Already Broken Quotes & Sayings

The constitution of madness as a mental illness, at the end of the eighteenth century, affords the evidence of a broken dialogue, posits the separation as already effected, and thrusts into oblivion all those stammered, imperfect words without fixed syntax in which the exchange between madness and reason was made. The language of psychiatry, which is a monologue of reason about madness, has been established only on the basis of such a silence. — Michel Foucault

When forces of oppression come to maintain themselves in power against established law, peace is considered already broken. — Che Guevara

She was too proud to eat her share of what little food we had. She told me she had. She swore she did. But every time I complained about being so hungry it hurt, she always offered me a nut or a partially rotted turnip, claiming she had just found two and already ate hers."

Rose sniffled and wiped her eyes again.

"After she was gone, I left my pride in that little hut and begged my way to Medford. I'd do anything. Once you've spent an afternoon chasing a fly around your house for dinner, once you've eaten spiders whole and drooled over worms found while burying your mother with your bare hands, there's nothing beneath you. All I wanted was to live-I'd forgotten everything else. A clod of dirt doesn't have dreams. A bit of broken stone doesn't understand hope. Each morning, all I wanted was to see the next dawn. — Michael J. Sullivan

I won't let him hurt you again." His breath makes me shiver. A strange sensation, when surrounded with such blazing warmth. "I believe you," I tell him, lying. Because I am weak, I turn in his arms. Because I am weak, I press my lips to his, searching for something to make me stop running, to make me forget. We are both weak, it seems. As his hands run over my skin, I feel a different sort of pain. Worse than Maven's machine, deeper than my nerves. It aches like a hollow, like an empty weight. I am a sword, born of lightning, of this fire - and of Maven's. One already betrayed me, and the other might leave at any moment. But I do not fear a broken heart. I do not fear pain. — Victoria Aveyard

It was in the days when France's power was already broken upon the seas, and when more of her three-deckers lay rotting in the Medway than were to be found in Brest harbour. But her frigates and corvettes still scoured the ocean, closely followed ever by those of her rival. At the uttermost ends of the earth these dainty vessels, with sweet names of girls or of flowers, mangled and shattered each other for the honour of the four yards of bunting which flapped from the end of their gaffs. — Arthur Conan Doyle

If you spend twenty years trying to get something and you still don't have it, is it admirable to keep trying? Or did you pass admirable several miles back and it's getting close to straitjacket time?
If you are no closer to having something you've been chasing for twenty years, your data is broken. Either you can't get it, period; you already have it; you don't really need or want it; or it's not real. — Augusten Burroughs

I have used the words and expressions which my experiences from Minsk to Kharkov to the Don suggested to me. But I should have reserved those words and expressions for what came later, even though they are not strong enough. It is a mistake to use intense words without carefully weighing and measuring them, or they will have already been used when one needs them later. It's a mistake, for instance, to used the word frightful to describe a few broken up companions mixed into the ground: but it's a mistake that might be forgiven. — Guy Sajer

I urge North Korea's leaders to reflect on Burma's experience. While the work of reform is ongoing, Burma has already broken out of isolation and opened the door to a far better future for its people. — Thomas E. Donilon

But Kell knew he couldn't break Holland.
Holland was already broken. It showed, not in the scars, but in the way he spoke, the way he held himself in the face of pain, too well acquainted with its shape and scale. He was a man hollowed out long before Osaron, a man with no fear and no hope and nothing to lose. — V.E Schwab

I can't walk away from you. I tried. I can't do it. Even as I was trying, I knew it was stupid. I already knew I wasn't really going anywhere. God, Hope. I care about you. I don't want to walk away." I coil my fingers in between her braids and twists, holding her head to my chest. "I'm broken, too. I think..." I lick my lips and press them into her hair. "I think we can fix each other. — Cheryl McIntyre

