He Closes His Eyes, Opens Them Again. "i'm Tired Of Sleeping."

I Love You. Remember. And Someday, I Will Find You Again.

I'll Find You," He Says, Watching Me With The Eyes I Remember. "i Won't Let You Go Again

This Is One Of My Favorite Things About The Underground: The Crashing Of The Cymbals, The Screeching Guitar Riffs, Music That Moves Into The Blood And Makes You Feel Hot And Wild And Alive.

Could It Be? Samantha Kingston? Home? On A Friday?” I Roll My Eyes. “i Don’t Know. Did You Do A Lot Of Acid In The Sixties? Could Be A Flashback.” “i Was Two Years Old In 1960. I Came Too Late For The Party.” He Leans Down And Pecks Me On The Head. I Pull Away Out Of Habit. “and I’m Not Even Going To Ask How You Know About Acid Flashbacks.” “what’s An Acid Flashback?” Izzy Crows. “nothing,” My Dad And I Say At The Same Time, And He Smiles At Me.

Maybe, The Hope Said. Maybe.

The Devil Stole Into The Garden Of Eden. He Carried With Him The Disease - Amor Deliria Nervosa - In The Form Of A Seed. It Grew And Flowered Into A Magnificent Apple Tree, Which Bore Apples As Bright As Blood. -from Genesis: A Complete History Of The World And The Known Universe, By Steven Horace, Phd, Harvard University

The Tunnels May Be Long, And Twisted, And Dark; But You Are Supposed To Go Through Them.

It's Going To Be Okay. Words That Mean Nothing. Really, Just Sounds Intoned Into Vastness And Darkness, Little Scrabbling Attempts To Latch On To Something When We're Falling.

Fridays Are The Hardest In Some Ways: You’re So Close To Freedom.

Waste Today, Want Tomorrow.

I Guess That’s Just Part Of Loving People: You Have To Give Things Up. Sometimes You Even Have To Give Them Up.

Fred Is Officially The Mayor Of Portland Now.

I Cry For Everything I Abandoned And Because I, Too, Have Been Left Behind -- By Alex, By My Mom, By Time That Has Cut Through Our Worlds And Separated Us.

Perfection Is A Promise, And A Reassurance That We Are Not Wrong.

It's A Miracle I Was Able To Get Out Of The House Today. It's A Miracle I'm Even Wearing Pants, A Double Miracle I Remembered To Wear Shoes.

Less Than A Month Ago All Of August Still Stretched Before Us - Long And Golden And Reassuring, Like An Endless Period Of Delicious Sleep.

But It's Not About Knowing. It Is Simply About Going Forward.

You Have To Understand. I Wasn't Just Thinking Of Me. I Was Thinking Of Her, Too.

Thinking Of Her

A Good Friend Keeps Your Secrets For You. A Best Friend Helps You Keep Your Own Secrets.

Keeping Secrets

Best Kept Secrets

He Is My World And My World Is Him And Without Him There Is No World.

Maybe This Is The Secret To Talking To Boys--maybe You Just Have To Be Angry All The Time.

I Guess That's What Saying Good-bye Is Always Like--like Jumping Off An Edge. The Worst Part Is Making The Choice To Do It. Once You're In The Air, There's Nothing You Can Do But Let Go.

It's Too Late. I've Seen Things...i've Lost Things You Can't Understand.

Sometimes I Feel Like If You Just Watch Things, Just Sit Still And Let The World Exist In Front Of You - Sometimes I Swear That Just For A Second Time Freezes And The World Pauses In Its Tilt. Just For A Second. And If You Somehow Found A Way To Live In That Second, Then You Would Live Forever.

I Know Some Of You Are Thinking Maybe I Deserved It. But Before You Start Pointing Fringers, Let Me Ask You Is What I Did Really So Bad? So Bad I Deserved To Die? So Bad I Deserved To Die Like That? Is What I Did Really Much Worse Then What Anybody Else Does? Is It Really So Much Worse Than What You Do?

