Doors Of My Heart Quotes & Sayings

I recalled that inward sensation I had experienced: for I could recall it, with all its unspeakable strangeness. I recalled the voice I had heard; again I questioned whence it came, as vainly as before: it seemed in ME
not in the external world. I asked was it a mere nervous impression
a delusion? I could not conceive or believe: it was more like an inspiration. The wondrous shock of feeling had come like the earthquake which shook the foundations of Paul and Silas's prison; it had opened the doors of the soul's cell and loosed its bands
it had wakened it out of its sleep, whence it sprang trembling, listening, aghast; then vibrated thrice a cry on my startled ear, and in my quaking heart and through my spirit, which neither feared nor shook, but exulted as if in joy over the success of one effort it had been privileged to make, independent of the cumbrous body. — Charlotte Bronte

And then the darkness gives way to white neon. An Art Deco font, burning into the night, announces our arrival at the CINEMA LE CHAMPO. The letters dwarf me. Cinema. Has there ever been a more beautiful word? My heart soars as we pass the colorful film posters and walk through the gleaming glass doors. The lobby is smaller than what I'm used to, and though it's missing the tang of artificially buttered popcorn, there's something in the air I recognize, something both musty and comforting. — Stephanie Perkins

For me, the writing life doesn't just happen when I sit at the writing desk. It is a life lived with a centering principle, and mine is this: that I will pay close attention to this world I find myself in. 'My heart keeps open house,' was the way the poet Theodore Roethke put it in a poem. And rendering in language what one sees through the opened windows and doors of that house is a way of bearing witness to the mystery of what it is to be alive in this world. — Julia Alvarez

I stood there, staring at the closed doors. I reached out and touched the bone handle.
You can fix this, I told myself. You can make this right. But I just stood there, frozen, Mal's words ringing in my ears. I bit down hard on my lip to silence the sob that shook my chest. That's good, I thought as the tears spilled over. That way the servants won't hear. An ache had started between my ribs, a hard, bright shard of pain that lodged beneath my sternum, pressing tight against my heart.
I didn't hear the Darkling move; I only knew when he was beside me. His long fingers brushed the hair back from my neck and rested on the collar. When he kissed my check, his lips were cold. — Leigh Bardugo

Beyond speech and mind,
Into the river of ever-effulgent Light
My heart dives.
Today thousands of doors, closed for millennia,
Are opened wide. — Sri Chinmoy

I was always the girl growing up who just wasn't quite like the rest of them. I liked working hard. I liked contorting my body until I could feel the ache inside my bones, until I could feel the pain in my teeth. I liked to wear lipstick and nothing else and found myself fascinated with the shape of my lips and the different colors I could make them. I ate too little. Slept too much. Masturbated far too often and at far too young an age. I enjoyed the feeling of being naked alone behind closed doors, exploring my deepest secrets within my imagination, as I put my hand over the rapid pace of my heart to feel how nervous it made me. I blushed at the faintest mention of my name and almost perished when complimented. I loved to find the answers behind someone's eyes. There's nothing quite like the feeling of when someone REALLY looks at you. And I read. Every chance I got. — R.B. O'Brien

Claire's Summer Survival Playlist Janis Joplin - "Piece of My Heart" We Are The Fallen - "Bury Me Alive" Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers - "Runnin' Down a Dream" Indigo Girls - "Least Complicated" The Doors - "Light My Fire" Mumford & Sons - "Little Lion Man" Girlyman - "Joyful Sign" Matt Nathanson - "Love Comes Tumbling Down" Natasha's Ghost - "Falling Up" The Beatles - "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" Nemesea - "Afterlife" Dar Williams - "The Ocean — Tracey Martin

I live in the Hollywood Hills. When I see a cop driving around there, I actually assume that he has my best interests at heart and that he has the best interests of my property at heart. I think if you'd go to Pasadena, they'd say the same thing. And I think if you knocked on doors in Glendale and asked them, they'd say the same thing. — Quentin Tarantino

I've spoken of the shining city all my political life, but I don't know if I ever quite communicated what I saw when I said it. But in my mind it was a tall, proud city built on rocks stronger than oceans, windswept, God-blessed, and teeming with people of all kinds living in harmony and peace; a city with free ports that hummed with commerce and creativity. And if there had to be city walls, the walls had doors and the doors were open to anyone with the will and heart to get there. That's how I saw it, and see it still. — Ronald Reagan