I close my eyes and try to hold back the tears, knowing that they'll just make my head hurt worse than it already does, but I can't stop them. Tears come and they come hard, in huge sobs wracking my broken body.
Fate has once again decided to be cruel to us. To give us a small taste of happiness only to yank it out from under us, and there's absolutely nothing I can do about it. — Heather Leigh

The sensation - it's not sorrow, but something deeper - of being broken. Of being crushed so often, and so hatefully, that emotion becomes something you can only wish for. If only you could cry, because then you'd feel something. Instead, you feel nothing. Just ... haze and smoke inside. Like you're already dead. — Brandon Sanderson

Since you went the sun refuses to shine The sky joins me in weeping for your absence All our pleasure is gone with you ... Silence reigns everywhere ... Oh come back! Already the shepherds and their flocks call for you! Come back soon, or it will be winter in May. — Jakob Michael Reinhold Lenz

The things here are stronger
the things that differentiate us from one another are too powerful. The common interest is no longer decisive. It has broken up already and given place to the interest of the individual. Now and then something still will shine through from that other time when we all wore the same rig, but already it is dwindled and dim. These others here are still our comrades and yet our comrades no longer
that is what is so sad. All else went west in the war, but comradeship we did believe in; now only to find that what death could not do, life is achieving; it is driving us asunder. — Erich Maria Remarque

It's dark. You exhale a fist of memory. I love you like weathering wood in a room of empty pianos. When you return to something you love, it's already beyond repair. You wear it broken. — James L. White

Here's what we're gonna do. You're going to give me that doubt. You're just going to hand it to me, and I'm going to hold it for you. I'm going to keep it for as long as you need me to. For the rest of our lives. I will be your safe place. The place you get to be soft. Right here, just like this. When you leave my arms, you leave whole. Because you already are.
You're not broken sweetie, you're human. You're incredibly strong. You're a wonder. You'll return to your team as the warrior you've always been. And you'll know that at any time, you can come to me, and you'll know mt arms are strong enough. Sigh — Jo Leigh

There was a sudden loud commotion outside, and Calvin's eyes widened. "Oh hell. It's them."
"Who?" Sounded like a damn war had broken out. Dex was sure he heard a chair clattering somewhere. He edged away from the door.
"Rafe and Seb...Hobbs's big brothers."
Dex arched an eyebrow at him. "Like, big as in older, right?"
"Big as in older and big."
"How much bigger can they get? Hobbs is already the size of the fuckin' Chrysler building. — Charlie Cochet

He is tired. He is broken. And he doesn't want to fight anymore.
Part of me doesn't either. Part of me wishes I could submit to chains, to captivity and silence. But I have lived that life already, in the mud, in the shadows, in a cell, in a silk dress. I will never submit again. I will never stop fighting.
Neither will Kilorn. Neither will Farley. We will never stop. — Victoria Aveyard

Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that ... The chain reaction of evil - hate begetting hate, wars producing more wars - must be broken, or we shall be plunged into the dark abyss of annihilation. — Martin Luther King Jr.

Lumani had never managed a failed delivery because, in the end, no matter how skilled or how hard they fought back, pressure applied in the right places caused even the strongest men to fracture.
But this one? He'd watched her. Studied her. Observed what maybe even Uncle, the reader of people, had missed. This one was already fractured, and the lines between her broken pieces were not fissures but scar material stronger than whatever had once filled those spaces. — Taylor Stevens

It was the continuance of things that crushed her already broken heart. The gears of the world turning on while she lived with his absence like a black tumor in her chest, the grief so potent she could barely bring herself to breathe. — Blake Crouch

Give me one last time," he begged. "Please, please. I beg you." "I - " She stopped and started again. "I'm afraid, Gabriel. You'll break my heart." "Mine is already broken. — Eloisa James

who have felt broken but keep moving forward. For all the ones who are searching for something beautiful in the world. You already have it within. — Jennifer Probst

A broken heart is a monument to a love that will never die; fulfillment is a monument to a love that is already on its deathbed. — George Jean Nathan

