Am Dead Quotes & Sayings

As far as i am concerned, i am in the knowledge that death can never extinguish the torch which i have lit in Ghana and Africa. Long after i am dead and gone, the light will continue to burn and be borne aloft, giving light and guidance to all people — Kwame Nkrumah

Loneliness

It's Hell for us to draw the fetters
Of life in alienation, stiff.
All people prefer to share gladness,
And nobody - to share grief.

As a king of air, I'm lone here,
The pain lives in my heart, so grim,
And I can see that, to the fear
Of fate, years pass me by like dreams;

And comes again with, touched by gold,
The same dream, gloomy one and old.
I see a coffin, black and sole,
It waits: why to detain the world?

There will be not a sad reflection,
There will be (I am betting on)
Much more gaily celebration
When I am dead, than - born. — Mikhail Lermontov

God is dead and I am his replacement. — J.D. Robb

I thought you were dead," Bera breathed.
Cadsuane sniffed irritably. "I am growing tired of hearing that. The next imbecile I hear it from is going to yelp for a week. — Robert Jordan

I'm sorry he's dead but I am happier, by far, that he lived. — Walter Mosley

I really am happy for Kiley. And for you and every other happily married lady. Except for that I'm not happy for you. I kind of want you all to drop dead. — Rainbow Rowell

They always think one
commits suicide for a reason. But it is quite possible to commit suicide for two reasons. No, that never occurs to them. So what is the good of dying
intentionally, of sacrificing yourself to the idea you want people to have of you? Once you are dead, they will take advantage of it to attribute idiotic or
vulgar motives to your action. Martyrs,cherami, must choose between being forgotten, mocked, or made use of. As for being understood
never! Besides,
let us not beat about the bush; I love life
that is my real weakness. I love it so much that I am incapable of imagining what is not life. Such avidity has
something plebeian about it, don't you think? — Albert Camus

The guide showed us a coffee-colored piece of sculpture which he said was considered to have come from the hand of Phidias, since it was not possible that any other artist, of any epoch, could have copied nature with such faultless accuracy. The figure was that of a man without a skin; with every vein, artery, muscle, every fibre and tendon and tissue of the human frame, represented in detail. It looked natural, because somehow it looked as if it were in pain. A skinned man would be likely to look that way, unless his attention were occupied with some other matter. It was a hideous thing, and yet there was a fascination about it some where. I am sorry I saw it, because I shall always see it, now. I shall dream of it, sometimes. I shall dream that it is resting its corded arms on the bed's head and looking down on me with its dead eyes; I shall dream that it is stretched between the sheets with me and touching me with its exposed muscles and its stringy cold legs. — Mark Twain

Ironic, isn't it?"
"What?"
"Here I am, trying to survive WITH you, when before my whole plan was just trying to SURVIVE YOU."
"I'm not sure what that means. And I wish you'd stop talking in puzzles and just say normal things, because I've had a big shock. This morning I was looking at a YouTube video of a hamster eating a tiny burrito and now I'm floating on this stupid raft and my friends are dead so just keep that in mind. — Kathy Hepinstall

Did anybody ever come back from the dead any single one of the millions who got killed did any one of them ever come back and say by god i'm glad i'm dead because death is always better than dishonor? did they say i'm glad i died to make the world safe for democracy? did they say i like death better than losing liberty? did any of them ever say it's good to think i got my guts blown out for the honor of my country? did any of them ever say look at me i'm dead but i died for decency and that's better than being alive? did any of them ever say here i am i've been rotting for two years in a foreign grave but it's wonderful to die for your native land? did any of them say hurray i died for womanhood and i'm happy see how i sing even though my mouth is choked with worms? — Dalton Trumbo

The darkness of the room is pulsing with gunfire, and by our standards we are grossly outnumbered - there are only three of us to every one of them - but something is tipping things in our favor. Our manic speed is uncharacteristic of the Dead, and our prey are not prepared for it. Is this all coming from me? Creatures without desire usually don't move quickly, but they're following my lead, and I am an angry whirlwind. — Isaac Marion

