Quotes & Sayings About Nostrils

I told him exactly what had happened and he listened with seeming impassiveness, but his nostrils twitched and his eyes blazed as I told how the ruthless hands of the Count had held his wife in that terrible and horrid position, with her mouth to the open wound in his breast. It interested me, even at that moment, to see that whilst the face of white set passion worked convulsively over the bowed head, the hands tenderly and lovingly stroked the ruffled hair. — Bram Stoker

Swann had, as he shook the Marquise's hand, seen her bosom from close to and from above, he plunged an attentive, serious, absorbed, almost anxious, gaze into the depths of her corsage, and his nostrils, intoxicated by the woman's perfume, quivered like a butterfly ready to go and settle on the half-glimpsed flower. — Marcel Proust

The point is that no matter what you choose to do with your body when you die, it won't, ultimately, be very appealing. If you are inclined to donate yourself to science, you should not let images of dissection or dismemberment put you off. They are no more or less gruesome, in my opinion, than ordinary decay or the sewing shut of your jaws via your nostrils for a funeral viewing. — Mary Roach

Her nostrils found the scent of her womanly wetness, wafting from the seat below her. Maybe she'd climb in the back As she did, she slipped off her jeans and her white cotton panties, slightly damp white cotton panties now. She couldn't resist a little sniff. Now her ample soft, round buttocks would enjoy the cool — A.M. Ball

I opened the other envelope. It contained a photograph of a girl. The pose suggested a natural ease, or a lot of experience in being photographed. It showed darkish hair which might possibly have been red, a wide clear forehead, serious eyes, high cheekbones, nervous nostrils and a mouth which was not giving anything away. It was a fine-drawn, almost a taut face, and not a happy one — Raymond Chandler

In Germany I ingested the entire contents of the hotel mini-bar before a show and stuck my fingers in this guy's nostrils because I thought they would fit. — Grace Slick

My classes commenced on the seventh of September, a tall blue day as crisp as the white starched blouses of the coeds who filed into my classroom and nervously took their seats. Standing behind the lectern at eight o'clock sharp, suit fresh-pressed and chin scraped clean, I felt my nostrils flare like a stud's at the nubby tight sex of them, flustered and pink-scrubbed, giggling and moist; my tighs flexed, and I yawned ferociously. — John Barth

I tell you, the old-fashioned doctor who treated all diseases has completely disappeared, now there are only specialists, and they advertise all the time in the newspapers. If your nose hurts, they send you to Paris: there's a European specialist there, he treats noses. You go to Paris, he examines your nose: I can treat only your right nostril, he says, I don't treat left nostrils, it's not my specialty, but after me, go to Vienna, there's a separate specialist there who will finish treating your left nostril. — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

When I was little, my Aunt Bigeois told me "If you look at yourself too long in the mirror, you'll see a monkey." I must have looked at myself even longer than that: what I see is well below the monkey, on the fringe of the vegetable world, at the level of jellyfish... The eyes especially are horrible seen so close. They are glassy, soft, blind, red-rimmed, they look like fish scales... A silky white down covers the great slopes of the cheeks, two hairs protrude from the nostrils: it is a geological embossed map. And, in spite of everything, this lunar world is familiar to me. I cannot say I recognize the details. But the whole thing gives me an impression of something seen before which stupefies me. — Jean-Paul Sartre

The more I think of it, the more our ideas, our idols and our so-called holy practices, and those of our visions which supposedly are ineffable, all seem to me to be engendered merely by the stirrings of the human machine, exactly as is the wind from our nostrils or from our netherparts, and as is our sweat and salty water from tears, or the white blood passed in love, or the muddy excrement of the body. It enraged me to think that man should so waste his own substance in construction of theories that were almost always pernicious, and should speak of chastity before having examined the whole machinery of sex; that he should debate the question of free will instead of pondering the thousand obscure reasons which, for example, cause you to blink if I suddenly point a stick at your eyes; or that he should talk of Hell before having looked more closely into the question of death. — Marguerite Yourcenar

When thou ascendest to thy Heaven I descend to my Hell - even then thou callest to me across the unbridgeable gulf, "My companion, my comrade," and I call back to thee, "My comrade, my companion" - for I would not have thee see my Hell. The flame would burn thy eyesight and the smoke would crowd thy nostrils. And I love my Hell too well to have thee visit it. I would be in Hell alone. — Kahlil Gibran