You'll meet a lot of stupid guys. You'll probably get your heart broken more than once. You might reach a point where life seems worthless without him. Maybe you've already hit that point. I can't tell you to to stop crying, because sometimes, crying helps. I can't ask you to smile, because sometimes, it's all you can do to just breathe. I can't make you happy, because that's something you have to do yourself. But I can promise you one thing. I will be there for you. I will listen if you need to rant. I will hug you if you're feeling alone. I will drive you away if you need to escape. I will buy you coffee, goddammit, if you need some. I will be there for you, because you've always been there for me. — Alysha Speer

Moved by insane delusion and reckless self-regard, the German people overturned the foundations on which we all lived and built. But the spokesmen of the French and British peoples have run the risk of completing the ruin, which Germany began, by a Peace which, if it is carried into effect, must impair yet further, when it might have restored, the delicate, complicated organization, already shaken and broken by war, through which alone the European peoples can employ themselves and live. — John Maynard Keynes

What a land. What power these rivers were already yielding, far beyond her sight. Even a map of this country
lines arranged in an arbitrary way on a long rectangular piece of paper
stirs the imagination beyond imagination, she thought, looking at the map, as other lines differently arranged in relation to each other have not the power to stir. Each name on the map says We reached this point, by broken trail and mountains and water; and when we reached it, thus and thus we named it. — Ethel Wilson

I feel small against him, fragile. Like he's realized the secret I've hidden: that I'm breakable, if not already broken. — Katie McGarry

I don't do that kind of negativity. If you put your energy into thinking about how much the fall would hurt, you're already halfway down. — Tana French

Washington, D.C. is what is broken, not the immigration policies. We have good laws. We have people suffer every day because of government's failure to enforce the law and be respectful to the process we have. We have a pathway to citizenship already in place. — Russell Pearce

Her heart had already been broken many times over, and yet she still believed she was destined to meet the man of her life. — Paulo Coelho

Judd's fists were so tight, he was in danger of fracturing his own bones. He understood why Brenna had needed to talk to Dorian. He even understood that the leopard saw Brenna as a young sister, not a potential lover. None of that made any difference. Judd wanted to be the one she turned to when in need.
Ice picks of pain shoved through his skull, dissonance so vicious it nearly shut down his consciousness. The countdown was getting inexorably closer to the end. Uncurling his fingers with sheer force of will, he watched the blood rush back in. Last night had made it clear that he'd already crossed too many lines, broken too many rules. Soon, it would be too late to draw back.
"Thank you, Dorian."
No, he would not pull back. Brenna was his. His to pleasure. And his to comfort ... — Nalini Singh

Staring out to sea, I finally forced myself to stop thinking of her as someone still somewhere, if only in memory, still obscurely alive, breathing, doing, moving, but as a shovelful of ashes already scattered; as a broken link, a biological dead end, an eternal withdrawal from reality, a once complex object that now dwindled, dwindled, left nothing behind except a l like a fallen speck of soot on a blank sheet of paper. — John Fowles

They have no mercy on that here or infanticide. Refuse christian burial. They used to drive a stake of wood through his heart in the grave. As if it wasn't broken already. — James Joyce

Who fixes broken people? Is it only other broken people, ones who've already been ruined? And do we need to be fixed? It was the messiness and hurt in our pasts that drove us, and that same hurt connected us at a subdermal level, the kind of scars written so deeply in your cells that you can't even see them anymore, only recognize them in someone else. — Leah Raeder

In case you haven't noticed, we're already involved, Finch. And in case you haven't noticed, I'm broken too. — Jennifer Niven

If you're not seeing each other anymore because things are so strained, and your only communication is a weekly e-mail, and you're wondering which medium is most appropriate for announcing your desire to break up - guess what, you've already broken up. — Amber Heard

