Kneel Before Me Quotes & Sayings

I could not retreat, as did so many, into the church and its mysteries. My parents rejected all dogmas. We spurned the holidays marketed by the people who wanted to be white. We would not stand for their anthems. We would not kneel before their God. And so I had no sense that any just God was on my side. "The meek shall inherit the earth" meant nothing to me. The meek were battered in West Baltimore, stomped out at Walbrook Junction, bashed up on Park Heights, and raped in the showers of the city jail. My understanding of the universe was physical, and its moral arc bent toward chaos then concluded in a box. That — Ta-Nehisi Coates

When I was a kid, I'd kneel down at the side of my bed every night before I went to sleep, and my mother and I would say a Greek prayer to the Virgin Mary. — Olympia Dukakis

It's time, little one," he coaxes from above me.
I take a deep breath as I crawl to where he instructs me. My heart is racing and I feel like tears could be close again. But I am resolved. I am going to do this. I know my own wilful obstinacy will see me into the stocks and from there it really is up to Shaw. He positions me in front of the stocks and waits a few seconds, letting me absorb their magnitude, before speaking.
"Kneel."
Just one word but it seals my fate. I comply immediately, wordlessly, allowing my terror to turn into the first shoots of arousal. This is really happening ... — Felicity Brandon

Before you sit down to listen to the news at seven, kneel down to ask God for the dew of Heaven — Julius Owusu

He felt as though his brain were on fire. She had come to him, what joy! And then, how she had looked at him! She seemed more beautiful than ever before. Beautiful with a beauty that combined all of the woman with all of the angel, a beauty that would have made Petrarch sing and Dante kneel. He felt as though he were swimming in the deep blue sky. At the same time he was horribly disconcerted, because there was dust on his boots. — Victor Hugo

I'm sure you've heard people talk about their Heart's Desire - well that's a load of rot. Hearts are idiots. They're big and squishy and full of daft dreams. They flounce off to write poetry and moon at folk who aren't worth the mooning. Bones are the ones that have to make the journey, fight the monster, kneel before whomever is big on kneeling these days. Bones do the work for the heart's grand plans. Bones know what you need. Hearts only know want. — Catherynne M Valente

I love color. It must submit to me. And I love art. I kneel before it, and it must become mine. Everything around me glows with passion. Every day reveals a new red flower, glowing, scarlet red. Everyone around me carries them. Some wear them quietly hidden in their hearts. And they are like poppies just opening, of which one can see only here and there a hint of red petal peeking out from the green bud. — Paula Modersohn-Becker

Stand before your god, bow before your king, kneel before your man. — Terry Pratchett

The sun will shine on those who stand, before it shines on those who kneel under them. — Chinua Achebe

6 Oh come, let us worship and bow down; let us l kneel before the LORD, our m Maker! 7. For he is our n God, and we are the people of his o pasture, and the sheep of his hand. — Anonymous

1. Society needs laws. While anarchy can often turn a humdrum weekend into something unforgettable, eventually the mob must be kept from stealing the conch and killing Piggy. And while it would be nice if that "something" was simple human decency, anybody who has witnessed the "50% Off Wedding Dress Sale" at Filene's Basement knows we need a backup plan - preferably in writing. On the other hand, too many laws can result in outright tyranny, particularly if one of those laws is "Kneel before Zod." Somewhere between these two extremes lies the legislative sweet-spot that produces just the right amount of laws for a well-adjusted society - more than zero, less than fascism. — Jon Stewart

Lord! teach me to tarry with Thee in the school, and give Thee time to train me. May a deep sense of my ignorance, of the wonderful privilege and power of prayer, of the need of the Holy Spirit as the Spirit of prayer, lead me to cast away my thoughts of what I think I know, and make me kneel before Thee in true teachableness and poverty of spirit. — Andrew Murray

Cleopatra: You come before me as a suppliant.
Antony: If you choose to regard me as such.
Cleopatra: You will therefore assume the position of a suppliant before this throne. You will kneel.
Antony: I will *what*?
Cleopatra: On-your-knees!
Antony: You dare ask the Proconsul of the Roman Empire?
Cleopatra: I *asked* it of Julius Caesar. I *demand* it of you — Elizabeth Taylor

A desire to kneel down sometimes pulses through my body, or rather it is as if my body has been meant and made for the act of kneeling. Sometimes, in moments of deep gratitude, kneeling down becomes an overwhelming urge, head deeply bowed, hands before my face. — Etty Hillesum

