She Is Fire Quotes & Sayings

What I know is that she sets me on fire, and if you were to perform an intradermal test on me, you'd know when she was in it because you'd see the trails of blaze she left behind. Because that's what I feel at the mere thought of her, and I'd rather live my life in flames than be numb without her. — Claire Contreras

There is a whole generation of young people just like us wandering around Europe and the rest of the world, trying to find some meaning for why they are alive and what they should choose to do with their time. When Martha leaves and we sit in front of the fire in the living room, I look to Lily until she turns to me and I can see the grief that hides just under the surface of her expression. We are, or at least were, two of those lost souls: wanderers, backpackers, season workers, Wwoofers, Workawayers, travellers: searching the world for something or someplace to hold on to. And we have come home not because we have retired from trying to find answers and are ready to settle into adulthood, but because my death has come upon us fast and unexpected. I am not the first person of this generation of travellers- or any person who lives in this godless, superficial society- to die. But I think that it feels to Lily and to me, my mother too perhaps, that I may very well be. — Annie Fisher

You are a free man now, and Ygritte is a free woman. What dishonor if you lay together?"
"I might get her with child."
"Aye, I'd hope so. A strong son or a lively laughing girl kissed by fire, and where's the harm in that?"
Words failed him for a moment. "The boy ... the child would be a bastard."
"Are bastards weaker than other children? More sickly, more like to fail?"
"No, but-"
"You are bastard born yourself. And if Ygritte does not want a chile, she will go to some woods witch and drink a cup o' moon tea. You do not come in to it, once the seed is planted."
I will not father a bastard. — George R R Martin

Simon had never noticed before, but she wore a silver ring on her right hand, with a partner of flames around the band of it, and a carved L in the center. It reminded him of the ring Clary wore around her neck, with its design of stars.
"It's the Lightwood family ring," she said, noticing where his gaze was fixed. "Every family has an emblem. Ours is fire. — Cassandra Clare

Peter sighed into the water, and his breath sent a small circle of it into tiny ripples. "It seems cowardly, getting old. Don't you think?"
She rolled onto her side to look at him, pillowing her ear with her right arm, and letting her fingers dangle in the water beyond her head. "How is it cowardly?"
Peter kept his eyes on his reflection. "You just curl up around yourself, and sit by the fire, and try to be comfortable. When you get old, you just get smaller inside, and you try not to pay attention to anything but your blankets and your food and your bed."
"Being comfortable is not a bad thing."
Peter shrugged and turned his head to look at her as if it was a matter of fact. "Of course it is. Old people lock out all the scary, wild things. It's like they don't exist."
She wanted to say that she would have liked for those things not to exist, either, but she held her tongue, because she didn't want to sound like a coward. — Jodi Lynn Anderson

Duke was already sitting in the passenger seat, waiting for her. She got in and started the car. Duke busted into a Slim Jim of his own.
"You hairy toad fucker. That stuff's nasty. Your toilet must be like a nuclear reactor." Dove turned on her windshield wipers as a light mist seemed to fracture the glass.
"I'm sorry, Whore Basket. I couldn't hear you over the noise of you crapping your pants!" Duke took another huge bite and chewed the waxy meat like gum.
"This stuff is off the charts. I could eat vats of it. — Debra Anastasia

He scoffs. "I fucking bought this house. You did nothing but sign a piece of paper."

My teeth grind, and I point at my chest. "I did nothing? Really? Nothing? I didn't give birth to two of your children? I didn't sacrifice my career? I didn't keep your house while you were running off behind my back fucking that fake-breasted skeleton?"

I see red and my body is on fire. Everything burns. My eyes. My chest. My lips. I can't even feel my face. Every cell in body buzzes. I've never felt more alive. If this is what Saige was talking about when she said anger is healthy, then I'll have to let her know, once again, that she was right because this feels fan-fucking-tastic. — Winter Renshaw

Their eyes met at the same instant moment, Therese glancing up from a box she was opening, and the woman just turning her head so she looked directly at Therese. She was tall and fair, her long figure graceful in the loose fur coat that she held open with a hand on her waist, her eyes were grey, colorless, yet dominant as light or fire, and, caught by them, Therese could not look away. She heard the customer in front of her repeat a question, and Therese stood there, mute. The woman was looking at Therese, too, with a preoccupied expression, as if half her mind were on whatever is was she meant to buy here, and though there were a number of salesgirls between them, There felt sure the woman would come to her, Then, Then Therese saw her walk slowly towards the counter, heard her heart stumble to catch up with the moment it had let pass, and felt her face grow hot as the woman came nearer and nearer. — Patricia Highsmith

She twisted her hair as if the question made her uncomfortable. "Seeing the past is simple magic. Seeing the present or the future - that is not." "Yeah, well," Leo said. "Watch and learn, Sunshine. I just connect these last two wires, and - " The bronze plate sparked. Smoke billowed from the sphere. A flash of fire raced up Leo's sleeve. He pulled off his shirt, threw it down, and stomped on it. He could tell Calypso was trying not to laugh, but she was shaking with the effort. "Not a word," Leo warned. She glanced at his bare chest, which was sweaty, bony, and streaked with old scars from weapon-making accidents. "Nothing worth commenting on," she assured him. "If you want that device to work, perhaps you should try a musical invocation." "Right," he said. "Whenever an engine malfunctions, I like to tap-dance around it. Works every time. — Rick Riordan