Mama, Mama, Help Me Get Home I'm Out In The Woods, I Am Out On My Own. I Found Me A Werewolf, A Nasty Old Mutt It Showed Me Its Teeth And Went Straight For My Gut. Mama, Mama, Help Me Get Home I'm Out In The Woods, I Am Out On My Own. I Was Stopped By A Vampire, A Rotting Old Wreck It Showed Me Its Teeth And Went Straight For My Neck. Mama, Mama, Put Me To Bed I Won't Make It Home, I'm Already Half-dead. I Met An Invalid, And Fell For His Art He Showed Me His Smile, And Went Straight For My Heart. -from "a Child's Walk Home," Nursery Rhymes And Folk Tales

People Are Like Houses. They Could Open Their Doors. You Could Walk Through Their Rooms And Touch The Objects Hidden In Their Corners. But Something--the Structure, The Wiring, The Invisible Mechanism That Kept The Whole Thing Standing--remai Ned Invisible, Suggested Only By The Fact Of Its Existing At All.

That's When I Realized That Certain Moments Go On Forever. Even After They're Over They Still Go On, Even After You're Dead And Buried, Those Moments Are Lasting Still, Backward And Forward, On Into Infinity. They Are Everything And Everywhere All At Once. They Are The Meaning.

A Room Full Of Words That Are Nearly The Truth But Not Quite, Each Note Fluttering Off The Steam Of Its Rose Like A Broken Butterfly Wing.

Most Of The Time-- 99 Percent Of The Time-- You Just Don't Know How And Why The Threads Are Looped Together, And That's Okay. Do A Good Thing And Something Bad Happens. Do A Bad Thing And Something Good Happens. Do Nothing And Everything Explodes.

The House, The Pond, The Tree-it Was All Both Overwhelmingly Familiar And Different From What She Remembered-smaller And Shabbier, Somehow. It Was Like Waking Up To Find That Your Reflection In The Mirror Had Aged Overnight, Or Had Sprouted A New Mole: You Were Forced To Admit That Things Changed, Whether You Gave Them Permission To Or Not.

The Sun Has Just Risen, Weak And Watery-looking, Like It Had Just Spilled Itself Over The Horizon And Is Too Lazy To Clean Itself Up.

I Want To Know." His Words Are A Whisper, Barely Audible. "i Want To Know With You.

I Feel An Overwhelming Rush Of Sadness... I'm Just Struck With A Sense Of Time Passing So Quickly, Rushing Forward. One Day I'll Wake Up And My Whole Life Will Be Behind Me, And It Will Seem To Have Gone As Quickly As A Dream.

You Have To Understand. I Am No One Special. I Am Just A Single Girl. I Am Five Feet Two Inches Tall And I Am In-between In Every Way. But I Have A Secret. You Can Build Walls All The Way To The Sky And I Will Find A Way To Fly Above Them. You Can Try To Pin Me Down With A Hundred Thousand Arms, But I Will Find A Way To Resist.

All Of You, Wherever You Are: In Your Spiny Cities, Or Your One-bump Towns. Find It, The Hard Stuff, The Links Of Metal And Chink, The Fragments Of Stone Filling Your Stomach. And Pull, And Pull, And Pull. I Will Make A Pact With You: I Will Do It If You Will Do It, Always And Forever. Take Down The Walls.

I Still Wanted To Know Why. As Though Somebody Was Going To Answer That For Me, As Though Any Answer Would Be Satisfying.

It Strikes Me How Strange People Are. You Can See Them Every Day - You Can Think You Know Them - And Then You Fшnd Out You Hardly Know Them At All.

Alex Loved Books. He Was The One Who First Introduced Me To Poetry. That's Another Reason I Can't Read Anymore.

I Think Of The Quietness Of Julian's Voice As He Said I Love You, The Steadiness Of His Rib Cage Rising And Falling Against My Back, As We Sleep.i Love You, Julian. But The Words Don't Come.

