Past Never Leaves Us Quotes & Sayings

The clear cold sunshine glances into the brittle woods, and approvingly beholds the sharp wind scattering the leaves and drying the moss. It glides over the park after the moving shadows of the clouds, and chases them, and never catches them, all day. It looks in the windows, and touches the ancestral portraits with bars and patches of brightness, never contemplated by the painters. — Charles Dickens

The responsibility for the risks we posed to others in some of our most extreme actions in those underground years never leaves my thoughts for long. The antiwar movement in all its commitment, all its sacrifice and determination, could not stop the violence unleashed against Vietnam. And therein lies cause for real regret. — Bill Ayers

Of all things this was the saddest, that life goes on: if one leaves one's lover, life should stop for him, and if one disappears from the world, then the world should stop, too: and it never did. And that was the real reason for most people getting up in the morning: not because it would matter but because it wouldn't. — Truman Capote

Then I saw her - Lars's guest - the one they called Faith. I wouldn't have missed her. She still had patches of her human karma clinging to her new form. It was as if the brightest sunlight I'd ever seen was filtering through the leaves of a tree while she sat under it on a spring day. I'd never seen anything like it. — Donna Augustine

Competition, free enterprise, and an open market were never meant to be symbolic fig leaves for corporate socialism and monopolistic capitalism. — Ralph Nader

The way I saw it, people are like leaves that have fallen into a swift-moving stream. As the leaves get carried downstream, some are caught in rocks and never get any farther. Some are swept to shore. Others - the lucky ones - keep going, missing the stones, staying clear of the shore, staying afloat until they reach the river delta and break free into open water. — Tony Curtis

Love cuts deeper than the sharpest blade, cripples more than shattered bones, and leaves scars that can never fade. — Jeaniene Frost

The three of us do not go out very often as the three of us. I think Daniel is perfect for Jed, which is the highest compliment I can give. But my friendship isn't with him, and Jed understands that. When we hit the road, we hit it together alone.
We get to the bridge, out undestined destination. Even though there's no sign, no arrow, Jed turns at the last minute and parks us in a verge right before the bridge leaves the ground.
The trunk pops open, and Jed runs round back to retrieve a bag of oranges and a sweatshirt that fits me better.
Shall we make like lizards and leap? he asks.
I never felt the urge to jump off a bridge, but there are times I have wanted to jump out of my life, out of my skin.
Would you stroll me down the promenade instead? I ask back.
Most certainly, my splendid.
There is no word for our kind of friendship. Two people tho don't see each other a lot, but can make each other effortlessly happy. — David Levithan

They never exhale, the trees; on a very windy day, they rustle and inhale, and then the leaves and the branches all tremble as though something means to strangle the life from them. The sky watches on. The world is filled with anticipation, as if to wonder if this day will be a great day, or a horrible day, or the last day. — Lauren DeStefano

Never be grandiloquent when you want to drive home a searching truth. Don't whip with a switch that has the leaves on, if you want it to tingle. — Henry Ward Beecher

Our life consists not in the pursuit of material success but in the quest for worthy spiritual growth. Our entire earthly existence is but a transitional stage in the movement toward something higher, and we must not stumble and fall, nor must we linger fruitlessly on one rung of the ladder. Material laws alone do not explain our life or give it direction. The laws of physics and physiology will never reveal the indisputable manner in which the Creator constantly, day in and day out, participates in the life of each of us, unfailingly granting us the energy of existence; when this assistance leaves us, we die. And in the life of our entire planet, the Divine Spirit surely moves with no less force: this we must grasp in our dark and terrible hour. — Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

We bloomed in Spring. Our bodies are the leaves of God. The apparent seasons of life and death our eyes can suffer; but our souls, dear, I will just say this forthright: they are God Himself, we will never perish until He does. — Teresa Of Avila

Suffering the nasty twisting of body parts that should never be twisted, the card soldiers fell, lifeless, and Arch's bodyguards were soon pushing through the tangles of Outerwilderbeastie, cruching twigs and leaves underfoot.
Visit the labs?" Blister said, refurring the squate network of building in Wondertropolies' warehouse district, where a consortium of Alyss' scientists and engineers had tried to transform a host of captured Glass Eyes into a benign force. On the lab grounds were the incinerator baths
large pits into which the Glass Eyes were being herded and melted down, sorched into ash. There would be lots of Glasss Eyes to choose from at the labs, bbut Ripkins shook his head.
To much security," he said.
Find one that roaming?"
It'll be easier for us to avoid notcie," Ripkins said.
Yeah, but it'd be more fun to hit the labs. — Frank Beddor

And she leaves. She opens the door and, without a backward glance, goes out and shuts the door. I stand at the window and watch her go. She vanishes in the shadow of a building. Hands resting on the sill, I gaze for the longest time at where she disappeared. Maybe she forgot something she wanted to say and will come back. But she never does. All that's left is an absence that's like a hollow space. — Haruki Murakami

Leaves that rustled, twigs that scraped and rattled. But the thin shapes weren't falling, they were scurrying head first down the tree-trunks at a speed that seemed to leave time behind. Some of them had no shape they could have lived with, and some might never have had any skin. She saw their shriveled eyes glimmer eagerly and their toothless mouths gape with an identical infantile hunger. Their combined weight bowed the lowest branches while they extended arms like withered sticks to snatch the child. ("With The Angels") — Ramsey Campbell

I think the pursuit of happiness is the pursuit of reality because illusion never leaves us ultimately happy. — Parker Palmer

In all my travels I never met with any one Scotchman but what was a man of sense: I believe everybody of that country that has any, leaves it as fast as they can. — Francis Lockier

The graves grow deeper.
The dead are more dead each night.