Sue had been told that tumors had developed in her liver and lungs. She had been in a deep depression for a while, but she finally followed Barb's advice to call me after various people at her church kept saying that she could be happy - she was going home to be with Jesus. This is the type of thing that gives Christians a bad name. This, and the Inquisition. Sue wanted to open fire on them all. I think I encouraged this.
Some of her evangelical friends had insisted sorrowfully that her nieces wouldn't get into heaven, since they were Jews, as was one of her sisters. I told her what I believe to be true - that there was not one chance in a million that the nieces wouldn't go to heaven, and if I was wrong, who would even want to go? I promised that if there was any problem, she and I would refuse to go. We'd organize.
"What kind of shitty heaven would that be, anyway?" she asked. — Anne Lamott

Milena - what a rich heavy name, almost too full to be lifted, and in the beginning I didn't like it much, it seemed to me a Greek or Roman gone astray in Bohemia, violated by Czech, cheated of its accent, and yet in colour and form it is marvellously a woman, a woman whom one carries in one's arms out of the world, and out of the fire, I don't know which, and she presses herself willingly and trustingly into your arms. — Franz Kafka

Once she had thrown a square of birch bark into the fire when her father came in the door. He might then have asked her why her quill pen had shaped a row of straight and crooked question marks and after each one an exclamation point
in rows of ten, perhaps forty running along
?! ?! ?! ?!
arranged in pairs or couples. If he had asked her what is this folderol and what can this nonsense mean she would have said the same she said when shaping them with her pen, one pair, one couple after another. Each question mark stands for my ignorance and asks if I may learn and know the answer. And each exclamation point stands for my surprise at how little I know, my amazement at my vast ignorance, my utter astonishment at how much there is for me to learn. — Carl Sandburg

She walks to the boy, tilts her head up at him, and smiles. He bends down to kiss her. Then he helps her onto the horse, and she rides away with him to a faraway place, until they can no longer be seen.
These are only rumors, of course, and make little more than a story to tell around the fire. But it is told. And thus they live on. — Marie Lu

I still remember screaming like a fire engine with tears rolling down my face and snot pouring out of my nose clinging onto her chubby legs as she tried to leave. Yuk! I can't believe I used to be such a baby. How embarrassing is that? — Kate Cullen

Can fearsome Ayo, who is herself a warrior, not understand their suffering? Can she not see what fire and inundation have done to the Wakadan heart?" "Tetu, I am a woman . I saw more suffering, more of the human heart, in my first five years than you will see in five lifetimes. — Ta-Nehisi Coates

Fire rises out of the lunar mountains: when she is cold, I'll carry her up to a peak, and lay her down on the edge of a crater. — Charlotte Bronte

The Talmud, the compilation of discussions of Jewish Law which I have quoted earlier in this book, gives examples of bad prayers, improper prayers, which one should not utter. If a woman is pregnant, neither she nor her husband should pray, "May God grant that this child be a boy" (nor, for that matter, may they pray that it be a girl). The sex of the child is determined at conception, and God cannot be invoked to change it. Again, if a man sees a fire engine racing toward his neighborhood, he should not pray, "Please God, don't let the fire be in my house." Not only is it mean-spirited to pray that someone else's house burn instead of yours, but it is futile. A certain house is already on fire; the most sincere or articulate of prayers will not affect the question of which house it is. — Harold S. Kushner

Jon Snow, is this a proper castle now? Not just a tower?"
"It is." Jon took her hand.
"Good," she whispered. "I wanted t' see one proper castle, before ... before I ... "
"You'll see hundred castles. The battle's done. Maester Aemon will see to you. You're kissed by fire, remember? Lucky. It will take more than an arrow to kill you. Aemon will draw it out and patch you up, and we'll get milk of the poppy for the pain."
She just smiled at that. "D'you remember that cave? We should have stayed in that cave. I told you so."
"We'll go back to the cave," he said." You're not going to die, Ygritte. You're not."
"Oh." Ygritte cupped his cheek with her hand. "You know nothing, Jon Snow," she sighed, dying. — George R R Martin

On things she had to pack before leaving her home in advance of a forest fire, 1996. Childhood pictures and pictures of my life. Do you know how many pictures that is? Not just this life; I have pictures from 13,000 lives. — Shirley Maclaine

Is there a rug?' she asked, hanging fire.
'Nay. The sins burnin' in yer marrow will keep yer warm. — Stella Gibbons

Not all sons were like their fathers. A son chose the man he would be.
Not all daughters were like their fathers. A daughter monster chose the monster she would be. — Kristin Cashore

Walks the Fire is a good woman. She is white,but she has been among you for many years now.She was a good wife to Rides the Wind.She is a good mother to me.I remember your tales of how he hunted after she walked the fire to save Hears Not.When she was well, he held a banquet in her honor.You were all there to share his joy. — Stephanie Grace Whitson

The tale is told by royalty and vagabonds alike, nobles and peasants, hunters and farmers, the old and the young. The tale comes from every corner of the world, but no matter where it is told, it is always the same story.

...Some say that, once upon a time, she had a prince, a father, a society of friends. Others say that she was once a wicked queen, a worker of illusions, a girl who brought darkness across the lands. Still others say that she once had a sister, and that she loved her dearly. Perhaps all of these are true.

These are only rumors, of course, and make little more than a story to tell around the fire. But it is told. And thus they live on.

- "The Midnight Star," a folktale. — Marie Lu

Passion is the fire, enthusiasm and courage that an individual feels when she is doing something she loves while accomplishing worthy ends, something that satisfies her deepest needs. — Stephen Covey

Good God!" Avery gasped at the bloody wound on Lucien's head and Cedric's grief-stricken expression.
"You were dueling?" Sir John growled. "Fools."
He relieved Lawrence of Lucien's feet to help carry the unconscious Marquess up the stairs to an empty bedroom.
The second Lucien was on the bed Lady Rochester burst into the room, fire in her eyes. "Is he dead?" she asked, panic creeping into her.
"The blow glanced his skull," Lawrence said. "He may still live."
"May? Oh, he will not die. I want to kill him myself and he will not deny me that."