Holy Mother Of Lord Cocoa Puffs

We Leave Pippa Behind, Standing In The Dark, Teeming Bowels Of The Camp, While The Sun Begins To Stain The Sky Electric, And From All Sides The Guns Draw Closer.

But You Can Build A Future Out Of Anything. A Scrap, A Flicker. The Desire To Go Forward, Slowly, One Foot At A Time. You Can Build An Airy City Out Of Ruins.

Grief Is Like Sinking, Like Being Buried. I Am In Water The Tawny Color Of Kicked-up Dirt. Every Breath Is Full Of Choking. There Is Nothing To Hold On To, No Sides, No Way To Claw Myself Up. There Is Nothing To Do But Let Go. Let Go. Feel The Weight All Around You, Feel The Squeezing Of Your Lungs, The Slow, Low Pressure. Let Yourself Go Deeper. There Is Nothing But Bottom. There Is Nothing But The Taste Of Metal, And The Echoes Of Old Things, And Days That Look Like Darkness.

Sometimes I'm Afraid To Go To Sleep Because Of What I'm Leaving Behind.

If You Want Something, If You Take It For Your Own, You'll Always Be Taking It From Someone Else.

Mice? Fine. Flying Mice? Not So Fine.

It's Like There's A Filter Set Up In My Brain, Except Instead Of Making Things Better, It Twists Everything Around So What Comes Out Of My Mouth Is Totally Wrong, Totally Different From What I Was Thinking.

The Deadliest Of All Deadly Things: It Kills You Both When You Have It And When You Don’t.

The Question Was: Will You Meet Me Tomorrow? And The Word Was: Yes.

You Can Build Walls All The Way To The Sky And I Will Find A Way To Fly Above Them.

I'd Rather Die On My Own Terms Than Live On Theirs. I'd Rather Die Loving Alex Than Live Without Him.

You See, We Didn't Know.

...into Hate, Into Refusal, Against Hope And Without Fear

I Close My Eyes. An Image Flashes—emerging From The Van With Julian After Our Escape From New York City; Believing, In That Moment, That We Had Escaped The Worst, That Life Would Begin Again For Us. Instead Life Has Only Grown Harder.

Mama, Mama, Put Me To Bed I Won’t Make It Home, I’m Already Half-dead I Met An Invalid, And Fell For His Art He Showed Me His Smile, And Went Straight For My Heart.

It Was A Bird. A Bird Struggling Through Stickiness: A Bird Coated In Paint, Floundering In Its Nest, Splashing Color Everywhere. Red. Red. Red. Dozens Of Them: Black Feathers Coated Thickly With Crimson-colored Paint, Fluttering Among The Branches. Red Means Run.

You Should Only Fall In Love With People Who Will Fall In Love With You Back.

Falling In Love

You Have To Learn That People Are Always Listening.

For The First Time In A Long Time, I Actually Look At Her. I've Always Thought Lena Was Pretty, But Now It Occurs To Me That At Some Point - Last Summer? Last Year? - She Became Beautiful.

Happiness Is Found When No One Is Looking

His Eyes Are The Color Of Honey. These Are The Eyes I Remember From My Dreams.

I've Never Really Thought About It Before, But It's A Miracle How Many Kinds Of Light There Are In The World, How Many Skies: The Pale Brightness Of Spring, When It Feels Like The Hole World's Blushing; The Lush, Bright Boldness Of A July Noon; Purple Storm Skies And A Green Queasiness Just Before Lightning Strikes And Crazy Multicolored Sunsets That Look Like Someone's Acid Trip.

The Most Dangerous Sicknesses Are Those That Make Us Believe We Are Well

And You Should Hear The Music. Incredible, Amazing Music, Like Nothing You've Ever Heard, Music That Almost Takes Your Head Off, You Know? That Makes You Want To Scream And Jump Up And Down And Break Stuff And Cry.