Looking back, I wonder if mom saw it in my eyes: the storm clouds gathering, the dry crackle of electricity in the air. But it was already too late. No warning sirens were going to save me. I guess you never really know the danger, not until you're the one left, huddled on the ground, surrounded by the pieces of your broken heart. — Melody Grace

Parade my trouble in front of you guys? Make you realize that my heart is broken ... that as long as I live I'll have chains dragging me down to the oceans of sad tears that my feet are wet in already. — Jack Kerouac

If any of this breaks your heart, it was probably already a little broken to begin with. — Chris Heath

The first thing that got to me was seeing David Bowie on a children's TV show, but Bowie was way beyond my aspirations. The Buzzcocks' Spiral Scratch came out in 1977 and it had a breakdown of the recording costs, then you saw Pete Shelley playing a broken guitar from Woolworths. We already had an idea of the kind of music we wanted to do, but punk showed us a way to do it. — Edwyn Collins

I thought that Uncle Julian was probably really very happy, with both Constance and Aunt Dorothy to take care of him, and I told myself that long thin things would remind me to be kinder to Uncle Julian; this was to be a day of long thin things, since there had already been a hair in my toothbrush, and a fragment of a string was caught on the side of my chair and I could see a splinter broken off the back step. — Shirley Jackson

Girls like me don't get the fairytales.
Because the white knights never want the dirty, damaged girls.
They know there's nothing left of us that's salvageable...nothing left of us that hasn't already been taken and destroyed.
And saving us? Will only ruin them. — Ashley Jade

She could already feel small waves of her juices fall from her newly-broken pussy, making a damp spot under her ass. — Lola Newmar

If the number of religious converts who converted during a season of intense suffering is high, then does that mean that the number of religious abstainers who abstained because their life was already satisfying is correspondingly low? If so, does this argue for or against religion's relevance in the world? If theistic religion is attractive, useful, and remedial only for those broken people in the most dismal of needful situations, then is this truly the work of a God or is it just the human psyche gravitating toward a comforting solution? — Michael Vito Tosto

Once I figured out what I was going to do with my life, I was definitely going to get a dog. Maybe I'd get a rescue. I liked the idea of an older dog that was already broken in and just needed a loving home. The irony was, that wasn't too different from how I was feeling about myself. — Dorothea Benton Frank

I once believed in faith - that if I patiently waited, something good will happen. But at the end of the chapter, I found myself devastated. Years have gone by and I'm back at chapter one again. I've tried several times already and ended up in the same ending. It was always a different title, same story; different choices made but ending up with the same plot and finale. I grew tired of this never ending maze, wandering endlessly and finally giving up faith. — Raphael Paolo Augustine Camanag

Learn from someone who has already been up there: no matter how unique you feel, there is always someone who has had the same dream before you and ended up leaving marks that can make your journey easier; places to hang the rope, trails, broken branches to make the walking easier. The climb is yours, so is the responsibility, but don't forget that the experience of others can help a lot. — Paulo Coelho

I broke his Bible box into bits and lit a fire and laid his body beside it and felt where the bones were broken in his back and chest and legs and licked the blood from his mouth and tried to give him my breath and I would have given him one of my legs and one of my arms and one of my kidneys and half of my liver and four pints of my blood and all easy for I had already given him my heart. — Jeanette Winterson

[That wall] might be breached sometime in the future, but for now the only real conversation between them was the roots that had already grown low and deep, under the wall, where they could not be broken.
The most terrible thing, though, was the fear that the wall could never be breached, that in his heart Alai was glad of the separation, and was ready to be Ender's enemy. For now that they could not be together, they must be infinitely apart, and what had been sure and unshakable was now fragile and insubstantial; from the moment we are not together, Alai is a stranger, for he has a life now that will be no part of mine, and that means that when I see him we will not know each other. — Orson Scott Card