-His Wicked Seduction — Lauren Smith

I've found her, she is how the story tells. Black hair, pale skin, perfect body. And her eyes, oh, her eyes! She hurts with her eyes. I saw her at the School. Two pink diamonds. It's she, I perceive the fire. I finally found the Maid of Flames. — Chiara Cilli

Mom hopped up to turn off the burner, but it subsided before she got there. 'If this--whatever it is--starts playing with fire,' she said through clenched teeth, 'I'm going to give it a spanking. — Ann Hodgman

In 'Colonization in Reverse'41 (a famous poem much anthologized) the speaker is presented as a more or less reliable commentator who implies that Jamaicans who come to 'settle in de motherlan' are like English people who settled in the colonies. West Indian entrepreneurs, shipping off their countrymen 'like fire', turn history upside down. Fire can destroy, but may also be a source of warmth to be welcomed in temperate England. Those people who 'immigrate an populate' the seat of the Empire seem, like many a colonizer, ready to displace previous inhabitants. 'Jamaica live fi box bread/Out a English people mout' plays on a fear that newcomers might exploit the natives; and some of the immigrants are - like some of the colonizers from 'the motherland' - lazy and inclined to put on airs. Can England, who faced war and braved the worst, cope with people from the colonies turning history upside down? Can she cope with 'Colonizin in reverse'? — Mervyn Morris

It wasn't a lie, not at all like one of those lies she told herself all the time, like This is the last drink of the evening, or I'm not going to set the bitch's house on fire. — Melissa De La Cruz

Fire is no laughing matter. In a drunken attempt to appear womanly, my neighbor tried to burn her pubes off when she was fifteen, but it hurt too much to get it completely smooth. My friend had sex with her two years later and said her clit looked like a chestnut. I've been pro-bush ever since. — Brian Celio

No, she wanted to shout to him, no, my good knight, do not fear for me. The fire is mine. I am Daenerys Stormborn, daughter of dragons, bride of dragons, mother of dragons, don't you see! Don't you SEE? — George R R Martin

Miss Dartle,' I returned, 'how shall I tell you, so that you will believe me, that I know of nothing in Steerforth different from what there was when I first came here? I can think of nothing. I firmly believe there is nothing. I hardly understand even what you mean.' As she still stood looking fixedly at me, a twitching or throbbing, from which I could not dissociate the idea of pain, came into that cruel mark; and lifted up the corner of her lip as if with scorn, or with a pity that despised its object. She put her hand upon it hurriedly - a hand so thin and delicate, that when I had seen her hold it up before the fire to shade her face, I had compared it in my thoughts to fine porcelain - and saying, in a quick, fierce, passionate way, 'I swear you to secrecy about this!' said not a word more. — Charles Dickens

When the war has lasted twenty years ...
the dragonets will come.
When the land is soaked in blood and tears ...
the dragonets will come.
Find the SeaWing egg of deepest blue.
Wings of night shall come to you.
The largest egg in mountain high
will give to you the wings of sky.
For wings of earth, search through the mud
for an egg the color of dragon blood.
And hidden alone from the rival queens,
the SandWing egg awaits unseen.
Of three queens who blister and blaze and burn,
two shall die and one shall learn
if she bows to a fate that is stronger and higher,
she'll have the power of wings of fire.
Five eggs to hatch on brightest night,
five dragons born to end the fight.
Darkness will rise to bring the light.
The dragonets are coming ... — Tui T. Sutherland

There are rare people who will fuel the fire inside of you, who will awaken a dormant passion, who will push you and better you. She alone is my rarity. — Krista Ritchie

There is no beast, no rush of fire, like woman so untamed. She calmly goes her way where even panthers would be shamed. — Aristophanes

The silence of the storm weighs heavily
On their strained spirits: sometimes one will say
Some trivial thing as though to ward away
Mysterious powers, that imminently lie
In wait, with the strong exorcising grace
Of everyday's futility. Desire
Becomes upon a sudden a crystal fire,
Defined and hard: If he could kiss her face,
Could kiss her hair! As if by chance, her hand
Brushes on his ... Ah, can she understand?
Or is she pedestalled above the touch
Of his desire? He wonders: dare he seek
From her that little, that infinitely much?
And suddenly she kissed him on the cheek. — Aldous Huxley

Fritz, this is Daniel. Daniel, Fritz," she introduced.
Daniel extended his palm in greeting.
"You best be nice to our Vhal!" Fritz said, ignoring Daniel's hand and pointing in his face.
"My, you didn't warn me you had bodyguards," Daniel chuckled, taking Fritz's hand from his face and shaking it. "You have my word, only kindness and care from me. — Elise Kova

He went to his own dark house and lighted the lamps and set fire in the stove. The clock wound by Elizabeth still ticked, storing in its spring the pressure of her hand, and the wool socks she had hung to dry over the stove screen were still damp. These were vital parts of Elizabeth that were not dead yet. Joseph pondered slowly over it. Life cannot be cut off quickly. One cannot be dead until the things he changed are dead. His effect is the only evidence of his life. — John Steinbeck

Your voice sounds like a midnight fire. All warm and worn in and golden. I could listen to you talk forever."
"I could never do that".
She laughed at him. He brought his lips to her ear.
"Your scent is like violets early in spring," he whispered. Then he laughed at himself because though it was true, he sounded like the worst kind of fool. — Veronica Rossi