Amor Deliria Nervosa Isn't A Disease Of Love. It's A Disease Of Selfishness.

I Start To Back Away Before I Do Something Wildly Inappropriate, Like Jump On Top Of Him.

You Came Form Different Starts And You'll Come To Different Ends.

That's What Zombieland Is: Frozen, Calm, Quiet.

That's When You Really Lose People, You Know.when The Pain Passes.

How Can Someone Have The Power To Shatter You To Dust--and Also To Make You Feel So Whole?

But From The Beginning, I Knew That In A World Where Destiny Was Dead, I Was Destined, Forever, To Love Him. Even Though He Didn't - Though He Couldn't - Ever Love Me Back.

Hearts Are Fragile Things. That's Why You Have To Be So Careful.

At A Certain Point Your Brain Stops To Rationalize Things. At A Certain Point It Gives Up, Shuts Off, Shuts Down.

The Worst Is Knowing I Can't Tell Anybody What's Happening -or What's Happened- To Me. Not Even My Mom.

For All The People Who Have Infected Me With Amor Deliria Nervosa In The Past - You Know Who You Are. For The People Who Will Infect Me In The Future - I Can't Wait To See Who You'll Be. And In Both Cases: Thank You.

In My Head I Try And Reach Back, Through The Fence, Past The Smoke; I Try And Grab His Hand And Pull. Alex, Come Back. There Is Nothing To Do But Sink. The Hours Close Around Me, Encase Me Completely, Like A Tomb.

The Kidnapping, The Kiss. I Brought Him Here, After All. I Rescue Him An Pulled Him Into This New Life, A Life Of Freedom And Feeling.

If Cassie Was Invalidated Because She Caught The Disease, Or Because Fred Suspected Her Of It, I Can Only Imagine What He Will Do To Me And To My Family If He Discovers That The Cure Did Not Work Perfectly.

But Maybe Happiness Isn't In The Choosing. Maybe It's In The Fiction, In The Pretending: That Wherever We Have Ended Up Is Where We Intended To Be All Along.

Of All The Systems Of The Body - Neurological, Cognitive, Special, Sensory - The Cardiological System Is The Most Sensitive And Easily Disturbed. The Role Of Society Must Be To Shelter These Systems From Infection And Decay, Or Else The Future Of The Human Race Is At Stake. Like A Summer Fruit That Is Protected From Insect Invasion, Bruising, And Rot By The Whole Mechanism Of Modern Farming; So Must We Protect The Heart.

I’ve Always Hated Being Looked At.

But Maybe You Carried Your Demons With You Everywhere, The Way You Carried Your Shadow.

I Can Admit, Now, That I Must Have Loved Lena. Not In An Unnatural Way, But My Feelings For Her Must Have Been A Kind Of Sickness. How Can Someone Have The Power To Shatter You To Dust--and Also To Make You Feel So Whole?

She Was Mine Before She Was Yours.

I Want To Be Healed And Whole And Perfect Again, Like A Misshapen Slab Of Iron That Comes Out Of The Fire Glowing, Glittering, Razor-sharp.

They Say That The Cure For Love Will Make Me Happy And Safe Forever. And I’ve Always Believed Them. Until Now. Now Everything Has Changed. Now, I’d Rather Be Infected With Love For The Tiniest Sliver Of A Second Than Live A Hundred Years Smothered By A Lie

Mary Bring Out Your Umbrella - The Sun Shines Down On This Fine, Fine Day But The Ashes Raining Down Forever Are Going To Turn Your Hair To Gray. Mary Keep Your Oars A-steady Sail Away On The Rising Flood Keep Your Candle At The Ready Red Tides Can't Be Told From Blood. - "miss Mary" (a Common Child's Clapping Game, Dating From The Time Of The Blitz), From Pattycake And Beyond: A History Of Play

In A World Without Love, This Is What People Are To Each Other: Values, Benefits, And Liabilities, Numbers And Data. We Weigh, We Quantify, We Measure, And The Soul Is Ground To Dust.