The Spirit continued to stir and declare, You cannot be afraid to face the wolf at the door. Don't let the fear paralyze you. When you get in fear and get paralyzed, sometimes somebody has to come and get you. Whatever is swarming around you that thinks you are dead. you tell it that you are not dead! Tell the vultures you are not dead and that they have to move on! Say, 'Vultures, I am not the meal you thought I was going to be! — Chuck Pierce

I have no idea how to do that. What am I supposed to do? Say 'Go, arise ye dead fucks to torment the ones who killed you'? — Rhiannon Frater

There isn't a name for my situation. Firstly because I decided to kill myself. And then because of this idea:
I don't have to do it immediately.
Whoosh, through a little door. It's a limbo.
I need never answer the phone again or pay a bill. My credit score no longer matters. Fears and compulsions don't matter. Socks don't matter. Because I'll be dead. And who am I to die? A microwave chef. A writer of pamphlets. A product of our time. A failed student. A faulty man. A bad poet. An activist in two minds. A drinker of chocolate milk, and when there's no chocolate, of strawberry and sometimes banana. — D.B.C. Pierre

I am grateful that my childhood was spent in a spot where there were many trees, trees of personality, planted and tended by hands long dead, bound up with everything of joy or sorrow that visited our lives. When I have "lived with" a tree for many years it seems to me like a beloved human companion. — L.M. Montgomery

I myself should also be dead already, but I am still here. — Albert Einstein

I want no thunder or lightning to remind me of my God, nor am I as apt to bethink on most of all His goodness in trouble and tribulations as on a calm, solemn, quiet day in a forest, when His voice is heard in the creaking of a dead branch or in the song of a bird, as much in my ears at least as it is ever heard in uproar and gales. — James Fenimore Cooper

I am ashamed to think how easily we capitulate to badges and names, to large societies and dead institutions. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

You are the advocate of the dead.' The old man nodded. 'I am. People talk about being fair to this one and that one, but nobody I ever heard talks about doing right by them. We take everything they had, which is all right. And spit, most often, on their opinions, which I suppose is all right too. But we ought to remember now and then how much of what we have we got from them. I figure while I'm still here I ought to put a word in for them. — Gene Wolfe

Shall I tell you what happened?' I asked. 'I died, and died without a sword in my hand, so I was sent to Hel and heard her dark cockerels crowing! They announced my coming, Leiknir, and the Corpse-Ripper came for me.' I took a pace towards him and he stepped back. 'The Corpse-Ripper, Leiknir, all rotted flesh peeling from his yellow bones and his eyes like fire and his teeth like horns and his claws like gelding knives. And there was a bone on the floor, a thigh bone, and I picked it up and I ripped it to a point with my own teeth and then I slew him.' I hefted Serpent-Breath. 'I am the dead, Leiknir, come to collect the living. Now kick your swords, spears, shields and helmets towards the door. — Bernard Cornwell

Cicero is dead! Cicero is born! The laughter has filled me, filled me so very completely. I am the laughter. I am the jester. The soul that has served as my constant companion for so long has breached the veil of the Void finally and forever. It is now in me. It is me. The world has seen the last of Cicero the man. Behold Cicero, Fool of Hearts - laughter incarnate! — Marcus Tullius Cicero

I really am tired of all the Clinton Democrats running around getting all-sanctimonious over Iraq. It was them who killed 1.5 to 2.2 million Iraqis through sanctions. Sanctions that Madeline Albright, their illustrious Secretary of State, when confronted with the fact of 500,000 dead Iraqi children, said it was a price she was willing to pay. — Scott Ritter

I am alone even when I'm in the middle of a crowd.
I am sad even when I'm laughing hysterically.
I am dead even when I'm alive. And isn't that the worst kind? — Amelia Mysko

Why do you care so badly that I live, if while alive, I am already dead? — Monica Sanz

Well, I guess I am about the livest dead man you ever saw; although I was once asked to accept a coffin. — Dan Rice

I am sad for the dead and I am sad for the living
but not for my 5 cats — Charles Bukowski

Everybody who is alive is a survivor, and everybody who is dead isn't," I said."So everybody alive must have the Survivor's Syndrome. It's that or death. I am so damn sick of people telling me proudly that they are survivors! — Kurt Vonnegut

I sympathize with the zombies and am not even sure they are villains. To me they are this earth-changing thing. God or the devil changed the rules, and dead people are not staying dead. — George A. Romero