Global warming is not a conqueror to kneel before - but a challenge to rise to. A challenge we must rise to. — Joe Lieberman

God is universal," spluttered the priest.
The imam nodded strong approval. "There is only one God."
"And with their one god Muslims are always causing troubles and provoking riots. The proof of how bad Islam is, is how uncivilized Muslims are,: pronounced the pandit.
"Says the slave-driver of the cast system," huffed the imam. "Hindus enslave people and worship dressed-up dolls."
"They are golden calf lovers. They kneel before the cows," the priest chimed in.
"While Christians kneel before a white man! They are flunkies of a foreign god. They are nightmare of all nonwhite people. — Yann Martel

She cackled. "Don't reckon he'd be up for that-n." "I don't reckon at all," Solomon said, going over to kneel before her for inspection. "How are those legs of yours?" "Sexy as all get out," she said, pulling her bathrobe up and wagging her feet. "I could probably out run yah, but don't want to make you look pitiful. — Lucian Bane

Kneel before the king, Griff." I look around for the king. "Me, asshole. I'm the king. Who else would be the king? Wade?"
[...]
"On this rainy Thursday, I, King Theo of New York City, praise you, Sir Griffin of New York City, for your vast knowledge of fantasy novels I"ll never take the time to read myself. And for having the kind of laugh that I like hearing so much I would punch myself over and over if you found it funny. — Adam Silvera

Get up, Shahrzad al-Khayzuran. You kneel before no one. Least of all me. — Renee Ahdieh

The quest for the Holy Grail is the quest to kneel before the bones of Mary Magdalene. A journey to pray at the feet of the outcast one. — Dan Brown

I kneel in the nights before tigers that will not let me be. what you were will not happen again. the tigers have found me and I do not care. — Charles Bukowski

We've made a beautiful mess of things lately, haven't we?" He flashed that sexy crooked smile at me, which made my heart flutter.
"But it's our crazy story," "It's been ours, only ours. There's been a lot of romance, sometimes way too much drama ... " "very memorable comedy, a few pulse-racing action scenes ... "
"We've also had our fair share of suspense and raw terror, and unfortunately gut-wrenching heartache too."
"I think we've covered it all, everything except fo being captured by aliens!"
"But through it all you've loved me unconditionally, and I know how fortunate I am to have your love. I don't want to live without you, not for one more minute, not for one more second. I want to spend the rest of my days living my story with you ... only you."
"It is here that I fell in love with you"
"And as fate would have it, it is here that I humbly kneel before you and ask you to be my wife. — Tina Reber

I have one final hope, If I get double sixes, maybe he will change his mind, come back to me. As if to cast a magic spell, I blow on the dice just as Dex did ... Just as it happened with our first roll, one die lands before its mate. On a six! I hold my breath. For a brief second, I see a mess of dots, and think I have boxcars again. I kneel, staring at the second die.
It is onle a five.
I have rolled an eleven, It is as if someone is mocking me, saying, Close, but no dice. — Emily Giffin

Back home, my favorite part of Mass was during communion, when I'd stand at the rail and hold a little gold platter under people's chins. The pretty girls would line up for communion (I confess to Almighty God). They'd kneel (and to you my brothers and sisters), cast their eyes demurely down (I have sinned through my own fault), and stick out their tongues (in my thoughts and in my words). Their tongues would shine, reflected in the gold platter, and since the wafer was dry, the girls would maybe lick their lips (and I ask Blessed Mary ever virgin, all the angels and saints, and you my brothers and sisters) before they swallowed (to pray for me to the Lord our God). It was all I could do not to pass out. — Rob Sheffield

Ignorance fears all things, falling, terror-stricken before the passing wind. Superstition stands as the monument to ignorance, and before it kneel all who realize their own weakness who see in all things the strength they do not possess — Manly P. Hall

Very often (nearly always, I'm afraid) when I come to church my feelings are uppermost in my mind. This is natural. We are human, we are "selves," and it takes no effort at all to feel. But worship is not feeling. Worship is not an experience. Worship is an act, and this takes discipline. We are to worship "in spirit and in truth." Never mind about the feelings. We are to worship in spite of them. Finding myself scattered in all directions and in need of corralling like so many skittish calves, I kneel before the service begins and ask to be delivered from a vague preoccupation with myself and my own concerns and to be turned, during this short hour, to God. — Elisabeth Elliot

He had to undress and then kneel and say his own prayers before the gas was lowered so that he might not go to hell when he died. — James Joyce