It Was Unfair That People Could Pretend To Be One Thing When They Were Really Something Else. That They Would Get You On Their Side And Then Do Nothing But Fail, And Fail, And Fail Again. People Should Come With Warnings, Like Cigarette Packs: Involvement Would Kill You Over Time.

Maybe It Would Be Better If We Didn't Love. If We Didn't Lose, Either. If We Didn't Get Out Hearts Stomped On, Shattered; If We Didn't Have To Patch And Repatch It Until We're Like Frankenstein Monsters, All Sewn Together By Who Knows What

Nothing Has Ever Been So Painful Or Delicious As Being So Close To Him And Being Unable To Do Anything About It: Like Eating Ice Cream So Fast On A Hot Day You Get A Splitting Headache.

I Don't Understand How Everything Changes, How The Layers Of Your Life Get Buried. Impossible. At Some Point, At Some Time, We Must All Explode.

I Know The Past Will Drag You Backward And Down, Have You Snatching At Whispers Of Wind And The Gibberish Of Trees Rubbing Together, Trying To Decipher Some Code, Trying To Piece Together What Was Broken. It's Hopeless. The Past Is Nothing But A Weight. It Will Build Inside You Like A Stone.

In One Of The Tents, Julian Is Sleeping. And In Another: Alex

All This Time, I Thought We Were Growing Apart Because I Was Leaving Lena Behind. But Really It Was The Reverse. She Was Learning To Lie. She Was Learning To Love.

Old Words; Words That Nearly Brought Me To My Knees. Live Free Or Die

Now, After So Many Years, I Understand What The Coldness Was And Where It Came From—this Sense That Everything Is Lost, And Worthless, And Meaningless.

And You Can't Love, Not Fully, Unless You Are Loved In Return.

Juliet!' I Whip Around But Not Quickly Enough. She's Swallowed By The Crowd, The Gap That Allowed Her To Break For The Door Closing Just As Quickly As It Opened, A Shifting Tetris Pattern Of Bodies.

Time And Space Recede And Blast Away Like A Universe Expanding Forever Outward, And Leaving Only Darkness And The Two Of Us On Its Periphery, Darkness And Breathing And Touch.

Love: A Single Word, A Wispy Thing, A Word No Bigger Or Longer Than An Edge. That's What It Is: An Edge; A Razor. It Draws Up Through The Center Of Your Life, Cutting Everything In Two. Before And After. The Rest Of The World Falls Away On Either Side.

They've Lied About Everything.-about The Fence, And The Existence Of Invalids, About A Million Other Things Besides. They Told Us The Raids Were Carried Out For Our Own Protection. They Told Us The Regulators Were Only Interested In Keeping The Peace. They Told Us Love Was A Disease. They Told Us It Would Kill Us In The End. For The Very First Time I Realize, That This, Too, Maight Also Be A Lie.

I Guess There Are Some Things You Never Get Used To.

Amor Deliria Nervosa: It Affects Your Mind So That You Cannot Think Clearly, Or Make Rational Decisions About Your Own Well-being. Symptom Number Twelve.

We Wanted The Freedom To Love. We Wanted The Freedom To Choose. Now We Have To Fight For It.

Fighting For Love

I’m Not The Hana Everyone Told Me I Would Be After My Cure.

As We're Standing There I Realize We're Almost Exactly The Same Height. We Must Look Like The Dark And Light Side Of An Oreo Cookie, And I Think How Just As Easily It Could Have Been The Other Way Around. She Could Be Blocking My Path; I Could Be Trying To Slip Around Her Into The Dark.

I Am Now Officially Married To Fred Hargrove. Nothing Will Ever Be The Same.

I Feel A Flash Of Grief So Intense It Almost Makes Me Cry Out: Not For What I Lost, But For The Chances I Missed.