If [Harry Potter] knew what he means to us, to the lowly, the enslaved, we dregs of the magical world! Dobby remembers how i was when He-Who-Must-No-Be-Named was at the height of his powers, sir! We house-elves were treated like vermin, sir! Of course, Dobby is still treated like that, sir, but mostly, sir, life has improved for my kind since you triumphed over He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. Harry Potter survived, and the Dark Lord's power was broken, and it was a new dawn, ir, and Harry Pote shone like a beacon of hope for those of us who thought the dark days would never end, sir. . . .And now, at Hogwarts, terrible things are to happen, are perhaps happening already, and Dobby cannot let Harry Potter stay here now that history is to repeat itself, now that the Chamber of Secrets is open once more - — J.K. Rowling

But this is what I also thought as I watched the waves of trash crash over the cracked and broken road: that for the rest of us, Arizona would always be one of our places now. It would be on the list of things we own in our heads. Don't we all have this list? It's like, everything that secretly belongs to us - a favorite color, or springtime, or a house we don't live in anymore. We all gained Arizona by coming here, but for the people who already lived here, we could only take something away. — Adam Rex

He was a detective, but he didn't detect anything. It fell into his lap, already broken,
every time. — Jodi Picoult

This wasn't in the histories", Raistlin murmured to himself, staring down at the little wretched bodies, his brow furrowed. His eyes flashed. "Perhaps", he breathed, "this means time has already been altered?"
For long moments he sat there, pondering. Then suddenly he understood.
None saw Raistlin's face, hidden as it was by his hood, or they would have noted a swift, sudden spasm of sorrow and anger pass across it.
"No," he said to himself bitterly, "the pitiful sacrifice of these poor creatures was left out of the histories not because it did not happen. It was left out simply because-"
He paused, staring grimly down at the small, broken bodies. "No one cared ... — Tracy Hickman

But be careful; sand is already broken but glass breaks. The shoes are for dancing, not running away. — Francesca Lia Block

You didn't break me. You can't break something that was already broken. — E.K. Blair

Contrary to everything you've heard, the only options are not: Amnesty or deporting 11 million people. There's also the option of letting them stay in the shadows - or the same thing we've been doing for the last thirty years. Americans are under no moral obligation to grant amnesty to people who have broken our laws. "The moral thing to do" is usually defined as "following the law." The fact that Democrats want 30 million new voters is not a good enough reason to ignore the law and screw over American workers, as well as legal immigrants already here. How about Republicans try this: We're not giving you anything - not even half - because there's no reason to do so. — Ann Coulter

I have not been one who believed in the global warming. But I tell you, they are making a convert out of me as these blistering summers. They have broken heat records in a number of cities already this year and broken all-time records and it is getting hotter and the ice caps are melting and there is a build up of carbon dioxide in the air. We really need to address the burning of fossil fuels. — Pat Robertson

[ ... ]one should act as if the things he cherished the most were already lost or broken. — H.J. Brues

When you've already broken the rules of the universe, fear becomes only a feeling of disconnection, distant. — Jonas Samuelle

Because it was clear to me now that I'd already broken something. — Morgan Matson

Sure, each night we staggered home, unfired, unglazed, already broken without knowing it. But at least we were trying. — Miguel Syjuco

The next day he passed Alai in the corridor, and they greeted each other, touched hands, talked, but they both knew that there was a wall there now.

It might be breached, that wall, sometime in the future, but for now the only real conversation between them was the roots that had already grown low and deep, under the wall, where they could not be broken. — Orson Scott Card

What are you looking at, Matthias?" The low thrum of her voice vibrated straight through him.
He kept his eyes on the ceiling, whispering softly. "Nothing."
"Matthias, are you praying?"
"Possibly."
"For restraint?" she said sweetly.
"You really are a witch."
"I'm not proper, Matthias."
"I am aware of this." Miserably, keenly, hungrily aware.
"And I'm sorry to inform you, but you're not proper either."
His gaze dropped to her now. "I - "
"How many rules have you broken since you met me? How many laws? They won't be the last. Nothing about us will ever be proper," she said. She tilted her face up to his. So close now it was as if they were already touching. "Not the way we met. Not the life we lead. And not the way we kiss. — Leigh Bardugo