Now now," he said, setting his hand on her shoulder. He didn't even see her turn. One moment she had her back to him, and the next her face was in his. Tears streamed from narrow, red eyes, her nostrils flared, and her mouth was twisted in a vicious snarl. She could have bitten his nose off if she wanted to. — Matt Tomerlin

Jess:"Sasha? I need some tissue to pack my nose with."
Sasha:"Is that hygienically sound?"
Jess:"Sasha ... "
Sasha:"Fine, but if you get toxic shock up your nose, buddy, remember I warned you."
Jess pulled a couple out and wedged them into his nostrils. He gave Abigail a sheepish smile. "Sexy, right?"
Abby: "Oh yeah, baby. You're so hot right now, if I was a chicken I'd lay hard-boiled eggs. — Sherrilyn Kenyon

Blood is pounding in my ears. Lingering smoke and tequila fill my nostrils as adrenaline courses through my veins. My lips curl into a smile. The only thing that would make this night more perfect is if I had killed some zombies. — Annie Walls

Got that gun?" Peter says to Tobias. "No," says Tobias, "I figured I would shoot the bullets out of my nostrils, so I left it upstairs. — Veronica Roth

I pulled the oxygen tubes from my nostrils and raised the tube up over my head, handing it to Dad. I wanted it to be just me and just him. — John Green

Dryads gathered in knots, hushed, and for once satyrs did not chase them but stood solitary sentinel, horned heads upflung and broad nostrils quivering. Kelpies and selkies hesitated, between horseform and biped shape, their wicked teeth gleaming as they snorted and stamped; among them, night-mares or elfhorses along the shores of the Dreaming Sea - which touches all shores, always - tossed their manes but did not neigh. — Lilith Saintcrow

But a smell shivered him awake.
It was a scent as old as the world. It was a hundred aromas of a thousand places. It was the tang of pine needles. It was the musk of sex. It was the muscular rot of mushrooms. It was the spice of oak. Meaty and redolent of soil and bark and herb. It was bats and husks and burrows and moss. It was solid and alive - so alive! And it was close.
The vapors invaded Nicholas' nostrils and his hair rose to their roots. His eyes were as heavy as manhole covers, but he opened them. Through the dying calm inside him snaked a tremble of fear.
The trees themselves seemed tense, waiting. The moonlight was a hard shell, sharp and ready to ready be struck and to ring like steel.
A shadow moved.
It poured like oil from between the tall trees and flowed across dark sandy dirt, lengthening into the middle of the ring. Trees seem to bend toward it, spellbound. A long, long shadow ... — Stephen M. Irwin

The thing about marriage is that it requires so much compromise. And, naturally, someone is going to come into the marriage being better at The Yield. In fact, I say a lengthy marriage requires it. Someone is always going to come in with horns down and nostrils flaring. That requires that the other person run away as quickly as possible while waving the white flag. Certainly not the red flag, because I don't want to be that poor woman who accidentally ran over her spouse sixty-five times. Someone is the bull. Someone must be the china shop. We all have important roles to play. — Jen Mann

At first he had appreciated only the material quality of the sounds which those instruments secreted. And it had been a source of keen pleasure when, below the narrow ribbon the violin part, delicate, unyielding, substantial and governing the whole, he had suddenly perceived, where it was trying to surge upwards in a flowing tide of sound, the mass of the piano-part, multiform, coherent, level, and breaking everywhere in melody like the deep blue tumult of the sea, silvered and charmed into a minor key by the moonlight. But at a given moment, without being able to distinguish any clear outline, or to give a name to what was pleasing him, suddenly enraptured, he had tried to collect, to treasure in his memory the phrase or harmony - he knew not which - that had just been played, and had opened and expanded his soul, just as the fragrance of certain roses, wafted upon the moist air of evening, has the power of dilating our nostrils. — Marcel Proust

In the past, dictionaries had been less scientific, and definitions often crudely brief. One example historians like to cite is the definition of 'mucus' in John Kersey's Dictionarium Anglo-Britannicum (1708) as 'snot or snivel'. Johnson, by contrast, defers to the authority of the medic John Quincy, and defines 'mucus' as 'that which flows from the papillary processes through the os cribriforme into the nostrils'. Kersey exemplifies the simplicity of the older dictionaries. He defines 'coffin' as 'a case for a dead body', 'penis' as 'a man's yard', 'eye' as 'the wonderful instrument of sight', — Henry Hitchings

Then his head sank to the floor of its own accord and from his nostrils came the last faint flicker of his breath. — Franz Kafka