I Suppose That's The Secret, If You're Ever Wishing For Things To Back The Way They Were. You Just Have To Look Up.

That's The Thing: We Didn't Really Care. A World Without Love Is Also A World Without Stakes.

I Remember Lena's Expression When He Knocked On The Door; And How Alex Had Looked At Her When She Finally Let Him Into The Storeroom. I Remember Exactly What He Was Wearing, Too, And The Mess Of His Hair, The Sneakers With Their Blue-tinged Laces. His Right Shoe Was Untied. He Didn't Notice. He Didn't Notice Anything But Lena.

It's Amazing How Words Can Do That, Just Shred Your Insides Apart. Sticks And Stones May Break My Bones, But Words Can Never Hurt Me - Such Bullshit.

Do The Other Kids Make Fun Of You? For How You Talk?' 'sometimes.' 'so Why Don't You Do Something About It? You Could Learn To Talk Differently, You Know.' But This Is My Voice. How Would You Be Able To Tell When I Was Talking?

Music, I Think, He Makes Me Feel Like Music

He Makes Me Feel

When You Love Someone, When You Care For Someone, You Have To Do It Through The Good And The Bad. Not Just When You're Happy And It's Easy.

When You Love Someone

The Hours Here Are Flat And Round, Disks Of Gray Layered One On Top Of The Other...they Move Slowly, At A Grind, Until It Seems As Though They Are Not Moving At All. They Are Just Pressing Down.

Some Things Are Better Left Buried And Forgotten.

But Now I Give In, Let The Anger Surge. I'm Sick Of People Acting Like This World, This Other World Is The Normal One, While I'm The Freak. It's Not Fair; Like All The Rules Have Suddenly Changed And Somebody Forgot To Tell Me.

We Are All Punished For The Lives We Have Chosen, In One Way Or Another.

I'm So Tired After Dinner I Fall Asleep With My Clothes On, Almost As Soon As My Head Hits The Pillow, And So I Forget To Ask God, In My Prayers, To Keep Me From Waking Up.

That's The Thing About Faith. It Works.

That's When You Realize That Most Of It-life, The Relentless Mechanism Of Existing-isn't About You. It Doesn't Include You At All. It Will Thrust Onward Even After You've Jumped The Edge. Even After You're Dead.

When He Speaks Again, I Can Tell That He's Smiling. "so I Guess We Saved Each Other.

And How She Looked At Me Like I Could Save Her From Everything Bad In He World. This Was My Secret: She Was The One Who Saved Me

Suicide. A Sideways Word, A Word That People Whisper And Mutter And Cough: A Word That Must Be Squeezed Out Behind Cupped Palms Or Murmured Behind Closed Doors. It Was Only In Dreams That I Heard The Word Shouted, Screamed.

They Haven't Killed Us Yet," I Say, And I Imagine That One Day I Will Fly A Plane Over Portland, Over Rochester, Over Every Fenced-in City In The Whole Country, And I Will Bomb And Bomb And Bomb, And Watch All Their Buildings Smoldering To Dust, And All Those People Melting And Bleeding Into Flame, And I Will See How They Like It. If You Take, We Will Take Back. Steal From Us, And We Will Rob You Blind. When You Squeeze, We Will Hit. This Is The Way The World Is Made Now.

Something Must Die So That Others Can Live.

I Put My Forehead On His Collarbone, Place One Hand On His Chest. Its Rhythm Reassures Me: He Is Real, And He Is Now.

Most People Don't Want To Be Saved. Besides, If You Keep Bailing Everybody Out, They'll Never Learn To Paddle On Their Own.

Who Knows? Maybe They’re Right. Maybe We Are Driven Crazy By Our Feelings. Maybe Love Is A Disease, And We Would Be Better Off Without It. But We Have Chosen A Different Road. And In The End That Is The Point Of Escaping The Cure: We Are Free To Choose. We Are Even Free To Choose The Wrong Thing.