The glass doors stared back at me like a secret passageway, moonlight filtering in and adding to the effect. I swallowed again, my heart pounding. What an exhilarating emotion this was. Exhilarating and terrifying. Nothing had ever made me feel so overwhelmed, so ethereal. Of all the new mysteries in my life, this was the most wrenching. Everything would change now, I knew. (Lily from Seers of Light) — Jennifer DeLucy

There's something simmering inside of me. Something I've never dared to tap into, something I'm afraid to acknowledge. There's a part of me clawing to break free from the cage I've trapped it in, banging on the doors of my heart, begging to be free. Begging to let go. Every day I feel like I'm reliving the same nightmare. I open my mouth to shout, to fight, to swing my fists, but my vocal cords are cut, my arms are heavy and weighted down as if trapped in wet cement and I'm screaming but no one can hear me, no one can reach me and I'm caught. And it's killing me. I've always had to make myself submissive, subservient, twisted into a pleading, passive mop just to make everyone else feel safe and comfortable. My existence has become a fight to prove I'm harmless, and I'm not a threat, that I'm capable of living among other human beings without hurting them. And I'm so tired I'm so tire I'm so tired I'm so tired and sometimes I get so angry. I don't know what's happening to me. — Tahereh Mafi

Dark house, by which once more I stand Here in the long unlovely street, Doors, where my heart was used to beat So quickly, waiting for a hand, A hand that can be clasp'd no more - Behold me, for I cannot sleep, And like a guilty thing I creep At earliest morning to the door. He is not here; but far away The noise of life begins again, And ghastly thro' the drizzling rain On the bald street breaks the blank day. — Alfred Lord Tennyson

But on that night, Dad staggered in, eyes eerily lit.
The corners of his mouth foaming spit.
His demons planned an overnight stay.
Mom motioned to take the girls away,
hide them in their rooms, safe in their beds.
We closed the doors, covered our heads,
as if blankets could mute the sounds of his blows
or we could silence her screams beneath her pillows.
I hugged the littlest ones close to my chest,
till the beat of my heart lulled them to rest.
Only then did I let myself cry.
Only then did I let myself wonder why
Mom didn't fight back, didn't defend,
didn't confess to family or friend.
Had Dad's demons claimed her soul?
Or was this, as well, another woman's role? — Ellen Hopkins

Doors of my heart are always open with love and kindness. — Debasish Mridha

Fearlessness is better than a faint-heart for any man who puts his nose out of doors. The length of my life and the day of my death were fated long ago. — Kevin Crossley-Holland

Neither the heart cut by a sliver of glass in a wasteland of thorns, nor the atrocious waters seen in the corners of certain houses, waters like eyelids and eyes, could hold your waist in my hands when my heart lifts its oak trees toward your unbreakable thread of snow. Night sugar, spirit of crowns, redeemed human blood, your kisses banish me, and a surge of water with remnants of the sea strikes the silences that wait for you surrounding the worn-out chairs, wearing doors away. — Pablo Neruda

here i am. there i was, broken. broken heart, broken dreams, broken soul. and there i was, stumbling down an endless road, my face tattooed in ashes, stained with tears, my clothes tattered, my feet tired of wandering. and there You were. standing at the end of the road, with your heart and arms open wide, and my tired feet ran, they ran to You, to your arms, to your heart. and here i am. slowly being put back together. here i am, no longer in tatters, but clothed in mercy, wrapped in grace. here i am, with a heart with open doors, a soul free to love and free to dream and free to be. with a crown of wildflowers instead of a crown of thorns, and a face of light and beauty instead of ashes. here i am. — Gaby Compres

I have chosen for my emblem a Star, representing the Virgin Mary, and the Eucharist. Those who know me as a professor of theology will remember my passion for the Eucharist from our classes. Blessed be God for this madness ... We must live our commitment to society steeped in the Eucharist. We must take the Eucharist to the streets, both in the heart of the city and on the outskirts, to the poor neighborhoods and to hospitals ... In order to obey the Resurrected Christ, I dare say with Pope John Paul II: 'Open wide the doors of your heart to the Holy Spirit.' — Nicolas Cotugno