In any communication, or in any situation which you cannot confront because it is exaggerating, hot or aggressive, just change your breath. Breathe through the lips instead of through the nostrils. Exhale always through the nostrils. Inhale through the rolled lips and make it slow and long. It will slow everything as required. It will increase your sensitivity. It will give you 10 times more projection over the person you are talking to. — Harbhajan Singh Yogi

But now it was spring again, and spring was almost unbearable for sensitive hearts. It drove creation to its utmost limits, it wafted its spice-laden breath even into the nostrils of the innocent. — Knut Hamsun

You cover Q-tips with sandpaper and ram them up your nostrils
as far as they will go. Then you sniff talcum powder while shredding
hundred dollar bills. — Herb Caen

So long as lust, whether of the world or flesh, smells sweet in our nostrils, so long we are loathsome to God. — Charles Caleb Colton

Stop trusting in man, who has but a breath in his nostrils. — Isaiah

The men were making too much noise, laughing, joking, to cover her terrible accusing silence below. She made the empty rooms roar with accusation and shake down a fine dust go guilt that was sucked in their nostrils as they plunged about. — Ray Bradbury

The leaves drifted silently to the ground in the crisp autumn air. I inhaled deeply, the smell of burning bonfires far, far away enchanting my nostrils.
Autumn had come early this year and I was excited for the change in colors that had already begun to take over the trees of the forest that surrounded Grandmother's house. — Emma Rose Kraus

It was always hard work to push through a crowed of reporters with the scent of blood in their nostrils. You might not think so, since on camera they appear to be brain-damaged wimps with severe eating disorders. But put them at a police barricade and a miraculous thing happens ... The strength comes from some mysterious place-and somehow, when there is gore on the ground, these anorexic creatures can push their way through anything. Without mussing their hair, too. — Jeff Lindsay

I live now for my work. I live for my work. I live only for my work. One day I will do work deserving of my talent & desire. One day. This I pledge. This I vow. I want you to love me for my work. But if you don't love me I can't continue my work. So please love me! - so I can continue my work. I am trapped here! I am trapped in this blond mannequin with the face. I can only breathe through that face! Those nostrils! That mouth! Help me to be perfect. If God was in us, we would be perfect. God is not in us, we know this for we are not perfect. I don't want money & fame. I want only to be perfect. The blond mannequin Monroe is me & is not me. She is not me. She is what I was born. Yes I want you to love her. So you will love me. Oh I want to love you! Where are you? I look, I look & there is no one there. — Joyce Carol Oates

And with it would come that wonderful, unmistakable smell of rain, that smell of dust and water meeting that lingered for a few seconds in the nostrils and then was gone, and would be missed, sometimes for months, before the next time that it caught you and made you stop and say to the person with you, any person: That is the smell of rain, there, right now. — Alexander McCall Smith

The best things are nearest: breath in your nostrils, light in your eyes, flowers at your feet, duties at your hand, the path of God just before you. Then do not grasp at the stars, but do life's plain common work as it comes certain that daily duties and daily bread are the sweetest things of life. — Robert Louis Stevenson

How fortunate for you that the water obscures so much." Blackwell shifted in his chair, his knees falling wider and his nostrils flaring.
"Would Dougan Mackenzie forgive this coercion?" she challenged, doing her best to ignore the stirrings of her own body. "If you owe him as much as you claim, would he not wish you to spare my modesty?"
The spark of heat in his eyes died for a moment, before flaring brighter than ever. "When we meet in hell, I'll ask his forgiveness. — Kerrigan Byrne

The heavy eyelids snapped open. Jack froze.
A huge gold-and-amber eye, as big as a dinner plater, stared at him. The dark pupil shrank, focusing.
Jack stood very still.
The colossal head turned, the scaled lip only three feet from Jack. The golden eyes gazed at him, wirling with fiery color.
Jack breathed in tiny, shallow breaths.
Dont blink. Don't blink ...
Two gusts of wind erutped from the wyvern's nostrils Jack jumped straight up, bounced off the ground into another jump, and scrambled up the nearest tree.
In the clearing, Gaston bent over, guffawing like an idiot.
'It's not funny! — Ilona Andrews

But Virginia, bacon is breafast. And nothing sets my nostrils twitching like bacon in the morning. Little pigs parading up and down with their curly cork screw tails... Bacon sizzling away on a iron frying pan. Baste it, roast it, toast it, nibble it, chew it, bite right through it, wobble it, gobble it, wrap it round a couple of chickens and am I ravenous! — Kathryn Wesley

The senses get tired. Sometimes, long before the end, they say, I'm quitting - I'm getting out of this now. And then the person is less prepared to meet the world, and stays at home more, without some of what he needs if he is to go on.