When I think how much my Protestant brothers and sisters are missing in not having Christ's Real Presence in the Eucharist; when I kneel before the Eucharist and realize I am as truly in Christ's presence as the apostles were but that my Protestant brothers and sisters don't know that, don't believe that - I at first feel a terrible gap between myself and them. What a tremendous thing they are missing! — Peter Kreeft

When [375] I was young, nearly every day in my prayers I would say, "Lord, I am coming to the throne of grace. At Your throne of grace I find grace for my timely need. Lord, I need Your grace every minute. I not only need Your grace every year, every week, every day, and every hour, but every minute. Without Your grace, I simply cannot bear anything." Today I still need the Lord's grace every minute. Perhaps in a few minutes my folks will give me a difficult time, or else one of the brothers will come to bother me. Perhaps I will receive a phone call from a sister. So, I keep on telling the Lord, "Lord, I need Your grace every minute. I know that You are gracious and that You have grace ready for me. Lord, since grace needs my cooperation, I kneel before the throne of grace to find grace to meet my need. — Witness Lee

All those who come in contact with his [Christ's] personality, even though they may neither bow to his altar or kneel before his priest, in some way find that the ugliness of their sin is taken away and the beauty of their sorrow is revealed to them. — Oscar Wilde

Wren laughs when I kneel on the floor and try to do a breakdance head-spin. I end up taking down two people before Kayla kicks me in a friendly manner to get me to stop. — Sara Wolf

For if in careless summer days
In groves of Ashtaroth we whored,
Repentant now, when winds blow cold,
We kneel before our rightful lord;
The lord of all, the money-god,
Who rules us blood and hand and brain,
Who gives the roof that stops the wind,
And, giving, takes away again;
Who spies with jealous, watchful care,
Our thoughts, our dreams, our secret ways,
Who picks our words and cuts our clothes,
And maps the pattern of our days;
Who chills our anger, curbs our hope,
And buys our lives and pays with toys,
Who claims as tribute broken faith,
Accepted insults, muted joys;
Who binds with chains the poet's wit,
The navvy's strength, the soldier's pride,
And lays the sleek, estranging shield
Between the lover and his bride. — George Orwell

You carried me nine months before bringing me to life
You polished my talent when I was less than five
You always grant me mirth and surround me with angelic care
Hence, giving you the world's treasures are still not fair
God created you to be the source of mercy on this hard planet
You are the one who taught me speaking and every good habit
I always pray to God during prostration and when I kneel
That he bless your time and make me under your heel — Yasser Kashef

Tell me ... is there really no other way for you but this? To kneel down forever before an army of boys for just five dirty minutes in the dark?
Think ... of the men who have kneeled before you while you thought of something else and pretended that nothing was happening down there in the dark between your legs. — James Baldwin

Now you kneel before us. You bare your throats. You spread your legs. You work, you serve, you fuck, and you submit. You obey, or you die. — R. Phoenix

We are here to become great men and women, and with that purpose in view, we must eliminate everything in our religion and philosophy that tends to make the human mind a dependent weakling. If you would serve God and be truly religious, do not kneel before God, but learn to walk with God, and do something tangible every day to increase the happiness of mankind. This is religion that is worth while, and it is such religion alone that can please the Infinite. — Christian D. Larson

Yesterday we obeyed kings and bent our necks before emperors. But today we kneel only to truth, follow only beauty, and obey only love. — Kahlil Gibran

O God-Man present in this sacrament for me - what a comfort, what a privilege to know I kneel before God! And to think that this God loves me! ... Mary, my mother, help me to love him in return — Alphonsus Liguori

As a camel kneels before his master to have him remove his burden at the end of the day, so kneel each night and let the Master take your burden. — Corrie Ten Boom

Ambition. Yes, that is my God.

When Ambition is your God, the office is your temple, the employee handbook your holy book. The sacred drink, coffee, is imbibed five times a day. When you worship Ambition, there is no Sabbath, no day of rest. Every day, you rise early and kneel before the God Ambition, facing in the direction of your PC.

You pray alone, always alone, even though others may be present. Ambition is a vengeful God. He will smite those who fail to worship faithfully, but that is nothing compared to what He has in store for the faithful. They suffer the worst fate of all. For it is only when they are old are tired, entombed in the corner office, that the realize hits like a Biblical thunderclap.