Some say I loved her to the point of madness, bordering on obsession. She said I put her on a pedestal that her real self couldn't attain. Perhaps they're all right. Perhaps I am mad. And if that's the case, to be frank, I don't give a damn. What I know is that she sets me on fire, and if you were to perform an intradermal test on me, you'd know when she was in it because you'd see the trails of blaze she left behind. Because that's what I feel at the mere thought of her, and I'd rather live my life in flames than be numb without her." He paused, and I let out a breath, but then he said one last thing. "Come back to me, my little Road Runner, my world is cold and boring without you. — Claire Contreras

The story he [Todd Willingham] told me was this: He woke up to a fire. He ran out of the house and couldn't run back in to save his children, and that was enough to get me interested ... There's a writer in me that's like, ... this is a great story ... I have a good friend, who was my neighbor at the time, and I told her about it ... She had been a reporter, and she was like, "Let's go investigate it." — Elizabeth Gilbert

I have been in love with no one, and never shall," she whispered, "unless it should be with you."
How beautiful she looked in the moonlight!
Shy and strange was the look with which she quickly hid her face in my neck and hair, with tumultuous sighs, that seemed almost to sob, and pressed in mine a hand that trembled.
Her soft cheek was glowing against mine. "Darling, darling," she murmured, "I live in you; and you would die for me, I love you so."
I started from her.
She was gazing on me with eyes from which all fire, all meaning had flown, and a face colorless and apathetic.
"Is there a chill in the air, dear?" she said drowsily. "I almost shiver; have I been dreaming? Let us come in. Come; come; come in. — J. Sheridan Le Fanu

Why is it that the Alpha females are crazy?"
Meryn shrugged. "She made sense to me."
Colton turned to Meryn. "You also set Aiden's car on fire when he ignored you."
Amelia looked at Meryn. "Sounds reasonable."
Meryn grinned. "I know, right? — Alanea Alder

She poured the water, arranged some bread near enough the embers to scorch but not catch fire, and looked up at Little John. She was so accustomed to his step, to his bulk, that it took a moment to notice his face; and when she did ... It was, she thought, rather like the moment it took to realize one had cut one's finger as one stared dumbly at the first drop of blood on the knife-blade. You know it is going to hurt quite a lot in a minute. — Robin McKinley

The other red-haired woman stepped forward with a regal grace that was impressive. "I'm Kiara Quiakides and the fiercely stern blond on my right is my husband Nykyrian. And we have other kids, but this," she rubbed her hand over her distended belly, "is the only one with us right now. The others are at home, hopefully not making their nannies too crazy." Nykyrian let out an intimidating grunt. "If Adron sets fire to his room one more time, I vote we make him live outside in a tent." Everyone laughed. Except Kiara who appeared to actually consider it. Ryn — Sherrilyn Kenyon

I AM RAPHAEL, ONE OF THE SEVEN ARCHANGELS WHO PASS IN and out of the presence of the Holy One, blessed be he. I bring him the prayers of all who pray and of those who don't even know that they're praying. Some prayers I hold out as far from me as my arm will reach, the way a woman holds a dead mouse by the tail when she removes it from the kitchen. Some, like flowers, are almost too beautiful to touch, and others so aflame that I'd be afraid of their setting me on fire if I weren't already more like fire than I am like anything else. There are prayers of such power that you might almost say they carry me rather than the other way round - the way a bird with outstretched wings is carried higher and higher on the back of the wind. There are prayers so apologetic and shamefaced and halfhearted that they all but melt away in my grasp like sad little flakes of snow. Some prayers are very boring. — Frederick Buechner

Stealing equipment from a small-town fire station is such an easy, petty crime," Nick said. "It feels anticlimactic after starting the day in New York selling three stolen Rembrandts and outwitting the FBI."
"We could break into the International Bluegrass Music Museum," she said. "I hear that it's the Louvre of northwest Kentucky."
That got Nick's attention. "What have they got to see?"
"I was kidding! I was being sarcastic."
"Sarcasm isn't one of your strengths," he said. — Janet Evanovich

Some young man has wronged you, hasn't he?' From a person who renounced on principle the possibility of transcendental morality, she thought, it was an interesting choice of words.

'None of them's stuck around long enough to wrong me, Bruno.'

He waved a hand dismissively. 'Romance is a fiction anyway. A myth to sell greeting cards.' Still, he seemed ready, given a name and address, to go challenge the malefactor, like some feudal-era father defending his daughter's chastity. This was all in the eyes, of course. The rest of the face stayed perfectly composed. — Garth Risk Hallberg

When she can't sleep, she writes. All she remembers is his words. It will soon be dawn, with fire-stoked horses thundering to the humming sky of crickets. I will see you run. And I will run with you. That morning, while Ata ate a dripping mango over the sink, she felt him come up behind her and touch the small of her back, light as a current of air. He kissed the side of her neck, inhaled the steam of bitter cocoa, boiling with bay leaves, cinnamon, and nutmeg, and said it reminded him of his childhood. "You are from the islands," she said. But then he was gone. — Oonya Kempadoo

I swear, guys in groups are capable of the stupidest things."
"Like war," Kellan says, heaping napkins and ketchup packets onto her tray.
"And jumping off rooftops."
"And lighting their farts on fire," she says. — Jay Asher

I traced my finger along her smooth jaw line and then reached for the back of her head, pulling her into my space as I blew a kiss across her lips. "And now? Now are you excited?" "You're getting warmer," she whispered. I sucked on her bottom lip then let my mouth hover over hers as I answered, "I want you to be on fire. Not just warm, but blazing. Not intrigued, but impressed. Not just excited. I want you enthralled. And at the end of the night, what I really want ... " I closed my eyes so I wouldn't kiss her again. " ... is for those tears to be washed away from your memory for good. — Rachel Van Dyken