If it all quits on him, he is really alone; in the dark, in the silence, numb hands, nothing in his mouth, nothing in his nostrils. He asks himself, Did I treat them wrong? Didn't I show them a good time? — Lydia Davis

In my nostrils still lives the breath of flowers that perished twenty years ago. — Mark Twain

You need not treat me like a child, sir. I am perfectly capable of navigating this staircase on my own."
He snorted.
Her nostrils flared. "I promise not to ask you to catch me again, all right? Now stop scowling."
Of course he did no such thing. — Karen Witemeyer

The 'New York Honk,' as it was called, was the most fashionable accent an American male could have at that time, namely, the spring of 1963. One achieved it by forcing all words out through the nostrils rather than the mouth. It was at once virile ... and utterly affected. Nelson Rockefeller had a New York Honk. — Tom Wolfe

Liberty was the breath of Emily's nostrils; without it she perished.

(about her sister) — Charlotte Bronte

Theater of Cruelty means a theater difficult and cruel for myself first of all. And, on the level of performance, it is not the cruelty we can exercise upon each other by hacking at each other's bodies, carving up our personal anatomies, or, like Assyrian emperors, sending parcels of human ears, noses, or neatly detached nostrils through the mail, but the much more terrible and necessary cruelty which things can exercise against us. We are not free. And the sky can still fall on our heads. And the theater has been created to teach us that first of all. — Antonin Artaud

The sweet-smelling aroma of the island spices still hung in the air. It filled his nostrils and titillated his appetite all over again. His appetite drove him mad for something much more than food. — Luke A.M. Brown

In the Bhagavad Gita. One stanza reads: "Offering the inhaling breath into the exhaling breath and offering the exhaling breath into the inhaling breath, the yogi neutralizes both breaths; thus he releases prana from the heart and brings life force under his control."2 The interpretation is: "The yogi arrests decay in the body by securing an additional supply of prana (life force) through quieting the action of the lungs and heart; he also arrests mutations of growth in the body by control of apana (eliminating current). Thus neutralizing decay and growth, the yogi learns life-force control." Another Gita stanza states: "That meditation-expert (muni) becomes eternally free who, seeking the Supreme Goal, is able to withdraw from external phenomena by fixing his gaze within the mid-spot of the eyebrows and by neutralizing the even currents of prana and apana [that flow] within the nostrils and lungs; and to control his sensory mind and intellect; and to banish desire, fear, and anger."3 — Paramahansa Yogananda

Peaseblossom-decorous, proper Peaseblossom-dropped her trousers to waggle her naked, pale bottom at the Stage Manager. Bertie laughed involuntarily, choked on her coffee, and nearly died as it came out her nose, but it was worth the searing pain in her nostrils to see the look on the Stage Manager's face. — Lisa Mantchev

I've always stayed on the periphery of things. When I used to go to the punk clubs and things like that, I was never up front. I always wanted to be in the back, or on the side, because I wanted to get the whole view, rather than be staring up at someone's nostrils. — James Wolcott

He gripped her hips, and standing up, slowly pushed volumes of silk with him. Blue fabric puffed and pillowed between them. His hand traced a slow caress the length of her from knee to hip. Edward's nostrils flared, as did his eyes, when his roving hand slipped behind her, grappling bare skin. She quivered from tantalizing male touch exploring forbidden flesh. Lydia read Edward's face, the flush of tanned skin and mouth unable to close, as knowledge seeped into his brain: she'd said her vows, eaten dinner with the utmost decorum, and chattered politely with all and sundry in this secret state of undress. Edward groaned and jammed her body hard against his. "You're naked under your skirt. — Gina Conkle

Now different races and nationalities cherish different ideals of society that stink in each other's nostrils with an offensiveness beyond the power of any but the most monstrous private deed. — Rebecca West

The faded scent of stale smoke had cured into the gray wood over the years, but it suddenly seems more potent. As are distinct notes of ass and sweat and some combination of the two, drifting up to your newly sensitive sloth nostrils. Did you really smell this bad? Was it noticeable to others? Why the hell do you give a shit about it right now? You're a fucking sloth. Shouldn't you be worrying about that rather than whose olfactory sensibilities you might offend? — Steve Lowe