The God Ambition is a false God and has always been. — Eric Weiner

You grow bored of these shrines, and you abandon them
because you know for a fact that you will worship
anything you kneel before.
Like God.
Like cock.
Like porcelain. — Kris Kidd

But all I could see was her. No skill of mine, no artist anywhere, could've immortalized how gorgeous she was. It was impossible to believe she'd ever had any doubts about her body. The firelight shone on her skin, golden and perfect, making her look like some radiant goddess of legend. I wanted to kneel before her and offer eternal obedience. — Richelle Mead

Maybe you've been there. You go into a police or sheriff's station after a gang of black kids forced you to stop your car while they smashed out your windows with garbage cans; a strung-out addict made you kneel at gunpoint on the floor of a grocery store, and before you knew it the begging words rose uncontrollably in your throat; some bikers pulled you from the back of a bar and sat on your arms while one of them unzippered his blue jeans. Your body is still hot with shame, your voice full of thumbtacks and strange to your own ears, your eyes full of guilt and self-loathing while uniformed people walk casually by you with Styrofoam cups of coffee in their hands. Then somebody types your words on a report and you realize that this is all you will get. — James Lee Burke

If you kneel before God, you will stand before men. — Leonard Ravenhill

You look at the greatest villains in human history, the fascists, the autocrats, they all wanted people to kneel before them because they don't love themselves enough. — Tom Hiddleston

Idiot. Above her head was the only stable point in the cosmos, the only refuge from the damnation of the panta rei, and she guessed it was the Pendulum's business. A moment later the couple went off
he, trained on some textbook that had blunted his capacity for wonder, she, inert and insensitive to the thrill of the infinite, both oblivious of the awesomeness of their encounter
their first and last encounter
with the One, the Ein-Sof, the Ineffable. How could you fail to kneel down before this altar of certitude? — Umberto Eco

When a child becomes an adult ... the elders are fearful. And for good reason ... not we but they are the germinators of future generations. Will they leave us behind as we did our parents? Consign us to neatly paved retirement villages? Trample us in the dust as they go flying out to their new galaxies? We had better tie them down, flagellate them, isolate them in the family cocoon, ... indoctrinate them into the tribal laws and make sure they kneel before the power of the elders. — Louise J. Kaplan

None of us will become perfect in a day or a month or a year. We will not accomplish it in lifetime, but we can begin now, starting with our more obvious weaknesses and gradually converting them to strengths as we go forward with our lives. this quest may be a long one: in fact, it will be lifelong. It may be fraught with many mistakes, with falling down and getting back up again. And it will take much effort. But we must not sell ourselves short. We must make a little extra effort. We would be wise to kneel before our God in supplication. He will help us. He will bless us. He will comfort and sustain us. He will help us to do more, and be more, than we can ever accomplish or be on our own. — Gordon B. Hinckley

How silly were the idolaters of old, who knelt before the clumsy wooden figurines of their own making! We are wiser now. We kneel before mirrors. — Anthony Esolen

Dear God, master of the universe, compassionate and merciful: we who are steeped in sin, kneel in supplication before your throne and beseech you to recall from this world Saadat Hasan Manto, son of Ghulam Hasan Manto, who was a man of great piety. Take him away, Lord, for he runs away from fragrance and chases after filth. He hates the bright sun, preferring dark labyrinths. He has nothing but contempt for modesty but is fascinated by the naked and the shameless. He hates sweetness, but will give his life to taste bitter fruit. He will not so much as look at housewives but is in seventh heaven in the company of whores. He will not go near running waters, but loves to wade through filth. Where others weep, he laughs; and where others laugh, he weeps. Faces blackened by evil, he loves to wash with tender care to make visible their real features. He never thinks about you but follows Satan everywhere, the same fallen angel who once disobeyed you. — Saadat Hasan Manto

Who are we, as we stand before the child Jesus? Who are we, standing as we stand before today's children? Are we like Mary and Joseph, who welcomed Jesus and cared for him with the love of a father and a mother? Or are we like Herod, who wanted to eliminate him? Are we like the shepherds, who went in haste to kneel before him in worship and offer him their humble gifts? Or are we indifferent? — Pope Francis

You can get lost on your way home. You can get lost looking for love. You can get lost between jobs. You can get lost looking for God. However it happens, take heart. Others before you have found a way in the wilderness, where there are as many angels as there are wild beasts, and plenty of other lost people too. All it takes is one of them to find you. All it takes is you to find one of them. However it happens, you could do worse than to kneel down and ask a blessing, remembering how many knees have kissed this altar before you. — Barbara Brown Taylor