Are you really going back there with me?" I ask.
"Hell yes I am. Your wish is finally coming true. I will see your vagina. Plus, I really want to see the look on that woman's face when she gets a peek at your plethora of pubes. Your copious curls, your abundant bush, the wild mane that if it sees a spark will start a forest fire," she states.
"Are you finished?" I ask irritably.
"I think so. But give me five minutes and I might be able to get one more in. — Tara Sivec

*After Skulduggery kills Valkyrie*
Skulduggery: This has been a good day so far, all things considered, I have the location of the Grotesquey and I got to kill Valkyrie, which admittedly is something I've been wanting to do since I met her, she can be incredibly annoying
Scapegrace: Um
Skulduggery: She hardly ever shut up, I pretended to be the friends with her, but honestly, I just felt sorry for the poor girl. Not the brightest you know.
Valkyrie: You're such a goon. — Derek Landy

Meanwhile the doctor was saying, "The reason there are so many people on the river these days is because there are too many people everywhere else." Bonnie shivered, slipping into the crook of his left arm. "Why don't we build a fire?" she said. "The wilderness once offered men a plausible way of life," the doctor said. "Now it functions as a psychiatric refuge. Soon there will be no wilderness." He sipped at his bourbon and ice. "Soon there will be no place to go. Then the madness becomes universal." Another thought. "And the universe goes mad." "We — Edward Abbey

It was brief. Last year, I think. She's a social climber. No wonder she has her sights set on Christian." "Christian is taken. I told her to leave him alone or I would fire her." Kate gapes at me once more, stunned. I nod proudly, and she lifts her glass to salute me, impressed and beaming. "Mrs. Anastasia Grey! Way to go!" We clink. — E.L. James

Feelings are just a fire in a field of stubble: it burns for a moment, and then all that's left is soot and ashes. Do you know what the main thing is - the thing a woman should look for in her man? She should look for a quality that's not at all exciting but that's rarer than gold: decency. — Amos Oz

This is my hall. And I do not
"
She was cut off as a sharp spear of fire shot out of Arosh's fingers. Livia pulled a guard in front of her, who immediately turned to ash.
"Shut up, woman. I am speaking. — Elizabeth Hunter

Sometimes that's all you can do, I think. Hold hands. Because life gets so scary sometimes, so bleak, so cold, that you are beyond being able to be comforted by mere words.


'Men are for amusement only. They are treats. Like candy. Like ice cream on an Alabama afternoon. A dessert. They are not the main course. As soon as you have a man in your life who becomes the main course, that is the time, my sweet, when you should go on a diet. Right that second. Men are for dessert only.' Envision: honey.
'Yum, yum,' I told her.
'They are yummy.' She winked at me. 'But never take them seriously. A bite here and there is puh-lenty. All three of my husbands died, bless their pea-brained souls, but I never thought of them as the chicken and potatoes. They were always the flamin' cherries jubilee at the end of dinner.' She stared off into space. 'And there was many a time, darlin', that I wanted to set them on fire. — Cathy Lamb

Unless we are all mad, there is at the back of the most bewildering business a story: and if we are all mad, there is no such thing as madness. If I set a house on fire, it is quite true that I may illuminate many other people's weaknesses as well as my own. It may be that the master of the house was burned because he was drunk; it may be that the mistress of the house was burned because she was stingy, and perished arguing about the expense of the fire-escape. It is, nevertheless, broadly true that they both were burned because I set fire to their house. — G.K. Chesterton

The life spills over, some days.
She cannot be at rest,
Wishes she could explode

Like that red tree -
The one that bursts into fire
All this week.

Senses her infinite smallness
But can't seize it,
Recognizes the folly of desire,

The folly of withdrawal -
Kicks at the curb, the pavement,
If only she could, at this moment,

When what she's doing is plodding
To the bus stop, to go to school,
Passing that fiery tree - if only she could

Be making love,
Be making a painting,
Be exploding, be speeding through the universe

Like a photon, like a shower
Of yellow flames -
She believes if she could only catch up

With the riding rhythm of things, of her own electrons,
Then she would be at rest -
If she could forget school,

Climb the tree,
Be the tree,
burn like that. — Alicia Suskin Ostriker

One that is ever kind said yesterday:
'Your well-beloved's hair has threads of grey,
And little shadows come about her eyes;
Time can but make it easier to be wise
Though now it seems impossible, and so
All that you need is patience.'
Heart cries, 'No,
I have not a crumb of comfort, not a grain.
Time can but make her beauty over again:
Because of that great nobleness of hers
The fire that stirs about her, when she stirs,
Burns but more clearly. O she had not these ways
When all the wild Summer was in her gaze.'
Heart! O heart! if she'd but turn her head,
You'd know the folly of being comforted! — W.B.Yeats

Dona Crista laughed a bit. "Oh, Pip, I'd be glad for you to try. But do believe me, my dear friend, touching her heart is like bathing in ice."
I imagine. I imagine it feels like bathing in ice to the person touching her. But how does it feel to her? Cold as she is, it must surely burn like fire. — Orson Scott Card

It is an heretic that makes the fire,
Not she which burns in't. — William Shakespeare

I don't want to be like her, like Vivian. I don't want to hurt anyone. Am I going to hurt people?"
"No one can make you do that, child. You are caught between two worlds, much like my own Lend. You will want the fire, you will want to be filled. It is your nature. I hope you do not fall, but she is much stronger than you are."
She smiled at me, reaching out as though she would wipe away my tears. "Cling to what is good in your life. Be good to my son. — Kiersten White

The Fire

When a human is asked about a particular fire,
she comes close:
then it is too hot,
so she turns her face -

and that's when the forest of her bearable life appears,
always on the other side of the fire. The fire
she's been asked to tell the story of,
she has to turn from it, so the story you hear
is that of pines and twitching leaves
and how her body is like neither -

all the while there is a fire
at her back
which she feels in fine detail,
as if the flame were a dremel
and her back its etching glass.