Under the elms and the rain of leaves,
The graves grow deeper.

The dark folds of the wind
Cover the ground. The night is cold.

The leaves are swept against the stones.
The dead are more dead each night.

A starless dark embraces them.
Their faces dim.

We cannot remember them
Clearly enough. We never will. — Mark Strand

Tell me, Socrates, have you got a nurse? Why do you ask such a question, I said, when you ought rather to be answering? Because she leaves you to snivel, and never wipes your nose: she has not even taught you to know the shepherd from the sheep. What makes you say that? I replied. — Plato

He has a really consistent routine. He comes in in the morning at around 8:30. He reads five newspapers. He reads The Financial Times, The Washington Post, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and The Omaha World Herald. Then he has a stack of reports on his desk from the companies Berkshire owns, and some trade press like American Banker or oil and gas journals, and through the rest of the day, he alternates between flipping through this stuff and then talking on the phone to people either who call him or who he calls. He never calls his managers; they can call him. He is really accessible, but he leaves them alone.
Then he has CNBC on all day long with the crawl, with the sound muted and if he sees his name cross along the bottom and they are talking about him, he will turn the sound on to find out what they are saying. That is his day. He doesn't do meetings
there are no meetings.
— Alice Schroeder

If we pursue this way, if we are decent, industrious, and honest, if we so loyally and truly fulfill our duty, then it is my conviction that in the future as in the past the Lord God will always help us. In the long run He never leaves decent folk in the lurch. Often He may test them, He may send trials upon them, but in the long run He always lets His sun shine upon them once more and at the end He gives them His blessing. — Adolf Hitler

i am confident i am over you. so much that some mornings i wake up with a smile on my face and my hands pressed together thanking the universe for pulling you out of me. thank god i cry. thank god you left. i would not be the empire i am today if you had stayed.

but then.

there are some nights i imagine what i might do if you showed up. how if you walked into the room this very second every awful thing you've ever done would be tossed out the closet window and all the love would rise up again. it would pour through my eyes as if it never really left in the first place. as if it's been practicing how to stay silent so long only so it could be this loud on your arrival. can someone explain that. how even when the love leaves. it doesn't leave. how even when i am so past you. i am so helplessly brought back to you. — Rupi Kaur

He who never leaves his country is full of prejudices. — Carlo Goldoni

It was a fruit we had never seen before, larger than an apple, about the size of a grapefruit. It was round and yellow like the leaves of a neglected book. — Mai Al-Nakib

As soon as he had left the room and walked into the air, he knew that he would never return and for the first time his fears lifted. It was a spring morning, and when he walked into Severndale Park he felt the breeze bringing back memories of a much earlier life, and he was at peace. He sat beneath a tree and looked up at its leaves in amazement - where once he might have gazed at them and sensed there only the confusion of his own thoughts, now each leaf was so clear and distinct that he could see the lightly coloured veins which carried moisture and life. And he looked down at his own hand, which seemed translucent beside the bright grass. His head no longer ached, and as he lay upon the earth he could feel its warmth beneath him. — Peter Ackroyd

When we got to the Lock-Horne Building on Park Avenue - again Win's full name is Windsor Horne Lockwood III, so you do the math - Dad said, "You want me to just drop you off?" Sometimes my father leaves me awestruck. Fatherhood is about balance, but how can one man do it so well, so effortlessly? Throughout my life he pushed me to excel without ever crossing the line. He reveled in my accomplishments yet never made them seem to be all that important. He loved without condition, yet he still made me want to please him. He knew, like now, when to be there, and when it was time to back off. "I'll be okay." He — Harlan Coben

He never leaves my side. And I know he never will. — J.A. Redmerski

We were running one morning through the fall leaves. I looked at him and had what I supposed was a defining moment. I saw how handsome he is, how strong
mentally and physically. When I was with him, I ... I really liked myself. Being with him was fun. Easy. I'd never felt so intensely about anyone before, and it made me sad. I wanted him to be around for a long time, to be my friend forever, and I knew it didn't work that way. But it didn't occur to me that what I was feeling was romantic love. Not until Mick kissed me." Fielding smiled slowly, a blush warming his cheeks. I felt an answering smile hijack my own. "Which he would never, ever have done if not for the mistletoe. — Eli Easton

Love, like the cold bath, is never negative, it seldom leaves us where it finds us; if once we plunge into it, it will either heighten our virtues, or inflame our vices. — Charles Caleb Colton

It's always hard to lose somebody. It leaves a hole in you heart that never grows back. — Kevin Brooks

The acrobat practices: He steps on the edge of a chair and leaps to the floor, feeling the rush as the air flares up his face as he falls. Then he sets himself on something higher, like a table then jumps. He scales a ladder to the ceiling, climbs a tree, pole, watchtower. He keeps increasing the height until no one sees him and the fear to jump leaves him completely, layer by layer [. . .] The acrobat imagines there is a highest possible point in the sky where if he were to fall from it the fall would never end. — Wataru Tsurumi

Virtue is our true wealth and the true reward of its possessor; it cannot be lost, it never deserts us until life leaves us. — Leonardo Da Vinci