Once a person falls in the fields of love, all the rules are already broken; the lover becomes open an exalted in ways that transcend the local issues as well as the commonly held beliefs. Love, like genuine devotion, will find a way. Where duty becomes replaced with love, a greater and deeper faith will blossom forth. — Michael Meade

Whoever has the mind to fight has broken his connection with the universe. If you try to dominate people you are already defeated. We study how to resolve conflict, not how to start it. — Daniel Goleman

I told you once I would never let you fall, Aesa ... And you're falling. You just don't see it.'
'No, you're wrong,' I snapped ... 'I've already fallen. You just don't want to see it. — Amber Lynn Natusch

But I've already broken the glass; I've given the green away; I've made my choice. — Ally Condie

You can't break what's broken already. — LeAnn Rimes

I'm in a weird-ass mood today, Doc. Wired up, mind all over the place, looking for answers, reasons something solid to cling to, something real, but just when I think I've got it figured out and neatly filed under fixed instead of fucked, turns out I'm still shattered, scattered, and battered. But you probably already knew that, didn't you? ... You might not be able to help me. That makes me sad, but not for me. It makes me sad for you. It must be frustrating for a shrink to have a patient who's beyond fixing. That first shrink I saw when I got back to Clayton Falls told me no one is a lost cause, but I think that's bullshit. I think people can be so crushed, so broken, that they'll never be anything more than a fragment of a whole person. (129) — Chevy Stevens

Crouching, Ceony felt the edge of the giant crack. None of it came away in her fingers, even when she scratched it with her nails. The rock stayed hard and firm. Another handful of sand dropped to the canyon floor, seeming to make no difference in the canyon's depth whatsoever. But Ceony knew that enough handfuls would fill it, eventually. After all, it took time to mend one's heart. Enough time could heal a heart as broken as this one. It was half-healed already. — Charlie N. Holmberg

You can't break something that's already broken. There's nothing left inside of me to kill. — Yolanda Olson

History is an omlette. THe eggs are already broken. — Orson Scott Card

It's okay,' he says, eyes closed. He's not even awake. 'It's okay.'
He says these words even in his sleep, like he has said them so often that it's his mouth's default sentiment. All this pain in his life, all this care he doles out to everyone else. And yet he still cracks his broken heart open even wider - wide enough to fit me, too. I wonder how much this must hurt him, the toll it just take to give more of himself to me when he already has so little left to give.
In slumber, his arm stays wrapped around me, encasing me for safekeeping. He would protect me even in his unconscious state, as we lie beneath my ceiling's half-painted sky.
This thought is enough to swell my heart - to swell, and to break. — Emery Lord

When she tried to put the nozzle back onto the pump, it kept falling off because her hands were shaking. She didn't feel anything at all, but she couldn't get her hands to stop shaking. By the time she looked up, Troy was already gone. He had gotten into his car (white sedan, broken taillight) and pulled away without looking at her once. She forced herself to stand very still and breathe slowly until her hands stopped shaking. Once they were steady, she put the nozzle back onto the pump, deliberately opened her car door, and drove away at a reasonable speed. The entire time she felt fine. — Joseph Fink

In front of him was an enemy who was trying to kill him: in front of him, also, was a human creature, in pain and perhaps with a broken bone. Already — George Orwell

When your mom noticed me watching a Buffy rerun on the little TV on the doorman desk one slow night on the job, she admitted that watching Buffy was her shared solace with you after your dad left. She told me how you cry and cry for Buffy. You cry when Angel shows up to be Buffy's prom date even though they'd already recognized the futility of their true love and broken up. You cry when Buffy's mom is taken away by natural instead of supernatural causes. You cry when seasons six and seven really don't reflect the quality of seasons one through five except for the musical episode. — Rachel Cohn