When I Am Dead, My Dearest
When I am dead, my dearest,
Sing no sad songs for me;
Plant thou no roses at my head,
Nor shady cypress-tree:
Be the green grass above me
With showers and dewdrops wet;
And if thou wilt, remember,
And if thou wilt, forget.
I shall not see the shadows,
I shall not feel the rain;
I shall not hear the nightingale
Sing on, as if in pain:
And dreaming through the twilight
That doth not rise nor set,
Haply I may remember,
And haply may forget. — Christina Rossetti

She was in big trouble now.
"You stupid man," she said to the body on the floor. "Why did you have to lunge at me like that? Why couldn't you have left well enough alone? I told your father I wasn't going to marry you. I told him I wouldn't marry you if you were the last idiot in Britain."
She nearly stamped her foot in frustration. Why was it her words never came out quite the way she
intended them to?
"What I meant to say was that you are an idiot," she said to Percy, who, not
surprisingly, didn't respond, "and that I wouldn't marry you if you were the last man in Britain, and- Oh, blast. What am I doing talking to you, anyway? You're quite dead. — Julia Quinn

Angelic Sookie, vision of love and beauty, I am prostrate that the wicked evil maenad violated your smooth and voluptuous body, in an attempt to deliver a message to me. -Eric — Charlaine Harris

Because she is dead!" She screamed the last word so loudly it burned in her throat. "Because she is dead, and I am left with my worthless life! — Sarah J. Maas

But I am designed to last forever," said the expendable, "if not interfered with."
"Isn't that nice? Expendable yet eternal. You'll be able to go back and observe any part of human history that you wish. Watch the pyramids being unbuilt. See the ice ages go and come in reverse. Watch the de-extinction of the dinosaurs as a meteor leaps out of the Gulf of Mexico."
"I will have no useful task. I will not be able to help the human race in any way. My existence will have no meaning after you are dead."
"Now you know how humans feel all the time. — Orson Scott Card

Are you the one named Alyse? For he calls that name in his sleep."
"No, that is his beloved sister, dead these past three years." The depth of my disappointment that it is not my name he calls takes me completely by surprise.
"Ah," the old nun says sympathetically, as if she somehow knows what I am feeling. "Then perhaps you are Sybella. That is the name he asks for when he is awake. — R.L. LaFevers

When Clark was asked about liberation from Moosburg he said, "It was a very emotional period, especially for a few of us who had been very old prisoners. We were closely bonded, so some of most wonderful friends I've ever had came out of those camps. We stayed together and helped each other. None of us feel it was a total dead loss, the experience I mean. A lot of us learned a lot about ourselves, about our limits, and we certainly learned how to get along with other people in difficult circumstances, which is a very important lesson. So I am sure that there are many people who don't share that view. But they've disappeared. They don't come to reunions. You never hear from them. I just hope they are happy too. But I doubt whether they're as happy as we are." What — Donald E. Phillips

Remember my words, I may again return,
I love you, I depart from materials,
I am as one disembodied, triumphant, dead. — Walt Whitman

I am very happy, Jane; and when you hear that I am dead, you must be sure and not grieve: there is nothing to grieve about. We all must die one day, and the illness which is removing me is not painful; it is gentle and gradual: my mind is at rest. I leave no one to regret me much: I have only a father; and he is lately married, and will not miss me. By dying young, I shall escape great sufferings. I had not qualities or talents to make my way very well in the world: I should have been continually at fault. — Charlotte Bronte

When I am dead
I say it that way because from the things I know, I do not expect to live long enough to read this book in its finished form
I want you to just watch and see if I'm not right in what I say: that the white man, in his press, is going to identify me with "hate". He will make use of me dead, as he has made use of me alive, as a convenient symbol, of "hatred"
and that will help him escape facing the truth that all I have been doing is holding up a mirror to reflect, to show, the history of unspeakable crimes that his race has committed against my race. — Malcolm X

to speak to anyone on her way, and by no means to speak to any Free State soldier, for if she does, we will be killed here. They will kill us as easily as they killed Willie on the mountain, that's for sure. I would say to you, we will kill you if she speaks, but I am not sure if we would.' My father looked at him surprised. And it seemed so honest and polite a thing to say, I resolved to do as he asked, and speak to no one. 'And anyhow, we have no bullets, which is why we stayed in the heather, like hares, and didn't stir. I would we had stirred, lads,' said the brother of the dead man, 'and risen up, and thrun ourselves at them, because this is no way to stand in the world, with Willie dead, and us living.' And — Sebastian Barry