Dismount and kneel before me, that I may strike off your head with fullest ease. You shall die in this tragic golden light of sunset. — Jack Vance

Like so many pilgrims before us, we kneel in wonder and adoration before the ineffable mystery which. was accomplished here ... In This Child - the Son who is given to us - we find rest for our souls and the true bread that never fails - the Eucharistic Bread foreshadowed even in the name of this town: Bethlehem, the house of bread. God lies hidden in the Child; divinity lies hidden in the Bread of Life — Pope John Paul II

To Lou: I want to see the world through you; for then I shall not be seeing the world but only you, you you! I have never seen you without thinking that I should like to pray to you. I have never heard you without thinking that I should like to believe in you. I have never longed for you without thinking that I should like to suffer for you. I have never desired you without thinking that I should be allowed to kneel before you. — Rainer Maria Rilke

It's as if you kneel to plant the seed of a tree and it grows so fast that it swallows your whole town before you can even rise to your feet. — Jaron Lanier

He had never before thought of himself as gullible. He wondered where he had gone wrong. It occurred to him that he had let himself be overawed - by bishop Henry and his silk robes, by the magnificence of Winchester and its cathedral, by the piles of silver in the mint and the heaps of meat in the butchers' shops, and by the thought of seeing the king. He had forgotten that God saw through the silk robes to the sinful heart, that the only wealth worth having was treasure in heaven, and that the even the king had to kneel down in church. Feeling that everyone else was so much powerful and sophisticated than he was, he had lost sight of his true values, suspended his critical faculties, and places his trust in his superiors. — Ken Follett

My love, you are closer to me than myself ...
You shine through my eyes,
Your light is brighter than the Moon ...
Step into the garden so all the flowers ...
Even the tall poplar can kneel before your beauty ...
Let your voice silence the lily famous for its hundred tongues,
When you want to be kind ...
You are softer than the soul ...
But when you withdraw ...
You can be so cold and harsh.
Dear one, you can be wild and rebellious ...
But when you meet him face to face ...
His charm will make you docile like the earth,
Throw away your shield and bare your chest ...
There is no stronger protection than him.
That's why when the Lover withdraws from the world ...
He covers all the cracks in the wall ...
So the outside light cannot come though,
He knows that only the inner light illuminates his world! — Rumi

So you have found me and would know the tale. When a poet speaks of truth to another poet, waht hope has truth? Let me ask this, then. DOes one find memory in invention? Or will you find invention in memory? Wich bows in servitude befor the other? Will the measure of greatness be weighed solely in details? Perhaps so, if details make up the full weft of the world, if themes are nothing more than the coomposite of lists perfectly ordered and unerring rendered; and if I should kneel before invention, as if it were memory made perfect. — Steven Erikson

I panted like a whore in church. The Church of Simon ... where I was dying to kneel before him. — Alice Clayton

Country jakes are always whining about the sanctity of states' rights and individual freedoms. Yet when a couple of queers want to get married in Massachusetts, half the South goes apeshit with homemade posters and fire-breathing sermons. And when a few million concerned residents of states thousands of miles away decide they want to stop destroying their landscape in the name of corporate mammon and consumer stupidity, the South sends out its greasy merchants of avarice to cajole, bribe, hector, lie, intimidate, and "lobby" until the seed of their plantation mentality is protected and their gluttonous mouths are once again filled with the jizz of the master caste before whom they kneel like Bourbon Street whores on Navy payday. — Chuck Thompson

Kneel down, kneel down- kneel round her every one of you, and mark my words. I say she starved to death. I never knew how bad she was, till the fever came upon her, and then her bones were starting through the skin. There was neither fire nor candle; she died in the dark- in the dark. She couldn't even see her children's faces, though we heard her gasping out their names. I begged for her in the streets, and they sent me to prison. When I came back, she was dying; and all the blood in my heart has dried up, for they starved her to death. I swear it before the God that saw it,- they starved her! — Charles Dickens

A hungry man can be a fast learner. When you come to a table with nothing but need, you are grateful for things you might have pushed aside before. And when you kneel, hungry & broken at His table, you receive a grace from Him you might, at some other time, have completely missed. — Mike Yankoski