You will not know all about the fire
simply because you asked.
When she speaks of the forest
this is what she is teaching you,

you who thought you were her master. — Katie Ford

She says to me, but were we ever intimate? How intimate were we really? Sure, there were the ordinary familiarity-type things - our bodies, our bodily discharges and stains and seepages, an encyclopedic knowledge of each other's family grudges, knowledge of each other's early school yard slights, our dietary peccadilloes, our tv remote control channel-changing styles. And yet ...
And yet?
And yet in the end did we ever really give each other completely to the other? Do either of us even know how to really share ourselves? Imagine the house is on fire and I reach to save one thing - what is it? Do you know? Imagine that I am drowning and I reach within myself to save that one memory which is me - what is it? Do you know? What things would either of us reach for? Neither of us know. After all these years we just wouldn't know. — Douglas Coupland

Listen, Mollie, I need to get home and let my parents know I'm alive. Then I am coming back for you. If my home is still standing, I'll provide a place for you and Frank as long as you need." "Why would you do that?" She looked a little taken aback, which surprised him. Because he loved her. Because they had just experienced the worst two days imaginable, and the bond that had been forged between them was not something to be tossed away. If Louis Hartman didn't like it, he would quit. The fire had just taught Zack what was most important in this world, and she was looking straight at him. — Elizabeth Camden

I looked through the Gideon Bible in my motel room for tales of great destruction. The sun was risen upon the Earth when Lot entered into Zo-ar, I read. Then the Lord rained upon Sodom and upon Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the Lord out of Heaven; and He overthrew those cities, and all the plain, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and that which grew upon the ground.
So it goes.
Those were vile people in both those cities, as is well known. The World was better off without them.
And Lot's wife, of course, was told not to look back where all those people and their homes had been. But she did look back, and I love her for that, because it was so human.
So she was turned to a pillar of salt. So it goes. — Kurt Vonnegut

Why is she afraid?" he asked. "She's not Anjin-san. Just a little nervous. Please excuse her. She's never seen a foreigner close to before." "Tell her when the moon's full, barbarians sprout horns and fire comes out of our mouths like dragons. — James Clavell

Where are your glasses?"
She shrugged. "Lost. How did you know I wore some?"
"You squint, Pima."
"Pima? My name is Vicky."
"I know what your name is. But I choose to call you Pima. Pain in my ass."
"Well excuse me, Nobody," she sassed back with the first ounce of fire he'd seen in her. — Eve Langlais

Simon told me I should take you home and start making kits. What do you think?" Max looked down at her, love and lust glowing equally in his brilliant smile. "Max?" "What?" His tone was wary; he'd come to expect the unexpected when she used that particular tone of voice. "Will I give birth to a baby or a litter?" "Emma," he groaned. "I mean, will we be feeding them baby formula or Kitten Chow?" "Emma!" "If they get stuck in a tree, who do we call? Does the fire department do kitten rescues anymore? This is important stuff to know, Lion-O!" "God save me. — Dana Marie Bell

A plane flies overhead and inside it is a writer who has spent most of his life as a law clerk, even though he's always known deep down that he's a writer. For the first time, he's worked out what he wants to write, what the truth really is. He begs a napkin and a pen off the air hostess and he writes down the most beautiful sentence ever written, as the engine catches fire outside and the plane starts its plummet to the ground. It doesn't matter to him. It's the only sentence he's ever written and it is the last and no part of him cares. The sentence falls through the air with singed, black edges and comes to rest in a tree, in a park, miles away. One day, around ten years from now, an old widow of an astronaut will find it when a strong breeze finally blows it from its hiding place. She will read it and she will weep. — Pleasefindthis

It is a heretic that makes the fire, Not she which burns in it. — William Shakespeare

What I want to know is when does Lily get off her butt and do some chores?" Tristan said, panting, as he dragged a gnarly stump of bleached wood up the beach. "I feel like I've been stacking wood and stoking fire all damn day while she just sits there."
Rowan gave Tristan a disapproving look. "It's a mechanic's privilege to serve his witch. — Josephine Angelini

I had always heard rumors of her, Nanook thought, she who can control the wind, the water, the earth, and fire ... she who can talk to time. But those were old myths of a woman who lived many thousands of years ago, the first daughter of the Earth. There is a prophecy that she will return again, during the end times -- every religion has someone like that, someone to wait for and put your faith in, but my culture had mostly covered up her existence. We had a god of the sea, a god of the land, a god of the air, a god of fire, but no one who could control all of the elements. We spoke, only in whispers, of the ancient bloodline -- the descendents of the Great Mother. Too many superstitious minds, too many men concerned only with their own power and position, had heard these whispers in the past and taken gruesome steps to erase the descendents. The lineage was said to be broken, the blood of the Great Mother spilled for the last time. — Sarah Warden