Love, a promise delivered already broken. — Lisa Unger

There are ways in, journeys to the center of life, through time; through air, matter, dream and thought. The ways are not always mapped or charted, but sometimes being lost, if there is such a thing, is the sweetest place to be. And always, in this search, a person might find that she is already there, at the center of the world. It may be a broken world, but it is glorious nonetheless. — Linda Hogan

It was funny actually because that was still during the time we were dating. He would get all these calls because supposedly before we broke up, we had already broken up in the trades, in the rags or whatever. — Rosario Dawson

Why did Africa let Europe cart away millions of Africa's souls from the continent to the four corners of the wind? How could Europe lord it over a continent ten times its size? Why does needy Africa continue to let its wealth meet the needs of those outside its borders and then follow behind with hands outstretched for a loan of the very wealth it let go? How did we arrive at this, that the best leader is the one that knows how to beg for a share of what he has already given away at the price of a broken tool? Where is the future of Africa? — Ngugi Wa Thiong'o

"I promised him something," I answer softly. I don't want to admit what he already knows. That there's more going on between me and Morpheus than I ever let on.
"A promise, huh? How romantic." His words slash like knives. He's become a master at wielding more than a brush since he's been here. "So that's why you've crashed our little paradise. To keep your promise to Morpheus."
I wince. "No. I came to rescue you both. You have every right not to believe me ... to be mad at me. I know this has been hell. This place ... it's broken you."
"I was broken before that." His tortured expression delivers the allegation - thanks to you and bug-rot - better than his voice ever could. — A.G. Howard

Fire supposed he needed to be there in order to give rousing speeches and lead the charge into the fray, or whatever is was commanders did in wartime. She resented his competence at something so tragic and senseless. She wished he, or somebody, would throw down his sword and say, 'Enough! This is a silly way to decide who's in charge!' And it seemed to her, as the beds in the healing room filled and emptied and filled, that these battles didn't leave much to be in charge of. The kingdom was already broken, and this war was tearing the broken pieces smaller. — Kristin Cashore

Curious the small and lesser fates that join to lead a man to this. The thousand brawls and stoven jaws, the clubbings and the broken bottles and the little knives that come from nowhere. For him perhaps it all was done in silence, or how would it sound, the shot that fired the bullet that lay already in his brain? These small enigmas of time and space and death. — Cormac McCarthy

And when that happens, I know it. A message saying so merely confirms a piece of news some secret vein had already received, severing from me an irreplaceable part of myself, letting it loose like a kite on a broken string. That is why, walking across a school campus on this particular December morning, I keep searching the sky. As if I expected to see, rather like hearts, a lost pair of kites hurrying towards heaven. — Truman Capote

The fallen hazel-nuts, Stripped late of their green sheaths, The grapes, red-purple, Their berries Dripping with wine, Pomegranates already broken, And shrunken fig, And quinces untouched, I bring thee as offering. — Hilda Doolittle

Americans are under no moral obligation to grant amnesty to people who have broken our laws. "The moral thing to do" is usually defined as "following the law." The fact that Democrats want 30 million new voters is not a good enough reason to ignore the law and screw over American workers, as well as legal immigrants already here. — Ann Coulter

There was no way that these guys were going to let a bleeding, barefoot woman simply wander off alone into the streets. Two of them were already running toward her with hands reaching out in a manner that, in normal circumstances, would have seemed just plain ungentlemanly. What would have been designated, in a Western office, as a hostile environment was soon in full swing as numerous rough strong hands were all over her, easing her to a comfortable perch on a chair that was produced as if by magic, feeling through her hair to find bumps and lacerations. Three different first aid kits were broken open at her feet; older and wiser men began to lodge objections at the profligate use of supplies, darkly suggesting that it was all because she was a pretty girl. A particularly dashing young man skidded up to her on his knees (he was wearing hard-shell knee pads) and, in an attitude recalling the prince on the final page of Cinderella, fit a pair of used flip-flops onto her feet. — Neal Stephenson