Adams dealt him so sound a Compliment over his Face with his Fist, that the Blood immediately gushed out of his Nose in a Stream. The Host being unwilling to be outdone in Courtesy, especially by a Person of Adams's Figure, returned the Favour with so much Gratitude, that the Parson's Nostrils likewise began to look a little redder than usual. — Henry Fielding

Shiloh had never seen a man who was a hunter. But she saw one now. There was an intense feeling around Roan, raw and untamed, as he studied her, his nostrils flaring to catch her scent. He ruthlessly dug into her opening eyes, reading her, trying to understand where she was at within herself and what she wanted from him.
"This is your call," he said, his voice low and guttural. — Lindsay McKenna

You're the best boyfriend ever. You let me ride in elevators and everything."
"Laugh it up, Pet. It'll be hilarious when we get stuck and the smell of unclean tourist is invading your nostrils."
"Don't worry, Sexy. I'll protect you. — C.J. Roberts

When the aromatic savour of the pine goes searching into the deepest recesses of my lungs, I know it is life that is entering. I draw life in through the delicate hairs of my nostrils. — Nan Shepherd

He could still see the dragon just fine. It was about sixty feet long, snout to tail, its body made of interlocking bronze plates. Its claws were the size of butcher knives, and its mouth was lined with hundreds of dagger-sharp metal teeth. Steam came out of its nostrils. It snarled like a chain saw cutting through a tree. — Rick Riordan

Home"

It would take forever to get there
but I would know it anywhere:

My white horse grazing in my blossomy field.
Its soft nostrils. The petals
falling from the trees into the stream.

The festival would be about to begin
in the dusky village in the distance. The doe
frozen at the edge of the grove:

She leaps. She vanishes. My face -
She has taken it. And my name -

(Although the plaintive lark in the tall
grass continues to say and to say it.)

Yes. This is the place.
Where my shining treasure has been waiting.
Where my shadow washes itself in my fountain.

A few graves among the roses. Some moss
on those. An ancient

bell in a steeple down the road
making no sound at all
as the monk pulls and pulls on the rope. — Laura Kasischke

I thought of my father, alone and elsewhere, his head cradled in his hands. I thought of the day he'd punched a hole straight through the kitchen wall, thinking she'd be tucked away inside. All those places he'd looked and never found. Inside their mattress. In stained-glass windows. How he'd scoured the carpet for her stray hair and strung them all together with a ribbon; how he'd slept with that one lock swathed across his nostrils, hugging a pillow fitted with a nightshirt. How he'd dug up the backyard, stripped and sweating. How he'd played her favorite album on repeat and loud, a lure. How when we took up the carpet in my bedroom to find her, under the carpet was wood. Under the wood there was cracked concrete. Under the concrete there was dirt. Under the dirt there was a cavity of water. I swam down into the water with my nose clenched and lungs burning in my chest but I could not find the bottom and I couldn't see a thing. — Blake Butler

We have been living through a time of sorrow. Our seed remains seed. Our nostrils are dusty. — Warren Eyster

In the dark room a cloud of yellow dust flew from beneath the tool like a scatter of sparks from under the hooves of a galloping horse. The twin wheels turned and hummed. Binet was smiling, his chin down, his nostrils distended. He seemed lost in the kind of happiness which, as a rule, accompanies only those mediocre occupations that tickle the intelligence with easy difficulties, and satisfy it with a sense of achievement beyond which there is nothing left for dreams to feed on. — Gustave Flaubert

Under an orchard tree, dropping with cherries, cowgirls lay in the shade. They fed each other fruit. Dark juice dribbled into dimples. Cherry meat stained smiles and nostrils. — Tom Robbins

It's just a trickle at first, dark hallways, empty rooms, but then Angela sees a face. Eyes wide, nostrils flaring, a little girl's mouth covered with taut rope. The room is damp and cold and simple, a chair in the middle of it all. That's where the girl sits in a yellow dress, hands bound, hair wet with sweat and feet dangling off the floor. The chair's much too big for her, and something's coming. Something bad. — E.M. Blomqvist

Because hypocrisy stinks in the nostrils one is likely to rate it as a more powerful agent for destruction than it is. — Rebecca West

Some say God exists outside creation if in fact he did breath in Adams nostrils he became part of humanity and creation. — Stanley Victor Paskavich