I shall be as willing as the next man to fall down in worship before the System, if only I can manage to set eyes on it. Hitherto I have had no success; and though I have young legs, I am almost weary from running back and forth ...
Once or twice I have been on the verge of bending the knee. But at the last moment, when I already had my handkerchief spread on the ground, to avoid soiling my trousers, and I made a trusting appeal to one of the initiated who stood by: "Tell me now sincerely, is it entirely finished; for if so I will kneel down before it, even at the risk of ruining a pair of trousers (for on account of the heavy traffic to and from the system, the road has become quite muddy)," - I always receive the same answer: "No, it is not yet quite finished." And so there was another postponement - of the system, and of my homage.
System and finality are pretty much one and the same, so much so that if the system is not finished, there is no system. — Soren Kierkegaard

Winter Grace It is autumn again and our anxiety blows With the wind, breaking the heart of the rose, Petals and leaves fall down and everything goes. All but the seed, all but the hard bright berry And the bulbs we kneel on the earth to bury And lay away with our anguish and our worry. It is time we learned again the winter grace To put the nerves to sleep in a dark place And smooth the lines in the self-tortured face. For we are at the end of our endurance nearly And we shall have to die this winter surely, For this is the end of more than a season clearly. Now we shall have to be poor, to yield up all, With the leaves wither, with the petals fall, Now we shall have to die, once and for all. Before the seed of faith so deep and still Pushes up gently through the frozen will And the joyless wake and learn to be joyful. Before this buried love leaps up from sorrow And doubt and violence and pity follow To greet the radiant morning and the swallow. — May Sarton

Be a Catholic: When you kneel before an altar, do it in such a way that others may be able to recognize that you know before whom you kneel. — Maximilian Kolbe

Ulric rushed forward to the pile as soon as the spikes were out of his way. The seneschal's wider frame lumbered with the effort it took him to kneel and he grunted under the strain. Swiping the sleeve of his brown tunic across his forehead, Ulric placed his arm before his nose as he leaned closer to the pelts.
Impatient, Vladamir watched Ulric pick through the skins. He followed silently behind, refusing to sheath his sword. The seneschal sat straight up in surprise.
"M'lord, it would appear to be a maiden amongst these pelts. Methinks I see the entrails of a rabbit in her hair," Ulric yelled through the sleeve of his tunic. — Michelle M. Pillow

But other people fast or walk long pilgrimages to honor the spirit of what they believe makes our world whole and lovely. If we gardeners can, in the same spirit, put our heels to the shovel, kneel before a trench holding tender roots, and then wait three years for an edible incarnation of the spring equinox, who's to make the call between ridiculous and reverent? — Barbara Kingsolver

This miracle of me is mine to own and keep, and mine to guard, and mine to use, and mine to kneel before! — Ayn Rand

Mark felt the Berg descending. He leaned his head against the wall and closed his eyes, for a moment wanting nothing but to fall asleep and never wake up again, or to do the opposite and kneel, bashing his head against the floor until it was over. But there was still that small sliver of clarity in his mind. He held on to it like a man clinging to a root on the side of a sheer cliff. Eyes open again. With a grunt, he forced himself to his feet, leaning against the window. The small city of Asheville lay spread out before them. Walls had been constructed out of wood, — James Dashner

Arin imagined how, if he could, he would kneel before the boy he had been. He'd cradle himself to his chest, let the child bury his wet face against his shoulder. Shh, Arin would tell him. You will be lonely, but you' ll become strong. One day, you will have your revenge. — Marie Rutkoski

Well, one day all the world's wizards and witches will kneel before Jesus and call Him 'Lord. — Jim Yackel

Every man's measurement is determined by his responses when he is on his knees before God. — Dr. J. Otis Yoder

I can easily imagine belonging to one man for my entire life, but he would have to be a whole man, a man who would dominate me, who would subjugate me by his inate strength. And every man - I know this very well - as soon as he falls in love becomes weak, pliable, ridiculous. He puts himself into the woman's hands, kneels down before her. The only man whom I could love permanently would be he before whom I should have to kneel. — Leopold Von Sacher-Masoch

Shows what you know, sunny-girl! I'm sure you've heard people talk about their Heart's Desire - well that's a load of rot. Hearts are idiots. They're big and squishy and full of daft dreams. They flounce off to write poetry and moon at folk who aren't worth the mooning. Bones are the ones that have to make the journey, fight the monster, kneel before whomever is big on kneeling these days. Bones do the work for the heart's grand plans. Bones know what you need. Hearts only know want. I much prefer to deal with children, boggans, and villains, who haven't got hearts to get in the way of the very important magic of Getting-Things-Done. — Catherynne M Valente