Had our hearts really become so numb that we needed dead bodies in order to feel the beat of compassion in our chests? Who am I if I need to be shocked back into my best self? — Jason Reynolds

THEN

When I am dead, even then,
I will still love you, I will wait in these poems,
When I am dead, even then
I am still listening to you.
I will still be making poems for you
out of silence;
silence will be falling into that silence,
it is building music. — Muriel Rukeyser

When God created the heavens and the earth, darkness was upon the face of the deep. When the Eternal Son became flesh, He was carried for a time in the darkness of the sweet virgin's womb. When He died for the life of the world, it was in the darkness, seen by no one at the last. When He arose from the dead, it was ,'very early in the morning." No one saw Him rise. It is as if God were saying, "What I am is all that need matter to you, for there lie your hope and your peace. I will do what I will do, and it will all come to light at last, but how I do it is My secret. Trust Me, and be not afraid. — A.W. Tozer

Now here is exactly the point, I am afraid, where multitudes of English people fail, and are in imminent danger of being lost for ever. They know that there is no forgiveness of sin excepting in Christ Jesus. They can tell you that there is no Saviour for sinners, no Redeemer, no Mediator, excepting Him who was born of the Virgin Mary, and was crucified under Pontius Pilate, dead, and buried. But here they stop, and get no further! They never come to the point of actually laying hold on Christ by faith, and becoming one with Christ and Christ in them. They can say, He is a Saviour, but not 'my Saviour,' - a Redeemer, but not 'my Redeemer,' - a Priest, but not 'my Priest,' - an Advocate, but not 'my Advocate:' and so they live and die unforgiven! No wonder that Martin Luther said, Many are lost because they cannot use possessive pronouns. — J.C. Ryle

Just remember, I am not going anywhere," he said, still watching her lips. "And if you ever try to hide from me, I will not believe you are dead. I will find you. Count on it. — Diana Pharaoh Francis

There was no hope for him this time: it was the third stroke. Night after night I had passed the house (it was vacation time) and studied the lighted square of window: and night after night I had found it lighted in the same way, faintly and evenly. If he was dead, I thought, I would see the reflection of candles on the darkened blind, for I knew that two candles must be set at the head of a corpse. He had often said to me: I am not long for this world and I had thought his words idle. Now I knew they were true. Every night as I gazed up at the window I said softly to myself the word paralysis. It had always sounded strangely in my ears, like the word gnomon in the Euclid and the word simony in the Catechism. But now it sounded to me like the name of some maleficent and sinful being. It filled me with fear, and yet I longed to be nearer to it and to look upon its deadly work. — James Joyce

Shadows of Shadows passing... It is now 1831... and as always, I am absorbed with a delicate thought. It is how poetry has indefinite sensations to which end, music is an essential, since the comprehension of sweet sound is our most indefinite conception. Music, when combined with a pleasurable idea, is poetry. Music without the idea is simply music. Without music or an intriguing idea, color becomes pallour, man becomes carcass, home becomes catacomb, and the dead are but for a moment motionless. — Edgar Allan Poe

We project our feelings onto other people, but there is always a dynamic that creates those inventions. The fantasies are made between people, and the ideas about those people live inside us ... And, even after they die, they are still there. I am made of the dead. — Siri Hustvedt

Am I better off living through death,
Or dying an invisible ghost?
Am I better off speaking in silence,
Or screaming so loud no one will hear?
I fake a smile,
But it's killed by you,
I fake a soul,
But that dies, too.
So I fake my life,
What else can I do?
Take me in, spit me out,
And I scream and scream and shout,
But you can't hear my pain,
My blood's nothing but a worthless stain.
I fake a smile,
But it's killed by you.
I fake a soul,
But that dies, too.
So I fake my life,
What else can I do?
And if one day I wake up gone,
Maybe people will see through,
But until then the lies will rule.
And sometimes I think
I'm better off dead,
But then I realize
I already am. — Olivia Rivers

