Walter De La Mare Quotes
All day long the door of the sub-conscious remains just ajar; we slip through to the other side, and return again, as easily and secretly as a cat.
A harvest mouse goes scampering by, With silver claws and silver eye; And moveless fish in the water gleam, By silver reeds in a silver stream.
After all, what is every man? A horde of ghosts - like a Chinese nest of boxes - oaks that were acorns that were oaks. Death lies behind us, not in front - in our ancestors, back and back until.
Once a man strays out of the common herd, he's more likely to meet wolves in the thickets than angels.
And some win peace who spend The skill of words to sweeten despair Of finding consolation where Life has but one dark end.
A lost but happy dream may shed its light upon our waking hours, and the whole day may be infected with the gloom of a dreary or sorrowful one; yet of neither may we be able to recover a trace.
For beauty with sorrow Is a burden hard to be borne: The evening light on the foam, and the swans, there; That music, remote, forlorn.
Very old are the woods; And the buds that break Out of the brier's boughs, When March winds wake, So old with their beauty are-- Oh, no man knows Through what wild centuries Roves back the rose.
A face peered. All the grey night In chaos of vacancy shone; Nought but vast Sorrow was there The sweet cheat gone.
His are the quiet steeps of dreamland, The waters of no-more-pain; His ram's bell rings 'neath an arch of stars, "Rest, rest, and rest again.
Now that cleverness was the fashion most people were clever - even perfect fools; and cleverness after all was often only a bore: all head and no body
Oh, pity the poor glutton Whose troubles all begin In struggling on and on to turn What's out into what's in.
The only catalogue of this world's goods that really counts is that which we keep in the silence of the mind.
What is the world, O soldiers? It is I, I, this incessant snow, This northern sky.
Poor tired Tim! It's sad for him He lags the long bright morning through, Ever so tired of nothing to do.
It was a pity thoughts always ran the easiest way, like water in old ditches.
But beauty vanishes; beauty passes; However rare rare it be; And when I crumble, who will remember This lady of the West Country?
We wake and whisper awhile, But, the day gone by, Silence and sleep like fields Of amaranth lie.
Hi! handsome hunting man Fire your little gun. Bang! Now the animal is dead and dumb and done. Nevermore to peep again, creep again, leap again, Eat or sleep or drink again. Oh, what fun!
Thinking is like a fountain. Once it gets going at a certain pressure, well, it almost impossible to turn it off. And, my hat! what odd things come up with the water!("Out Of The Deep")
After all, what is every man? A horde of ghosts – like a Chinese nest of boxes – oaks that were acorns that were oaks. Death lies behind us, not in front – in our ancestors, back and back until...
Science, I am told, is making great strides, experimenting, groping after things which no sane man has ever dreamed of before – without being burned alive for it.
Fancies were all very well for a change, but must be only occasional guests in a world devoted to reality.
When indeed you positively press your face, so to speak, against the crystalline window of your eyes, your mind is apt to become a perfect vacuum.("Out Of The Deep")
Yes, after all, this by now was his customary loneliness: there was little else he desired for the present than the hospitality of the dark.
Poor sleepers should endeavor to compose themselves. Tampering with empty space, stirring up echoes in pitch-black pits of darkness is scarcely sedative.("Out Of The Deep")
Oh, pity the poor gluttonWhose troubles all beginIn struggling on and on to turnWhat's out into what's in.
The time's gone by for sentiment and all that foolery. Mercy's all very well but after all it's justice that clinches the bargain.
Hi! handsome hunting manFire your little gun.Bang! Now the animalis dead and dumb and done.Nevermore to peep again, creep again, leap again, Eat or sleep or drink again. Oh, what fun!
In these days of faith-cures, and hypnotism, and telepathy, and subliminalities – why, the simple old world grows very confusing. But rarely, very rarely novel.
It was to be a day of queer experiences. He had never realized with how many miracles mere everyday life is besieged.
When there hasn't been anything there, nothing can be said to have vanished from the place where it has not been.("Out Of The Deep")
Hi handsome hunting man Fire your little gun Bang! Now the animal Is dead and dumb and done. Nevermore to peep again creep again leap again Eat or sleep or drink again. Oh what fun.
It's a very odd thing As odd as can be That whatever Miss T. eats Turns into Miss T.