I Get That Rush That Comes When You Know You're Doing Something Wrong And Are Getting Away With It, Like Stealing From The School Cafeteria Of Getting Tipsy At A Family Holiday Without Anyone Knowing It.

It Won't Matter If Nobody Ever Thinks I'm Pretty (although Sometimes I Wish, Just For A Second, That Somebody Would)

It's Connecticut: Being Like The People Around You Is The Whole Point.

Is This Freedom? Is It Happiness? I Don't Know. I Don't Care Anymore. It Is Different--it Is Being Alive.

People Are Like Ants: Just A Few Of Them Give All The Orders. And Most Of Them Spend Their Lives Getting Squashed.

I Don't Know How I Stay On My Feet, Why I Don;t Just Shatter Into Dust Right There, Why My Heart Keeps Beating When I Want It So Badly To Stop

This Is Not The Person I Wanted To Become: Hatred Has Carved A Permanent Place Inside Me, A Hollow Where Things Are So Easily Lost.

They Told Us Love Was A Disease. They Told Us It Would Kill Us In The End. For The Very First Time I Realize, That This, Too, Might Also Be A Lie.

Of Course. That's What People Do In A Disordered World, A World Of Freedom And Choice: They Leave When They Want. They Disappear, They Come Back, They Leave Again. And You Are Left To Pick Up The Pieces On Your Own.

I Didn't Even Know A Heart Could Beat So Loudly...it Reminds Me Of An Edgar Allen Poe Story We Had To Read In One Of Our...classes...it's Supposed To Be A Story About Guilt And The Dangers Of Civil Disobedience, But When I First Read It I Thought It Seemed Kind Of Lame And Melodramatic. Now I Get It, Though. Poe Must Have Snuck Out A Lot When He Was Young.

When I’m Running, There’s Always This Split Second When The Pain Is Ripping Through Me And I Can Hardly Breathe And All I See Is Color And Blur—and In That Split Second, Right As The Pain Crests, And Becomes Too Much, And There’s A Whiteness Going Through Me, I See Something To My Left, A Flicker Of Color […]—and I Know Then, Too, That If I Only Turn My Head He’ll Be There, Laughing, Watching Me, And Holding Out His Arms. I Don’t Ever Turn My Head To Look, Of Course. But One Day I Will. One Day I Will, And He’ll Be Back, And Everything Will Be Okay. And Until Then: I Run.

I Reach Out And Grab Her Wrist. It Feels Impossibly Tiny In My Hand, Like This One Time I Found A Baby Bird Near Goose Point, And I Picked It Up And It Died There, Taking Its Final Gasping Fluttering Breaths In My Palm.

But This Isn’t Like Anything I’ve Ever Seen, Or Imagined, Or Even Dreamed: This Is Like Music Or Dancing But Better Than Both.

The Mark Of The Procedure. A Real One. Lu Is Cured.

This Was What True Fear Was--that You Could Never Know Other People, Not Completely. That You Were Always Just Guessing Blind.

And This, Really, Is The Story-within-the-story, Because If You Do Not Believe That Hearts Can Bloom Suddenly Bigger, And That Love Can Open Like A Flower Out Of Even The Hardest Places, Then I Am Afraid That For You The World Will Be Long And Brown And Barren, And You Will Have Trouble Finding The Light. But If You Do Believe, Then You Already Know All About Magic.

Sometimes I Think Maybe They Were Right All Along, The People On The Other Side In Zombieland. Maybe It Would Be Better If We Didn't Love. If We Didn't Lose Either. If We Didn't Get Our Hearts Stomped On, Shattered: If We Didn't Have To Patch And Repatch Until We're Like Frankenstein Monsters, All Sewn Together And Bound Up By Who Knows What. If We Could Just Float Along, Like Snow. But How Could Anyone Who's Ever Seen A Summer - Big Explosions Of Green And Skies Lit Up Electric With Splashy Sunsets, A Riot Of Flowers And Wind That Smells Like Honey - Pick The Snow?