Although I am good at enumerating my father's flaws, it's hard for me to sustain much anger at him. I expect this is partly because he's dead, and partly because the bar is lower for fathers than it is for mothers. — Alison Bechdel

When I am dead, no pageant train shall waste their sorrows at my bier. Nor worthless pomp of homage vain stain it with hypocritic tear. — Edward Everett

I am disappointed with America. And there can be no great disappointment where there is not great love. I am disappointed with our failure to deal positively and forthrightly with the triple
evils of racism, economic exploitation, and militarism. We are presently moving down a dead-end road that can lead to national disaster. America has strayed to the far country of racism and militarism. — Martin Luther

The monument I want after I am dead is a monument with two legs going around the world-a saved sinner telling about the salvation of Jesus Christ. — Dwight L. Moody

So, as we have our tea, I propose not only to operate on your heart so as to change your will, but also on your eyes so as to change your outlook. But wait a minute. No, I do not propose to operate at all. I myself cannot do anything of the sort. I am just mildly suggesting that you are perhaps dead, and perhaps blind, leaving you to think the matter over for yourself. If an operation is to be performed it must be performed by God Himself. — Cornelius Van Til

I am the most tired woman in the world. I am tired when I get up. Life requires an effort I cannot make. Please give me that heavy book. I need to put something heavy like that on top of my head. I have to place my feet under the pillows always, so as to be able to stay on earth. Otherwise I feel myself going away, going away at a tremendous speed, on account of my lightness. I know that I am dead. As soon as I utter a phrase my sincerity dies, becomes a lie whose coldness chills me. Don't say anything, because I see that you understand me, and I am afraid of your understanding. I have such a fear of finding another like myself, and such a desire to find one! I am so utterly lonely, but I also have such a fear that my isolation be broken through, and I no longer be the head and ruler of my universe. I am in great terror of your understanding by which you penetrate into my world; and then I stand revealed and I have to share my kingdom with you. — Anais Nin

One Monday, just for sport, Charlie grabbed an eggplant that a spectacularly wizened granny was going for, but instead of twisting it out of his hand with some mystic kung fu move as he expected, she looked him in the eye and shook her head - just a jog, barely perceptible really - it might have been a tic, but it was the most eloquent of gestures. Charlie read it as saying: O White Devil, you do not want to purloin that purple fruit, for I have four thousand years of ancestors and civilization on you; my grandparents built the railroads and dug the silver mines, and my parents survived the earthquake, the fire, and a society that outlawed even being Chinese; I am mother to a dozen, grandmother to a hundred, and great-grandmother to a legion; I have birthed babies and washed the dead; I am history and suffering and wisdom; I am a Buddha and a dragon; so get your fucking hand off my eggplant before you lose it. — Christopher Moore

I don't think I shall ever find peace till I make up my mind about things,' he said gravely. He hesitated. 'It's very difficult to put into words. The moment you try you feel embarrassed. You say to yourself: "Who am I that I should bother myself about this, that, and the other? Perhaps it's only because I'm a conceited prig. Wouldn't it be better to follow the beaten track and let what's coming to you come?" And then you think of a fellow who an hour before was full of life and fun,and he's lying dead; it's all so cruel and meaningless. It's hard not to ask yourself what life is all about and whether there's any sense to it or whether it's all a tragic blunder of blind fate. — W. Somerset Maugham

My vanity is not dead. I laugh when I see pictures of myself as I am now-maybe so I won't cry, but just because it is really funny how much I've changed. — Michael Zaslow

I am a prisoner of my skin. My bones are my cage. — Dawn Kurtagich

If I stop writing I am dead. And that's the only way I'll stop: dead. — Charles Bukowski

It wasn't even a good note. 'If you are reading this I am probably dead.' What sort of a note is that? — Patrick Rothfuss

I guess I should explain. I'm not exactly your typical sixteen-year-old girl.
Oh, I seem normal enough, I guess. I don't do drugs, or drink, or smoke-well, okay, except for that one time Sleepy caught me. I don't have anything pierced, except my ears, and only once on each earlobe. I don't have any tattoos. I've never dyed my hair. Except for my boots and leather jacket, I don't wear an excessive amount of black. I don't even wear dark fingernail polish. All in all, I am a pretty normal, everyday, American teenage girl.
Except, of course, for the fact that I can talk to the dead. — Meg Cabot

