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c6c7df5
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So I learned two things that night, and the next day, from him: the perfection of a moment, and the fleeting nature of it.
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loss
relationships
fiction
life
love
epiphany
journey
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Margaret George |
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58a428d
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The cure for a broken heart is simple, my lady. A hot bath and a good night's sleep.
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comforting-thought
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Margaret George |
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8c7a3e1
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When he comes into a room, you give a little gasp, deep inside, far inside,' someone once said when trying to describe what it meant to love.
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Margaret George |
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8ca040a
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I loved him so, even his past was precious to me. I found myself kissing each mark, thinking, taking him further and further back to a time when he had known no disappointments, no battles, no wounds, as I erased each one. To make him again like Caesarion. Yet if we take the past away from those we love - even to protect them - do we not steal their very selves?
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love
cleopatra
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Margaret George |
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1e23d65
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I had a desire to see something besides my own shores, if only to be content to return to them someday. If I wish to live in my native land and love her, it should not be out of ignorance.
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Margaret George |
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00364d4
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Things do not happen, we must make them happen
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Margaret George |
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9ed2a21
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The strong look for more strength, the weak for excuses.
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Margaret George |
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5ac9461
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In my experience, there are two things that no one will admit to: having no sense of humor and being susceptible to flattery.
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Margaret George |
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d72da29
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Defeat I can endure with cheerfulness, my lady. But betrayal is like taking the wind from my sails, or the earth from beneath my feet. It chills my spirits like a rainy day, and all I can do is draw the curtains and cry into my pillow.
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treachery
despair
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Margaret George |
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b3fa5b6
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Thus we use our supposed "knowledge" of others to speak on their behalf, and condemn them for their words we ourselves put in their silent mouths."
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truth
dissapointment
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Margaret George |
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04997ff
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To love someone is to catch your breath whenever he walks in the room.
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Margaret George |
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81f0df0
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What is one person's diversion may be another's supreme test.
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Margaret George |
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b1874f8
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Oh, he was just angry, we tell ourselves when someone blurts out something he later apologizes for. But a word, once spoken, lingers forever; to keep peace we pretend to forget, but we never do. Strange that a spoken word can have such lasting power when words carved on stone monuments vanish in spite of all our efforts to preserve them. What we would lose persists, lodged in our minds, and what we would keep is lost to water, moths, moss.
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Margaret George |
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2e90885
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Now I felt the long-forgotten urgency of lovemaking, when it seems one's human selves leave, to be replaced by hungry beasts bolting their food. Gone are the civilized beings who talk of manners and journeys and letters; in their places are two bodies straining to give birth to a burst of inhuman pleasure followed by a great, floating nothingness. An explosion of life followed by death - in this we live, and in this we foreshadow our own sw..
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Margaret George |
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27e1fa7
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Perhaps life is like an hour glass, with dear ones the sand that slips from the upper glass--the earth--into the second--eternity.
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time
mortality
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Margaret George |
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54bb517
|
Yet we always envy others, comparing our shadows to their sunlit sides.
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Margaret George |
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9ab252a
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Boredom is that awful state of inaction when the very medicine -- that is, activity -- which could solve it, is seen as odious. Archery? It is too cold, and besides, the butts need re-covering; the rats have been at the straw. Music? To hear it is tedious; to compose it, too taxing. And so on. Of all the afflictions, boredom is ultimately the most unmanning. Eventually, it transforms you into a great nothing who does nothing -- a cousin to ..
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Margaret George |
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86a611b
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Lying in bed, half-covered by the blankets, I would drowsily ask why he had come to my door that night long ago. It had become a ritual for us, as it does for all lovers: where, when, why? remember...I understand even old people rehearse their private religion of how they first loved, most guarded of secrets. And he would answer, sleep blurring his words, "Because I had to." The question and the answer were always the same. Why? Because I h..
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lovers-love-story
secrets
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Margaret George |
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8b29c45
|
The most wicked criminals have God on their lips at all times, for God is the only one who can stomach them.
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Margaret George |
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84d7917
|
Fortune offers you opportunities to create; she does not hand you presents.
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Margaret George |
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65586b9
|
Some things can be recovered. Some things can be restored. But some lost things, we seek forever.
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mythology
|
Margaret George |
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a11c587
|
Mary awoke from her nightmare with a pounding heart, convinced that she had only imagined Elizabeth's cruel plot. A full moon was shining into her chamber, illuminating everything around her in silvery light. That was when she noticed for the first time that there were bars on her window.
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Margaret George |
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873b077
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I was ever the realist, sometimes to my sorrow. But seldom to my regret.
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Margaret George |
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ae3a118
|
Hope is a straw hat hanging beside a window covered with frost.
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Margaret George |
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8c8eab7
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Heart of my heart, bone of my bone, spirit of my spirt, we cannot be held.