Trying to attract another underserved audience group - females - brought Super Princess Peach, a game where Peach finally avoids being princess-napped. Bowser kidnaps Mario and Luigi instead, and it's up to her for once to save them. The second-wave feminism lasts as long as it takes Peach to acquire a magical talking parasol. Peach's powers manifest through her emotional states. When she is calm she can heal herself, when she is happy she can fly, when glum she can water plants with her tears, and when angry she literally catches on fire. Using emotions as part of basic game play is a daring concept, and feel free to sub in "insulting" or "outrageous" or "awesome" for "daring." The concept might have been taken more seriously if not for touches like the pink umbrella, and Peach having unlimited lives - core gamers hate being unable to die. — Jeff Ryan

(Mutt, a mentally ill brother who is setting fire to a load of expensive things from the house he grew up in and was physically abused and neglected in)
"Tuck (mutt's brother is being asked), aren't you going to stop him?"
'Why?'
'Well' - she waved her hand across the house - 'couldn't you two do something good with all this?" ...
"Yeah, but the money we earned wouldn't buy as much therapy as that fire ... — Charles Martin

Fire supposed he needed to be there in order to give rousing speeches and lead the charge into the fray, or whatever is was commanders did in wartime. She resented his competence at something so tragic and senseless. She wished he, or somebody, would throw down his sword and say, 'Enough! This is a silly way to decide who's in charge!' And it seemed to her, as the beds in the healing room filled and emptied and filled, that these battles didn't leave much to be in charge of. The kingdom was already broken, and this war was tearing the broken pieces smaller. — Kristin Cashore

Is there something I can do?"
"About what?" she snapped.
"About your problem," he persisted. "Does anybody's ass need kicking? I can take care of that for you. I kick good ass."
Her laughter rang out, sweet and bright and gorgeous. "Wow," she said. "You'd do that for me? After, what has it been now, a fifteen-minute acquaintance? Twenty, maybe, tops?"
He considered that, and opened his mouth, and the raw, uncut, uncensored truth just plopped right out. "Yeah," he said. "I would. — Shannon McKenna

Everybody asks why I started at the end and worked back to the beginning, the reason is simple, I couldn't understand the beginning until I had reached the end. There were too many pieces of the puzzle missing, too much you would never tell. I could sell these things. People want to buy them, but I'd set all this on fire first. She'd like that, that's what she would do. She'd make it just to burn it. I couldn't afford this one, but the beginning deserves something special. But how do I show that nothing, not a taste, not a smell, not even the color of the sky, has ever been as clear and sharp as it was when I belonged to her. I don't know how to express the being with someone so dangerous is the last time I felt safe ... (White Oleander) — Janet Fitch

Percy: "Hey, how's it going?" Annabeth: "Uh, no thanks." Percy: "Okay ... have you eaten anything today?" Annabeth: "I think Leo is on duty. Ask him." Percy: "So, my hair is on fire." Annabeth: "Okay. In a while." She got like this sometimes. It was one of the challenges of dating an Athena girl. — Rick Riordan

Levana agreed to a cease-fire," said Wolf, "but we're waiting to hear if it's been implemented." "Also, Cress destroyed me in a game of Mountain Miners," said Iko. Thorne nodded, as if these two announcements carried the same weight. "She is a genius." Cress — Marissa Meyer

Mom! Look. This one is my favorite," Devin said, pulling out a faded pink dress with a red plaid sash. The crinoline petticoat underneath was so old and stiff it made snapping sounds, like beads or fire embers. She dropped the dress over her head, over her clothes. It brushed the floor. "When I'm old enough for it to fit me, I'm going to wear it with purple shoes," she said.
"A bold choice," Kate said as Devin dove back into the trunk. The attic in Kate's mother's house had always fascinated Devin with its promise of hidden treasures. When Kate's mother had been alive, she had let Devin eat Baby Ruth candy bars and drink grape soda and play in this old trunk full of dresses that generations of Morris women had worn to try entice rich men to marry them. Most of the clothes had belonged to Kate's grandmother Marilee, a renowned beauty who, like all the rest, had fallen in love with a poor man instead. — Sarah Addison Allen

Make no mistake, Marin ... a Dragon Guardian may not always be the one sitting upon the throne, but he or she is the protector of the entire realm. — Aida Jacobs

Hamish smiled and rubbed his hands together. "Sure we can. What do you say? Pigs in a Blanket?" He leaned over the cool counter and raised his eyebrows at Gabrielle.
"The only way I'll get under a blanket with you is if both of us are on fire," she told him. — Ally Carter

She was dark-haired, fierce; she wore two drop earrings made of crystal; her face was a pure oval tickled with dimples; her skin was golden; and her laugh was like a fire in the night. But on her face you could also read the concentration of a soul whose life is entirely inward, and a mischievous gravity which acquires a silver patina with age. — Muriel Barbery

Why did no one tell him that loving someone who does not love him back is like him jumping stupidly off a cliff, knowing that there is no one waiting below to catch him?

"If you shall leave, then leave knowing that you are, and will always be...my life's best part."

Alynna wept as she kissed Cullan, and he kissed her back in equal fire, as if it was their last. — Nicholaa Spencer

Six-Pack didn't despise George W. Bush to the degree that Ketchum did, but she thought the president was a smirking twerp and a dumbed-down daddy's boy, and she agreed with Ketchum's assessment that Bush would be as worthless as wet crap in even the smallest crisis. If a fight broke out between two small dogs, for example, Ketchum claimed that Bush would call the fire department and ask them to bring a hose; then the president would position himself at a safe distance from the dogfight, and wait for the firemen to show up. The part Pam liked best about this assessment was that Ketchum said the president would instantly look self-important, and would appear to be actively involved
that is, once the firefighters and their hose arrived, and provided there was anything remaining of the mess the two dogs might have made of each other in the interim. — John Irving