Many years ago I found out something about hamburgers that really grossed me out. You may not know this, so I hope I don't make you sick, but it turns out hamburgers are actually made out of dead cows. I am not making this up. Needless to say, as soon as I discovered that, I gave up meat entirely. — Al Yankovic

The Bible does not deny that we were various things - addicts, homosexuals, hateful, prideful, pornographic masturbators - but that is what we were (past tense) (1 Cor. 6:9-11; Titus 3:3-5). The emphasis in Scripture is on what we are and what we are called to be. The Christian does not say, Hello, my name is _ and I am an X Y or Z." The Christian says I was dead, but now I am alive. The Christian says I am a struggling sinner, yet I am a saint. The Christians says I am a new creation; I am transformed. — Paul O'Brien

I thought: "Perhaps Adelma is the city where you arrive dying and where each finds again the people he has known. This means I, too, am dead." And I also thought: "This means the beyond is not happy. — Italo Calvino

I will not say that your mulberry trees are dead; but I am afraid they're not alive. — Jane Austen

My name is Katniss Everdeen. Why am I not dead? I should be dead. — Suzanne Collins

It has thrown off its disguise as a meal and has revealed itself to me for what it is, a large dead bird. I'm eating a wing. It's the wing of a tame turkey, the stupidest bird in the world, so stupid it can't even fly any more. I am eating lost flight. — Margaret Atwood

Street culture is a culture of containment. Most young people do not realize that it all too often leads to a "dead end". "Street culture," as I am using the term, is a counterforce to movement culture. Street culture in contemporary urban reality is synonymous with survival at all costs. This world view is mostly negative, because it demands constant adjustment to circumstances that are often far beyond young people's control or understanding, such as economics, education, housing, employment, nutrition, law, and so forth. — Haki R. Madhubuti

Alek: "Am I that obvious?"
Deryn: "No. Im just dead clever. — Scott Westerfeld

I take the knife and stab myself in the neck. I bleed out on top of the fortune-teller's grave and then I'm dead and that's my game. I am OK and I'll be OK but this is the end and this is my story. CH. — John Darnielle

When I am dead and buried, on my tombstone I would like to have it written, 'I have arrived.' Because when you feel that you have arrived, you are dead. — Yul Brynner

I am anger reborn and frustration unjustified. I am brutal hate and cold, dead winter. I am turning, tumbling in despair and there is no light, no warmth, no world, no heart. — Karina Halle

My private history in terms of people in my life who are dead is very easy to discuss. I don't feel those people can be threatened or intruded upon now. But I am enormously protective of the people who are currently in my life, my existing friends and family. That is where the curtain is drawn. — Chuck Palahniuk

S death one of those adventures from which I can't emerge as myself? The sister whose hand I am clutching in the picture is dead. I wonder every day whether she still exists ... A person whom one has loved seems altogether too significant a thing to simply vanish altogether from the world. A person whom one loves is a world, just as one knows oneself to be a world. How can worlds like these simply cease altogether? But if my sister does exist, then what is she, and what makes that thing that she now is identical with the beautiful girl laughing at her little sister on that forgotten day? Can she remember that summer's day while I cannot? — Rebecca Goldstein

A panda walks into a tea room and ordered a salad and ate it. Then it pulled out a pistol, shot the man in the next table dead, and walked out. Everyone rushed after it, shouting "Stop! Stop! Why did you do that?" "Becuase I am a panda," said the panda. "That's what pandas do. If you don't believe me, look in the dictionary." So they looked in the dictionary and sure enough they found Panda: Racoon-like animal of Asia. Eats shoots and leaves. — Ursula K. Le Guin

I am so sick of reading about another car bomb, another suicide bomber, another 10, 20, 30, 70, 100 people dead in a day, both Americans and Iraqis. — Rosanne Cash

I can tell you that she's not breathing," he said. "She has no heartbeat and all organ function and brain activity have stopped. Also her body temperature is now at seventy-three degrees."
"So you're saying that she's dead," I said.
"Well, I can't prove it, but, yes, I am leaning that way. — John Zakour