They used to drive a stake of wood through his heart in the grave. As if it wasn't broken already. Yet sometimes they repent too late.
Ulysses — James Joyce

Torquil has already broken his fast. Ye will find him in the stable when ye're erady to begin his lessons."
"Already? I'm surprised he's awake. It's still rather early."
"Aye, well, we Highlanders donna lie in bed all day when there is work to be done. — Victoria Roberts

In truth, I'm not my body, my race, religion, or other beliefs, and neither is anyone else. The real self is infinite and much more powerful-a complete and whole entity that isn't broken or damaged in any way. The infinite me already contains all the resources I need to navigate through life, because I'm One with Universal energy. In fact, I am Universal energy. — Anita Moorjani

Attraction

The whites of his eyes
pull me like moons.
He smiles. I believe
his face. Already
my body slips down in the chair:

I recline on my side,
offering peeled grapes.
I can taste his tongue
in my mouth
whenever he speaks.

I suspect he lies.
But my body oils itself loose.
When he gets up to fix a drink
my legs like derricks
hoist me off the seat.
I am thirsty, it seams.

Already I see the seduction
far off in the distance
like a large tree
dwarfed by a rise
in the road.

I put away objections
as quietly as quilts.
Already I explain to myself
how marriages are broken--
accidentally, like arms or legs. — Enid Shomer

A bum woke up in the gutter right beside where I stood looking across the street at this place. He felt in the waist of his pants and came up with a pint bottle, half full. He tipped it up and it gurgled steadily until he'd emptied it all down into him. I was only twenty-four or -five but I already knew from experience how it tasted. And people who've kissed the feet of Christ know how it tasted. I saw everything there in the gutter
the terror and the promise. Later I spent the morning in the smoky Day Labor Division with better than a hundred men who'd learned how not to move, learned how to stay beautifully still and let their lives hurt them, white men with gray faces and black men with yellow eyes. I worked the rest of the week in a factory without ever comprehending exactly what was manufactured there, and at night I'd get drunk and shut myself in a phone booth and call the woman in Minnesota who'd broken my heart. — Denis Johnson

Don't do that," he says. "Don't ask me questions you already know the answers to. Twice I've laid myself bare to you and all it's gotten me was a bullet wound and a broken heart. Don't torture me," he says, meeting my eyes again.
"It's a cruel thing to do, even to someone like me. — Tahereh Mafi

I'm not leaving you. We still have a chance."
"How?"
Kayson's voice echoes his hopelessness. He's already given up.
"Hey, as long as we are still breathing, we still have a chance. If you quit, then you're quitting on me too. — Brandy Nacole

There is no greater despair, than to tread with care upon ice that is already broken — Johnathan Jena

It is not difficult to be a revolutionary when revolution has already broken out and is in spate, when all people are joining the revolution just because they are carried away, because it is the vogue, and sometimes even from careerist motives. It is far more difficult
and far more precious
to be a revolutionary when the conditions for direct, open, really mass and really revolutionary struggle do not yet exist. — Vladimir Lenin

I always tell our community that we should attract the people Jesus attracted and frustrate the people Jesus frustrated. It's certainly never our goal to frustrate, but it is worth noting that the people who were constantly agitated were the self-righteous, religious elite, the rich, and the powerful. But the people who were fascinated by him, by his love and grace, were folks who were already wounded and ostracized - folks who didn't have much to lose, who already knew full well that they were broken and needed a Savior. — Shane Claiborne

A man once jumped from the top floor of a burning house in which many members of his family had already perished. He managed to save his life; but as he was falling he hit a person standing down below and broke that person's legs and arms. The jumping man had no choice; yet to the man with the broken limbs he was the cause of his misfortune. If both behaved rationally, they would not become enemies. — Isaac Deutscher

I know this glass is already broken, so I enjoy it incredibly. — Ajahn Chah