What if I can't do this, Gregori?" She sounded close to tears. "What if I can never do this?"
"No one is making you do anything, ma petite," he replied gently, kissing her stomach. "We are just exploring possibilites."
"But,Gregori," she tried to protest, attempting to bring his head back up so that he could see her very real fear for him, for their life together.
"If I cannot persaude you otherwise, mon amour, I am not much of a lifemate, now am I?" The words were muffled in the tight silky curls, the intriguing little triangle at the apex of her thighs.
"You don't understand,Gregori." Savannah closed her eyes against the waves of fire racing through her. "It's me who is no real lifemate.I don't know how to please you, and I'm so afraid of this."
"Relax,bebe." He breathed warm air against her, inhaled her scent. "You please me far more than you will ever know. — Christine Feehan

The gods have sent medicines for the venom of serpents, but there is no medicine for a bad woman. She is more noxious than the viper, or than fire itself. — Euripides

Slowly rising from the fire, she went down to the shore, and not wanting to frighten him off again, she squatted on a rock above the water, looking down at him where he sat on the wet sand with his long blue-green tail disappearing into the lapping waves. He shyly offered the bag up to her, which had been woven of seaweed, and she took it with a whispered thanks and opened it, staring in delight and surprise at the sheer amount of oysters that were inside.
The siren made a trilling noise and whispered, "I-I hope it is well enough. I do not know what land women eat. — Ash Gray

This theory worked well for my sister, who has never been sick a day in her life, and is one of those Amazonian women who could squat in a field to have a baby and then pick the baby up and keep on hoeing, except also the field would be on fire, and she'd be all, "Fuck you, fire!" and walk through it like that scary robot in The Terminator. — Jenny Lawson

Picture this broad: 22 going on 18. Half the guys in my class would have given their left testicle to date her. This cupcake is the guidance counselor the principal has assigned me. Miss Boyle is her name. We all call her "Miss Bubbly Water." Imagine the teasing I have to endure from my friends. Not to mention what it's like, sitting across from this Barbie Doll every Thursday afternoon, watching her cross and uncross her legs, while she's lecturing me about - get this: "staying focused." Right! My pants are on fire, and she's handing me a crash course in Psych 101! — Ted Gargiulo

GHOSTBUSTERS I always wanted the reboot of Ghostbusters to be four girl-ghostbusters. Like, four normal, plucky women living in New York City searching for Mr. Right and trying to find jobs - but who also bust ghosts. I'm not an idiot, though. I know the demographic for Ghostbusters is teenage boys, and I know they would kill themselves if two ghostbusters had a makeover at Sephora. I just have always wanted to see a cool girl having her first kiss with a guy she's had a crush on, and then have to excuse herself to go trap the pissed-off ghosts of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire or something. In my imagination, I am, of course, one of the ghostbusters, with the likes of say, Emily Blunt, Taraji Henson, and Natalie Portman. Even if I'm not the ringleader, I'm definitely the one who gets to say "I ain't afraid a no ghost." At least the first time. — Mindy Kaling

Each person is made of five different elements, she told me.
Too much fire and you had a bad temper. That was like my father, whom my mother always critized for his cigarette habit and who always shouted back that she should feel guilty that he didn't let my mother speak her mind.
Too little wood and you bent too quickly to listen to other people's ideas, unable to stand on your own. This was like my Auntie An-mei.
Too much water and you flowed in too many different directions. like myself. — Amy Tan

Nothing moves me more than courage: so total a sacrifice deserved complete trust from me. But she never believed that I trusted her, since she did not suspect how much I distrusted others. In spite of appearances to the contrary, I do not regret having yielded to Sophie as much as it lay in my nature to do; at the first glance I had caught sight of something in her incorruptible, with which one could make a compact as sure, and as dangerous, as with an element itself. Fire may be trusted, provided one knows that its law is to burn, or die. — Marguerite Yourcenar

She smiles when she sees me. That's it. All she did just now was smile, but all of a sudden, my chest is on fire, and it feels as if a wave of heat just rolled down the entire length of my body. I recognize this feeling, and it's not good. — Colleen Hoover

Of course I am bland, she thought. You too would be bland if you grew up with one gas pump in front of the house and nothing else except a view that stretched over half the world. Landscape made me bland, bears poking in the garbage can stunted my individuality, as did plagues of horseflies, permafrost, wild-fire, and the sun setting like a bomb. So much sky makes one bewildered - which is the proper way to be. — Anne Enright

My grandmother once told my mother that there is a splice of quartz inside each of us, like the quartz inside a compass or clock. We feel the stone glow warm when we find what it is we are meant to do. My grandmother was a singer; voice was her quartz, a second heartbeat that reminded her always of who she was. My mother's quartz is dance and Joaquin's is the piano. The saddest souls in the world, my mother believes, are those who never discover this thing within them. There is a difference between those who wander in search of that glow and those who wander in hopes of evading it. It is frightening, after all - that first awakening when the radiance within threatens to topple you. Even more terrifying is the decision to allow the fire to continue smoldering, because the brighter you let it get, the more terrible the darkness should you ever let it out."

- Elizabeth Genovise "Irises" (O. Henry prize winner 2016) — Elizabeth Genovise

Mrs. Sol Schwimmer is suing me because I made her bridge as I felt it and not to fit her ridiculous mouth! That's right! I can't work to order like a common tradesman! I decided her bridge should be enormous and billowing, with wild, explosive teeth flaring up in every direction like fire! Now she is upset because it won't fit in her mouth! She is so bourgeois and stupid. I want to smash her! I tried forcing the false plate in but it sticks out like a star burst chandelier. Still, I find it beautiful. — Woody Allen