The smell the tornado left in its wake combined pine, sulfur, and natural gas with the sickly sweet smell of death. It was a nauseating, desperate smell that clung to his nostrils and turned his stomach in every disaster zone he would ever visit. After one tornado, a man looked at him with ancient eyes and described the smell in words he would never forget: It comes from the pit of hell. — Kim Cross

Jeff's fingers pinched around Eddie's nostrils as he pushed deep into Eddie's throat. There was no way of getting any air into his lungs. No way of moving even.
Eddie had never felt safer in his life.
Total, utter trust. — Josephine Myles

Of all things in the world that stink in the nostrils of men, hypocrisy is the worst. — Charles Spurgeon

Should I tolerate it as normal male behaviour, like when he gets a cold and starts Googling nose cancer symptoms discharge nostrils? — Sophie Kinsella

Tilting his head back he slowly released an enormous quantity of smoke from his mouth and drew it up through his nostrils. He continued to smoke in this "French-inhale" style. Very probably, it was not part of the sofa vaudeville of a showoff but, rather, the private, exposed achievement of a young man who, at one time or another, might have tried shaving himself left-handed. — J.D. Salinger

The priest rose to take up the crucifix; at that, she strained her neck forward like someone who is thirsty, and, pressing her lips to the body of the Man-God, she laid upon it with all her expiring strength the most passionate kiss of love she had ever given. Then he recited the Miserateur and the Indulgentiam, dipped his right thumb in the oil, and began he unctions: first on the eyes, which had so coveted all earthly splendors; then on the nostrils, greedy for mild breezes and the smells of love; then on the mouth, which had opened to utter lies, which had moaned with pride and cried out in lust; then on the hands, which had delighted in the touch of smooth material; and lastly on the soles of the feet, once so quick when she hastened to satiate her desires and which now would never walk again. — Vladimir Nabokov

If we bought everything on the Internet, our eyes and mouths and nostrils would probably begin to film over with a tegument - one initially tissue-thin and capable of being removed each morning, but which gradually thickened and hardened until we were imprisoned in our own tiny minds. — Will Self

O'Shaughnessy is hitting Denholt on the side of his head with his free arm, great, walloping, pile-driver blows. The two of them stagger together, like partners in a crazy dance. Glass is breaking all around them. Gray smoke from the six shots, pink-and-white dust from the chipped brick-and-plaster walls, swirl around them in a rainbow haze. Something vividly green flares up from one of the overturned retorts, goes right out again. O'Shaughnessy tears the emptied gun away, flings it off somewhere. More breaking glass, and this time a tart pungent smell that makes the nostrils sting. The crunch of pulverized tube glass underfoot makes it sound as if they were scuffling in sand or hard-packed snow. ("Jane Brown's Body") — Cornell Woolrich

His nostrils flared, he was breathing like a picadored bull. — Jerry Spinelli

Poof," Ross said. "I'm still here." "You smell something?" Kirk asked. "Smell what? My fuckin' nostrils froze up long ago. — Keith C. Blackmore

Under the desert sun, in the dogmatic clarity, the fables of theology and the myths of classical philosophy dissolve like mist. The air is clean, the rock cuts cruelly into flesh; shatter the rock and the odor of flint rises to your nostrils, bitter and sharp. Whirlwinds dance across the salt flats, a pillar of dust by day; the thornbush breaks into flame at night. What does it mean? It means nothing. It is as it is and has no need for meaning. The desert lies beneath and soars beyond any possible human qualification. Therefore, sublime. — Edward Abbey

The dissolute and unlawful king came: Herod! I saw him with my own eyes when he called me to Jericho to heal him. I took along my secret herbs - I knew all about such lore - and went. I went, and from that day on, I have not been able to eat meat, for I saw his putrescent flesh; I have not been able to drink wine, for I saw his blood filled with worms. I have retained his stench in my nostrils for over thirty years. — Nikos Kazantzakis

Help me," said Jesper. "We need to barricade the entrance."
The man behind the desk wore gray scholar's robes. His nostrils were flared so wide in effrontery that Jesper feared being sucked up one of them.
"Young man - " Jesper pointed his gun at the scholar's chest. "Move."
"Jesper!" his father said.
"Don't worry, Da. People point guns at each other all the time in Ketterdam. It's basically a handshake."
"Is that true?" his father asked as the scholar grudgingly moved aside and they shoved the heavy desk in front of the door.
"Absolutely," said Wylan.
"Certainly not ," said the scholar. — Leigh Bardugo