HERSHEY HIGH AS BODY

The classroom bell like a slow heartbeat
pumps students through the hallways of your veins.
Your cafeteria growls and your doors close
like eyelids at night when you sleep.
What do you dream about, high school?
Do you dream that you are a hospital,
keeping us alive with your textbooks-heart monitors,
your basketball court, an emergency room?
When I fall down in the hallway,
my books spraying over the floor like vomit,
you wish you could pull your motor arms
out of the earth and pick me up.
But you can't help me. No one can. — Karen Finneyfrock

If the way to the center were easy to find - if it were capable of being captured in doctrines or were subject to human control - it would not be the genuine way. If the path that opens the heart and the mind could be found by simple belief, all the true believers would be opening the doors and windows of their hearts with gestures of true compassion. They would readily understand the common threads in the words "Jesus was right," "Moses led me along," and "Mohammed opened doors in my heart." When the great way opens even for a moment the path between mind and heart widens. The heart begins to find the thought of unity buried within it and the mind begins to see subtleties that were impossible to grasp just a minute before. Finding the great way requires a willingness to surrender again and again, not simply a zeal for bowing one's head in the same old way. — Michael Meade

Wishbone

Half-eaten chicken
lying on white serving plate
quartered potatoes
chunks of carrots
celery too
we tell stories
and laugh about the day
your little finger is locked around the wishbone
so is mine
I pretend to make a wish
close my eyes
mumbling my lips
that's the way I faked out the nuns
pretending to say the rosary
so they would leave me alone
your face is so determined
you win the wrestling match
lifting your piece of chicken bone above your head
in victory
I know better than to ask
what did you wish for
secret desires of the heart are not to be shared
or
they won't come true
everyone knows that
you clean the dishes
I turn on the TV
lying on the couch
listening to you make music
with running water
and closing cupboard doors. — Robert Hobkirk

My life now centered around sleepless nights and stand-bys, dodging the Brits and calming nerves to go out on operations. But the people stood by us. The people not only opened the doors of their homes to lend us a hand, but they opened their hearts to us. I learned that without the people, we could not survive and I knew that I owed them everything. — Bobby Sands

Let us open wide the windows of our hearts, that each family member may feel welcome and 'at home.' Let us open also the doors of our very souls, that the dear may enter. Remember His promise: 'Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him' (Revelation 3:20). — Thomas S. Monson

Soon after this incident the court rose. As I was being taken from the courthouse to the prison van, I was conscious for a few brief moments of the once familiar feel of a summer evening out-of-doors. And, sitting in the darkness of my moving cell, I recognized echoing in my tired brain, all the characteristic sounds of a town I'd loved, and of a certain hour of the day which I had always particularly enjoyed. The shouts of newspaper boys in the already languid air, the last calls of birds in the public garden, the cries of sandwich vendors, the screech of streetcars at the steep corners of the upper town, and that faint rustling overhead as darkness sifted down upon the harbor. All these sounds made my return to prison like a blind man's journey along a route whose every inch he knows by heart. — Albert Camus

For a moment after his voice faltered and fell, the sanctuary was silent, and the voice throbbed like weeping, as if in his words the people recognized themselves, recognized the failure he described as their own. But then a new voice arose. Saltheart Foamfollower said boldly, "My Lord, we have not reached our end. True, the work of our lifetime has been to comprehend and consolidate the gains of our forebearers. But our labour will open the doors of the future. Our children and their children will gain because we have not lost heart, for faith and courage are the greatest gift that we can give to our descendants. And the Land holds mysteries of which we know nothing
mysteries of hope as well as of peril. Be of good heart, Rockbrothers. Your faith is precious above all things." — Stephen R. Donaldson

Landscape
Isn't it plain the sheets of moss, except that
they have no tongues, could lecture
all day if they wanted about
spiritual patience? Isn't it clear
the black oaks along the path are standing
as though they were the most fragile of flowers?
Every morning I walk like this around
the pond, thinking: if the doors of my heart
ever close, I am as good as dead.
Every morning, so far, I'm alive. And now
the crows break off from the rest of the darkness
and burst up into the sky - as though
all night they had thought of what they would like
their lives to be, and imagined
their strong, thick wings. — Mary Oliver