I Thought The Invalids Were Beasts; I Thought They Would Rip Me Apart. But These People Saved Me, And Gave Me The Softest Place To Sleep, And Nursed Me Back To Health, And Haven't Asked For Anything In Return. The Animals Are On The Other Side Of The Fence: Monsters Wearing Uniforms. They Speak Softly, And Tell Lies, And Smile As They're Slitting Your Throat.

Everything Looks Beautiful. The Book Of Shhh Says That Deliria Alters Your Perception, Disables Your Ability To Reason Clearly, Impairs You From Making Sound Judgments. But It Does Not Tell You This: That Love Will Turn The Whole World Into Something Greater Than Itself.

I Didn’t Know It Would Be Like This,” He Says In A Whisper. And Then: “i’m Scared.

Love, The Deadliest Of All Things: It Kills You Both When You Have It And When You Don't. But That Isn't It, Exactly. The Condemner And The Condemned. The Executioner; The Blade; The Last-minute Reprieve; The Gasping Breath And The Rolling Sky Above You And The Thank You, Thank You, Thank You God. Love: It Will Kill You And Save You, Both.

Are You Sure You Can't Dematerialize? Not Even A Little?" "i'm Sure.

I Used To Think That's What Love Was: Knowing Someone So Well He Was Like A Part Of You.

And I Guess That's When It Starts To Hit Me: The Whole Point Is, You Do What You Can.

The Priests And The Scientists Are Right About One Thing: At Our Heart, At Our Base, We Are No Better Than Animals.

No Guy In His Right Mind Would Ever Choose Me When There Are People Like Hana In The World: It Would Be Like Settling For A Stale Cookie When What You Really Want Is A Big Bowl Of Ice Cream, Whipped Cream And Cherries And Chocolate Sprinkles Included.

If You Cross A Line And Nothing Happens, The Line Loses Meaning.

Requiem Has Been Controversial Because People Dont Feel I Gave It Closure.

Poetry Isn't Like Any Writing I've Ever Heard Before. I Don't Understand All Of It, Just Bits Of Images, Sentences That Appear Half-finished, All Fluttering Together Like Brightly Colored Ribbons In The Wind.

The Flip Side Of Freedom Is This: When You're Completely Free, You're Also Completely On Your Own.

And A Face Above Mine, White And Beautiful, Eyes As Large As The Moon. You Saved Me. A Hand On My Cheek, Cool And Dry. Why Did You Save Me? Words Welling Up On A Tide: No, The Opposite. Eyes The Colour Of A Dawn Sky, A Crown Of Blond Hair, So Bright And White And Blinding I Could Swear It Was A Halo.

And When I Wake Up It's Wonderful, Like I've Been Carried Quietly Onto A Calm, Peaceful Shore, And The Dream, And Its Meaning, Has Broken Over Me Like A Wave And Is Ebbing Away Now, Leaving Me With A Single, Solid Certainty. I Know Now.

Like I've Been Sketched By An Amateur Artist: If You Don't Look Too Closely, It's All Right, But Start Focusing And All The Smudges And Mistakes Become Really Obvious.

One Of The Strangest Things About Life Is That It Will Chug On, Blind And Oblivious, Even As Your Private World - Your Little Carved-out Sphere - Is Twisting And Morphing, Even Breaking Apart.

Feelings Aren't Forever. Time Waits For No One, But Progress Waits For Man To Enact It.

No Wonder The Regulators Decided On Segregation Of Boys And Girls: Otherwise, It Would Have Been A Nightmare, This Feeling Angry And Self-conscious And Confused And Annoyed All The Time.

I'd Rather Die My Way Than Live Yours.

Trending Author

Jawaharlal Nehru

Anne Sullivan Macy

Francine Rivers

Category