As I look back on my fondness for the outdoors, and specifically the elements in nature that I find visually stimulating, I am surprised at how often the theme of dead trees arise. I guess it's that each one seems to have a story of its own, representing many years of living through everything that nature could throw at them. — Cory Trepanier

The thing is that I am a member of that sad, ever-dwindling minority ... the child of an unbroken home. I have carried this albatross since the age of eleven, when I started at grammar school. Not a day would pass without somebody I knew turning out to be adopted or illegitimate, or to have mothers who were about to hare off with some bloke, or to have dead fathers and shabby stepfathers. What busy lives they led. How I envied their excuses for introspection, their ear-marked receptacles for every just antagonism and noble loyalty. — Martin Amis

He who governed the world before I was born shall take care of it likewise when I am dead. My part is to improve the present moment. — John Wesley

While at Colonel Niel's marquee I saw a detail of soldiers bring out a man by the name of Rowland, whom they were going to shoot to death with musketry, by order of a court-martial, for desertion. He was being hauled to the place of execution in a wagon, sitting on an old gun box, which was to be his coffin. When they got to the grave, which had been dug the day before, the water had risen in it, and a soldier was baling it out. Rowland spoke up and said, 'Please hand me a drink of that water, as I want to drink out of my own grave so the boys will talk about it when I am dead, and remember Rowland. — Sam R. Watkins

I have occupied this idle, empty winter with writing a story. It has been written to please myself, without thought of my own vanity or modesty, without regard for other people's feelings, without considering whether I shock or hurt the living, without scrupling to speak of the dead.

The world, I know, is changing. I am not indifferent to the revolution that has caught us in its mighty skirts, to the enormity of the flood that is threatening to submerge us. But what could I do? In the welter of the surrounding storm, I have taken refuge for a moment on this little raft, constructed with the salvage of my memory. I have tried to steer it into that calm haven of art in which I still believe. I have tried to avoid some of the rocks and sandbanks that guard its entrance.

[from the introduction] — Dorothy Bussy

I believe my theory of relativity to be true. But it will only be proved for certain in 1981, when I am dead. — Albert Einstein

WHEN YOU'RE BETWEEN A ROCK AND A HARD PLACE 1-4 But now, GOD's Message, the God who made you in the first place, Jacob, the One who got you started, Israel: "Don't be afraid, I've redeemed you. I've called your name. You're mine. When you're in over your head, I'll be there with you. When you're in rough waters, you will not go down. When you're between a rock and a hard place, it won't be a dead end - Because I am GOD, your personal God, The Holy of Israel, your Savior. I paid a huge price for you: all of Egypt, with rich Cush and Seba thrown in! That's how much you mean to me! That's how much I love you! I'd sell off the whole world to get you back, trade the creation just for you. 5-7 "So don't be afraid: I'm with you. — Anonymous

No longer mourn for me when I am dead Than you shall hear the surly sullen bell Give warning to the world that I am fled From this vile world, with vilest worms to dwell. — William Shakespeare

I," she [the Holy Spirit] opened her hands to include Jesus and Papa, "I am a verb. I am that I am. I will be who I will be. I am a verb! I am alive, dynamic, ever active and moving. I am a being verb. And as my very essence is a verb, I am more attuned to verbs than nouns. Verbs such as confessing, repenting, living, loving, responding, growing, reaping, changing, sowing, running, dancing, singing, and on and on. Humans, on the other hand, have a knack for taking a verb that is alive and full of grace and turning it into a dead noun or principle that reeks of rules. Nouns exist because there is a created universe and physical reality, but the universe is only a mass of nouns, it is dead. Unless 'I am' there are no verbs and verbs are what makes the universe alive. — Wm. Paul Young

I don't really have a favorite bass player. I listen to a lot of bluegrass. But then again, I'm not a typical bluegrass bass player. I was really into the Grateful Dead, and I still am - I don't listen to them too much, but for me they are a big influence. — Mike Gordon

Look, there's nothing I'm ever going to tell you about me that's the truth. The more you know about me, the shorter your life span is going to be. All you need to know is that I don't miss. In fact, you don't even need to know exactly how good I really am, because if you ever find out, you're going to be dead. (Steele) — Sherrilyn Kenyon