Who are you, reader, reading my poems a hundred years hence?
I cannot send you one single flower from this wealth of the spring, one single streak of gold from yonder clouds.
Open your doors and look abroad.
From your blossoming garden gather fragrant memories of the vanished flowers of an hundred years before.
In the joy of your heart may you feel the living joy that sang one spring morning, sending its glad voice across an hundred years. — Rabindranath Tagore

I was conscious of that moment of stepping into the woods and leaving everything else behind. That one instant when all the sounds of people, of traffic, of doors opening and closing, were suddenly gone, swallowed up by trees and ferns. It was like a curtain falling on a stage, and I waited for that moment every time. My heart opened just a little bit wider. — Lynn Thomson

At the Sound of the Gunshot,
Leave A Message

That's what my friend spoke
into his grim machine the winter he first went mad
as we both did in our thirties with still
no hope of revenue, gravely inking
our poems on pages held fast by gyres
the color of lead.

Godless, our minds
did monster us, left us bobbing as in a swamp
until we sank. His eyes were burn holes
in a swollen face. His breath was a venom
he drank deep of. He called his own tongue
a scar, this poet

who can crowbar open
the most sealed heart, make ash flower,
and the cocked shotgun's double-zero mouths
(whose pellets had exploded star holes into plaster and porcelain
and not a few locked doors) never touched
my friend's throat. Praise

Him, whose earth is green.

(for Franz Wright) — Mary Karr

My secrets cry aloud.
I have no need for tongue.
My heart keeps open house,
My doors are widely swung.
An epic of the eyes
My love, with no disguise.
My truths are all foreknown,
This anguish self-revealed.
I'm naked to the bone,
With nakedness my shield.
Myself is what I wear:
I keep the spirit spare.
The anger will endure,
The deed will speak the truth
In language strict and pure.
I stop the lying mouth:
Rage warps my clearest cry
To witless agony. — Theodore Roethke

I'm counting my drawer when Regn comes into the office. I hear her before she enters. I listen for her. The sound of the keypad, the sound of three doors. I saw her pull up on my way in. The anticipation is what I love. The details. The security of knowing she's arrived and will be here for the day. Even if we don't have the leisure of time, we have time. It is the unspoken acknowledgments to self. The constant checking and watching for expressions, inflections in the voice, mannerisms. It is a gradual advance. The more we are restrained, the stronger it grows. It is innocence and age that allows the affection to mature, naturally, as it should. Something inside stirs, the heart itself is attracted, much before the body responds. Knowing Regn looks forward to seeing me as much as I do her makes me happy. — Wheston Chancellor Grove

Every morning I walk like this around
the pond, thinking: if the doors of my heart ever close, I am as good as dead. — Mary Oliver

Dad staggered in, eyes eerily lit.
The corners of his mouth foaming spit.
His demons planned an overnight stay.
Mom motioned to take the girls away.
hide them in their rooms, safe in their beds.
We closed the doors, covered our heads,
as if the blankets could mute the sounds of his blows
or we could silence her screams behind out pillows.
I hugged the littlest ones close to my chest,
till the beat of my heart lulled them to rest.
Only then did I let myself cry.
Only then did I let myself wonder why
Mom didn't fight back, didn't defend,
didn't confess to family or friend.
Had Dad's demons claimed her soul?
Or was this, as well, a woman's role? — Ellen Hopkins

I opened the doors of my heart.
And behold,
There was music within and a song,
And echoes did feed on the sweetness, repeating it long.
I opened the doors of my heart. And behold,
There was music that played itself out in aeolian notes:
Then was heard, as a far-away bell at long intervals tolled. — Jean Ingelow

I turn you out of doors tenant desire you pay no rent I turn you out of doors all my best rooms are yours the brain and heart depart I turn you out of doors switch off the lights throw water on the fire I turn you out of doors stubborn desire. — Alain Chartier

To me the desire to create and to have control over your own life, irrespective of the politics of the time or social structures, has always been a part of the human spirit. What I did not fully realize was that work could open the doors to my heart. — Anita Roddick