The woman with hair of flames knelt over me. She might have been pretty if not for the anger in every corner of her face. Emerald eyes glowed with almost seeping venom as her nostrils flared.
- Lord Tristan Dracanburh, Ethandun — Alexandra May

Her armpits were still slightly wet & she examined them one by one. No hair. This was one of her greatest assets over her sister who had underarm hair.Her slender arms & long legs were also free of hair. She had only a little bit of pubic hair, she noticed. It must be terrible to have lots of ugly underarm & thick coarse arm & leg hairs that you had to shave off daily, she thought. A bit more pubic hair, she wouldn't mind, she decided. But they tended to tickle men's nostrils & make them sneeze.[MMT] — Nicholas Chong

Since when are you so nice?" I whispered.
Cage's nostrils flared slightly. "Only once, since the day I met you, Teacup, that I haven't treated you right. Am I right? — Madeline Sheehan

Tsornin's nostrils showed red, but his ears were as alert as ever, and occasionally he would rub his nose gently against the nape of her neck, just in case she was momentarily not thinking about him. — Robin McKinley

I returned from the West, and brought home in my nostrils and nerves that benumbing lethargy, imprudent hostility, and arrogant superiority with which the West viewed the fate of Eastern Europe. — Sandor Marai

When we're being mindful, we're paying attention to the present moment, deliberately and non-judgementally. When we're meditating, we're being mindful of a specific object, such as the sensation of the breath at the tip of our nostrils, for a sustained period of time. — David Michie

The man went to the controls, looking up at me, flaring his nostrils to my actions. His voice was like a voice under water. "We'll see what becomes of your rebellious nature when you lose your memories, Rei Lin." He punched a few buttons and turned the knob on the wall to the right. — Millicent Ashby

THREE MONTHS HAVE GONE BY without the taste of Gabriel Storm in my mouth, the scent of his skin in my nostrils, the rush of his powerful body pounding into mine. — Magda Alexander

The View from Europe And that was Africa: the long line to the south little higher than the Atlantic that defined it. The sea rolled its drums on the shore, broke in white foam, flowers for the hair of the girls. I sipped the wind with my nostrils, and the smell was the smell of fear. Two million- year-old skulls surfaced from soil fathoms, grinning their disdain at the accuracy of the new weapons. And that was Eden indeed: Adam was black and the woman, Eve, was black; and the serpent, master of the click languages, spoke to them sibilantly of how the machine would sound as it waited under the tree of death, offering them nothing but a pretence of life. 1988 — R.S. Thomas

Look into the face of a man who will kill you for a belief and your nostrils will snuff up the scent of abomination. Hear a speech declaring a holy war and, I assure you, your ears should catch the clink of evil's scales and the dragging of its monstrous tail over the purity of the language. — Terry Pratchett

Smoking I find the most ridiculous of all the varieties of human behavior and practically the only one that is entirely against nature. Can you imagine a cow or any animal taking a mouthful of smoldering straw then breathing in the smoke and blowing it out through its nostrils? — Ian Fleming

Law has no skin, reason has no nostrils. — Jose Rizal

Every second I stand here in your temperature-controlled cell," Jenna said, "I'm forced to suck down the same recycled air that's going through your nostrils, and that thought absolutely nauseates me. — Richard Finney

The smell of the sea, of kelp and fish and bitter moving water, rose stronger in my nostrils. It flooded my consciousness like an ancestral memory. The swells rose sluggishly and fell away, casting up dismal gleams between the boards of the pier. And the whole pier rose and fell in stiff and creaking mimicry, dancing its long slow dance of dissolution. I reached the end and saw no one, heard nothing but my footsteps and the creak of the beams, the slap of waves on the pilings. It was a fifteen-foot drop to the dim water. The nearest land ahead of me was Hawaii. — Ross Macdonald