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Margaret George |
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6f41693
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It is only when our fate hangs in the balance, when our very life depends on something, that we see whether or not we trust that the rope to which we are clinging will support us. If we do not, then we let of of the ledge and swing on it with our full weight.
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Margaret George |
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965974b
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You must bear losses like a soldier, the voice told me, bravely and without complaint, and just when the day seems lost, grab your shield for another stand, another thrust forward. That is the juncture that separates heroes from the merely strong.
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war
loss
inspirational
resilience
julius-caesar
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Margaret George |
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166c68a
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One always imagines that the days that change one's life must be marked with something extraordinary in nature--storms and lightning, darkness at noon, and so on. In truth they are indistinguishable from any other, which is one reason we feel mocked, as if the world is telling us we are inconsequential.
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Margaret George |
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74478f9
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Kindness is stronger than iron bars.
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Margaret George |
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0660353
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Jesus saw the eternal in the everyday. Your last day on earth should be spent as you spent all your others-- doing your daily tasks with love and honesty... An ordinary day is, perhaps, the most holy of all.
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jesus
spirtuality
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Margaret George |
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0101970
|
It is thus that inanimate objects seem to soak up the essence of living things, and later cause pain or pleasure when we merely look at them.
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Margaret George |
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c147a0e
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Mary was like a caged tiger in the first days of her captivity. Keen, alert, and watchful, she listened tensely each dawn for the key that unlocked her door. After breakfast she watched the road for messengers, pacing back and forth like a confined feline. But no messengers ever came. Elizabeth had abandoned her. Or forgotten her. And the days passed. Little by little, the Queen of Scots grew accustomed to her captivity. She no longer hea..
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Margaret George |
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8aefe8f
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Omens. If I were beginning again, starting out in life, I would ignore all omens, neither heeding them nor trying to disable them. If we chose to pass them by, then perhaps they would lose their power, as old gods and goddesses, no longer worshiped, fade away and lose their grip on us.
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Margaret George |
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236b481
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As long as the sun rose each day, as long as they could behold it, there life was secure.
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Margaret George |
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ff8825f
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I embrace Fate like a lover. All my life, Fate has wished to be my lover and tried to govern me. Now I turn to submit to his embraces.
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Margaret George |
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4ff7a4d
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Our minds see things that our eyes cannot. I suppose something continues to exist until the mind that sees it no longer exists.
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Margaret George |
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987f803
|
The soft strings of the lute rippled with memories, and the maid's lilting voice made Mary sigh as she closed her eyes. She fell asleep filled with sadness, but without regret.
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regret
|
Margaret George |
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6148b94
|
My firm resolve was to escape my wicked cousin and my English captors. But the wind was howling, and rain was coming down in sheets. And even as I relaxed in a hot bath in my snug apartments, the clamor of the storm outside was counseling me to be patient and wait. A wise woman never does anything in a hurry.
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Margaret George |
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fbc7144
|
I realized then how odd it must seem to them to be summoned by a woman. Roman women were at home quietly minding their business or else doing what wives were known to do in joke and song: boss, nag, forbid. As a foreign queen I was the only woman who was their equal and had the power to summon them, question them, and advise them on matters other than domestic details. I thought that a pity; there should be others.
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Margaret George |
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76ab5d2
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Mary watched the sunset from her carriage window, realizing that such beauty could never last. Life was a golden glory that faded in the wink of an eye. Life was a village fair that only lasted for a single day. As the carriage rattled along, rocking her like a babe in arms, Mary felt very old and wise. She found that she didn't mind being taken back to the castle, to a caring captivity that was filled with comforts and kindness. And she al..
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life-lessons
wisdom
|
Margaret George |
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87a3f95
|
I will even not rant about treachery. I was brought up in a sea of treachery and deceit and betrayal. I swam in it like perch in the Nile. I am completely at home in it. I shall not drown.
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cleopatra
|
Margaret George |
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af623f7
|
It is almost impossible to describe happiness, because at the time it feels entirely natural, as if all the rest of your life has been the aberration; only in retrospect does it swim into focus as the rare and precious thing it is. When it is present, it seems to be eternal, abiding forever, and there is no need to examine it or clutch it. Later, when it has evaporated, you stare in dismay at your empty palm, where only a little of the perf..
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Margaret George |
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2a1cfcf
|
I thought of the "Roman way" of impaling oneself on a sword. Certainly poison seemed more civilized. And I thought the Romans were a little too eager to commit suicide. It did not take much of a setback before they were reaching for their swords, or opening their veins."
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Margaret George |
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15573a3
|
For a man, however, it was the opposite. Alexander's beauty was not felt to detract from his generalship. Nowhere was it hinted that a handsome man could not be a good ruler, or clever, or strong, or brave. In fact, people longed for a resplendent king. But for a woman...I shook my head. It was as if beauty in a woman rendered all other traits suspect.
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Margaret George |