I have a strong feeling that I shall be glad when I am dead and done for - scrapped at last to make room for somebody better, cleverer, more perfect than myself. — George Bernard Shaw

I am the living dead girl because I am too weak to die. I hate those crying dough women on TV because they are just like me, weak and broken and clinging to the hands that hold us under. — Elizabeth Scott

Shane held the jewelry at arm's length, dangling it like a dead rat. No way in hell am I caught dead or alive wearing that. — Rachel Caine

I am not dead" argued Edward. "There are nefarious villains who would have you believe I died. But any accounts of my demise have been grossly exaggerated, I assure you, for here I am, very much alive. — Cynthia Hand

Then I take a dump. Feel better. Take off my clothes and step into the pool. Ice water. But great. I walk along toward the deep end of the pool, the water rising inch by inch, chilling me. Then I plunge below the water. It's restful. The world doesn't know where I am. I come up, swim to the far edge, find the ledge, sit there. It must be about the 9th or 10th race. The horses are still running. I plunge again into the water, being aware of my stupid whiteness, of my age hanging onto me like a leech. Still, it's OK. I should have been dead 40 years ago. I rise to the top, swim to the far edge, get out. — Charles Bukowski

The hiking boots the outdoor adventure magazine sent me to buy - large, ungainly potato like things that I have been trying to break in for the past four days - cut into my feet and draw blood as if the were lined with cheese graters. I have come to hate these Timberlands with a fervor I usually reserve for people. Just think, the shoes I wouldn't be caught dead in might actually turn out to be the shoes I am caught dead in. — David Rakoff

Wherever I am, whatever I'm doing, alive or dead, young or old, my heart will always be with yours. Every beat you feel against your fingertips ... " His fingers tapped against my chest, once, twice. " ... is me calling out to you. It's you returning the call. It's us talking, communicating, bonding, sharing, Living
Kiersten, it's us living. — Rachel Van Dyken

What's that map?" I asked.
"Spells of Coming Forth by Day," he said. "Don't worry. It's a good copy."
I looked at Carter for a translation.
"Most people call it The Book of the Dead," he told me. "Rich Egyptians were always buried with a copy, so they could have directions through the Duat to the Land of the Dead. It's like an Idiot's Guide to the Afterlife."
The captain hummed indignantly. "I am no idiot, Lord Kane."
"No, no, I just meant ... " Carter's voice faltered. "Uh, what is that? — Rick Riordan

Be lamps unto yourselves. Be refuges unto yourselves. Take yourself no external refuge. Hold fast to the truth as a lamp. Hold fast to the truth as a refuge. Look not for a refuge in anyone besides yourselves. And those, Ananda, who either now or after I am dead, Shall be a lamp unto themselves, Shall betake themselves as no external refuge, But holding fast to the truth as their lamp, Holding fast to the truth as their refuge, Shall not look for refuge to anyone else besides themselves, It is they who shall reach to the very topmost height; But they must be anxious to learn. — Gautama Buddha

Because I wasn't anything anymore. Not anythingI love or know or care about. Because thou shalt not kill, Kade. Thou shalt not kill. With all my heart I believed this. And I killed. So what am I now? And why should I live? How am I even alive? Because if this is what our lives are
if doing this to others before they do it to us is all our lives are
we're already dead. Honest to God I feel it, Kade. I'm dead. The hell with me. — David James Duncan

If I'm still walking, I am not dead. So I have to still walk and run towards the benefit of Lebanon. — Najib Mikati

Oh Danny boy, the pipes, the pipes are calling
From glen to glen, and down the mountain side
The summer's gone, and all the flowers are dying
'Tis you, 'tis you must go and I must bide.
But come ye back when summer's in the meadow
Or when the valley's hushed and white with snow
'Tis I'll be here in sunshine or in shadow
Oh Danny boy, oh Danny boy, I love you so.
And if you come, when all the flowers are dying
And I am dead, as dead I well may be
You'll come and find the place where I am lying
And kneel and say an "Ave" there for me.
And I shall hear, tho' soft you tread above me
And all my dreams will warm and sweeter be
If you'll not fail to tell me that you love me
I'll simply sleep in peace until you come to me.
I'll simply sleep in peace until you come to me. — Fred E. Weatherly