And the purple parted before it, snapping back like skin after a slash, and what it let out wasn't blood but light: amazing orange light that filled her heart and mind with a terrible mixture of joy, terror, and sorrow. No wonder she had repressed this memory all these years. It was too much. Far too much. The light seemed to give the fading air of evening a silken texture, and the cry of a bird struck her ear like a pebble made of glass. A cap of breeze filled her nostrils with a hundred exotic perfumes: frangipani, bougainvillea, dusty roses, and oh dear God, night-blooming cereus ... And rising above one horizon came the orange mansion of the moon, bloated and burning cold, while the sun sank below the other, boiling in a crimson house of fire. She thought that mixture of furious light would kill her with its beauty. — Stephen King

inner cheek, heart hammering, realizing he'd wasted two valuable bullets on a dime store scare. Only one bullet left. Then he was out of ammo. Roy checked his watch. Not even 4am yet. Hours to go before dawn. Might as well be days. Breathe. Remember to breathe. He took in air through his nostrils, tried to let it out slowly. His hands were shaking, and sweat was stinging his eyes despite the cool temperature. Roy holstered his sidearm, and drew his KA-BAR knife from his belt sheath, clutching it to his chest. Okay, stay calm. Find a place — Jack Kilborn

On the hill there was a poor old tramp wandering about with his stick, in among the carriages. A mass of rags covered his shoulders, and a squashed beaver-hat, bent down into the shape of a bowl, concealed his face; but, when he took it off, he exposed, instead of eyelids, two yawning bloodstained holes. The flesh was tattered into scarlet strips; and fluid was trickling out, congealing into green crusts that reached down to his nose, with black nostrils that kept sniffing convulsively. — Gustave Flaubert

He tried his luck again, and things went so smoothly that with no more noise or disturbance than the last time, he found himself rid of the burden that had caused him so much grief. But since Don Quixote had a sense of smell as acute as his hearing, and Sancho was joined so closely to him, and the vapors rose up almost in a straight line, some unavoidably reached his nostrils, and as soon as they did he came to the assistance of his nostrils and squeezed them closed between two fingers, and in a somewhat nasal voice, he said: It seems to me, Sancho, that you are very frightened. — Miguel De Cervantes Saavedra

Yes, I know," he said, impatient. "I am going to rend you from limb to limb. Someday. When I feel like it. In the meantime, you will not faint, you will get warm, and you will stop being distressed." His nostrils pinched. "I don't like how it smells. — Thea Harrison

I could tell she was snooty. If she leaned her head back any further, her nostrils would act as teacups. — E.L. Todd

I am merely biding my time. (Stryder)
For what? (Rowena)
For the moment when I am out of this cell and am able to wreak havoc on the one who put me here. I'm going to pull out his innards through his nostrils and dance around his entrails. (Stryder) — Kinley MacGregor

Her nostrils flared as she inhaled. There was a musky scent in the air, salty and animal, and it made her clench her legs together.
He grinned suddenly, his white teeth gritted together, as if he knew what he did to her. His fist was moving faster now, the deep red head of his cock appearing and disappearing between his fingers. It shone, fully revealed, and so big she bit her lip.
"Now," he grunted. "Now, Eve, watch me. Are you watching me?"
"Yes," she moaned.
The muscles stood out in his neck as a white liquid erupted from his cock, flowing and spurting, his legs shaking, his hand slowing.
And the entire time he watched her. — Elizabeth Hoyt

On TV you can, you know you can cram, you know, 30 people into a closet and have an orgy, and then they can all shoot up, and everybody has cigarettes in their nostrils and their ears. They don't care. So yeah, television is amazing right now. — Billy Bob Thornton

Steven laid Emma gently on the carpet of daisies to take the little flagon from her hand. She watched, half bewitched, as he removed the stopper and touched it ever so lightly to the pulse point at the base of her throat. The lush woodsy scent rose to her nostrils, and Emma closed her eyes to savor this new pleasure. Steven stretched out beside Emma and kissed the place he had just perfumed, one hand resting brazenly on her bare breast. She swallowed a moan, for there was still some vestige of pride held prisoner in a dark part of her heart. The perfume touched the sensitive place beneath her right ear then, and as before, Steven followed the scent with his lips. Emma — Linda Lael Miller

No alien land in all the world has any deep strong charm for me but one, no other land could so longingly and so beseechingly haunt me, sleeping and waking, through half a lifetime, as that one has done. Other things leave me, but it abides me; other things change, but it remains the same. For me its balmy airs are always blowing, its summer seas flashing in the sun; the pulsing of it surfbeat is in my ear; I can see its garland crags, its leaping cascades, its plumy palms drowsing by the shore, its remote summits floating like islands above the cloud wrack; I can feel the woodland solitudes, I can hear the splash of its brooks; in my nostrils still lives the breath of flowers that perished twenty years ago.
-MARK TWAIN in an 1889 Dinner Speech at Delmonico's in New York to honor two baseball teams that had just returned from touring the Pacific, including Honolulu. — John Richard Stephens