Quotes & Sayings About Snails

Things didn't seem promising initially. I arrived like everyone else did, after swearing that I wasn't a spy or guilty of moral turpitude, and that I hadn't got any snails. In the first, bewildering minutes outside JFK, on a Friday night in the rain, I stared out at veering yellow cabs, airport staff screaming abuse at cowboy operators, sleek limos nosing along the bedlam, the whole teetering on the brink of chaos. I thought, as many people do, This is impossible. I won't be able to manage this. But then, we do manage- we manage to get into the city without being murdered, and wake up the next day still alive, and shortly afterwards we are striding down Broadway in the sun. — Deborah Meyler

My taste includes both snails and oysters. — Marcus Licinius Crassus

Lobsters, snails, crabs, clams, squids, slugs, and members of the European royal families, by contrast, have blue blood, due to the fact that it's based on copper rather than iron. — Alan Bradley

Save the trees, save the bees, save the whales, save those snails. — George Carlin

And then there's my brother Wally; he's four years younger than me, and he's the classic younger brother
a turd. The Turd is kind of like that old nursery rhyme about snails and puppy dog tails; he's got the intelligence of a slug and he's about as well house-trained as a Chihuahua. — Huston Piner

It is widely believed that the snails did not even know they overthrew the shiners, so nonexistent was the resistance, said Howard. — Suzanne Collins

There must be something ghostly in the air of Christmas - something about the close, muggy atmosphere that draws up the ghosts, like the dampness of the summer rains brings out the frogs and snails. — Jerome K. Jerome

Never doubt the courage of the French. They were the ones who discovered that snails are edible. — Doug Larson

The creatures who act as though they belong to the world follow the peace-keeping law, and because they follow that law, they give the creatures around them a chance to grow toward whatever it's possible for them to become. That's how man came into being. The creatures around Australopithecus didn't imagine that the world belonged to them, so they let him live and grow. How does being civilized come into it? Does being civilized mean that you have to destroy the world?" "No." "Does being civilized make you incapable of giving the creatures around you a little space in which to live?" "No." "Does it make you incapable of living as harmlessly as sharks and tarantulas and rattlesnakes?" "No." "Does it make you incapable of following a law that even snails and earthworms manage to follow without any difficulty?" "No." "As I pointed out some time ago, human settlement isn't against the law, it's subject to the law - and the same is true of civilization. — Daniel Quinn

That's what love is made of, snakes, snails, and puppy dog tails, sugar, spice, and everything nice. — Smokey Robinson

It would be rash to conclude that, on balance, the environment of the globe as a whole is either deteriorating or improving, or that the survival of the societies we know depends upon filling a simple set of prescriptions. It is all too complex and dynamic, whether it involves managing greenhouse gases or Nile snails ... The future condition of the globe's interlocking natural and social systems depends more on human behavior than on the further investigation of natural processes, however desirable that may be. — Gilbert F. White

I eat the hearts of girls and puke slugs and snails. — Raegan Butcher

At the pet store he picked out two painted turtles, each about as big around as a mayonnaise-jar lid. He bought them a large kidney shaped dish that had its own little island, a plastic palm tree, some aquatic plants, and a snail. The snail, presumably, to bolster the self-esteem of the turtles: "You think we're slow? Look at that guy." To store up the snail's morale in the same way, there was a rock. — Christopher Moore

It seemed far more reasonable to belong to a species that had evolved natural tooth replacement than to belong to one that had developed the dental profession. — Elisabeth Tova Bailey

Your family tree includes not just obvious cousins like chimpanzees and monkeys but also mice, buffaloes, iguanas, wallabies, snails, dandelions, golden eagles, mushrooms, whales, wombats and bacteria. All are our cousins. Every last one of them. Isn't that a far more wonderful thought than any myth? — Richard Dawkins

[L]ife is a system of geological and biological cooperation. Certainly, the system contains fights: birds against worms, snails against lettuce, and spiders against flies. But these fights are contained in the sense that they do not get out of hand, that no one species is the permanent victor. Man alone is trying to eliminate his natural enemies in the conviction that he is, or should be, the supreme species. — Alan W. Watts

The snails on the pink sleds of their bodies are moving
among the morning glories
The spider is asleep among the red thumbs
of the raspberries. — Mary Oliver

His abhorrence and fear of alcohol did not extend to his power as host. He kept a huge cupboard of drinks in the station house and loved to serve large measures to visiting relatives
especially those he disliked
about which there was a definite element of spreading bait for garden snails. — John McGahern

I've watched snails climb over
ten foot walls and
vanish. — Charles Bukowski

Rule One: Make friends with death
Tailgating in the Antarctic is no joke. We are trying to do nothing less ambitious than reverse the course of history. We want Team Krill to defeat Team Whale.
Look, if you want to tailgate in comfort, don't get on the boat. You can buy some quail eggs or snails or whatever you people eat and you can watch the Food Chain Games on your flat TV. Stay in Los Angeles. Hug your wife on your plush banquette. Cheer for the Antarctic minke whales, like every other asshole.
No, wait a second, here comes the real Rule One: if you are a supporter of Team Whale, you can go fuck yourself, my fine sir.
This list is for the fans of Team Krill. — Karen Russell

I have a lot of mice, I have a kitten named 'Girr,' I have an iguana named 'Invader Zim,' I have some fish, a whole buncha water snails, and a tarantula named 'Sweet Pea.' — Matthew Underwood

It is so hard for an evolutionary biologist to write about extinction caused by human stupidity. [ ... ] Let me then float an unconventional plea, the inverse of the usual argument. [ ... ] The extinction of Partula is unfair to Partula . That is the conventional argument, and I do not challenge its primacy. But we need a humanistic ecology as well, both for the practical reason that people will always touch people more than snails do or can, and for the moral reason that humans are legitimately the measure of all ethical questions for these are our issues, not nature's. — Stephen Jay Gould

We're so self-important. So arrogant. Everybody's going to save something now. Save the trees, save the bees, save the whales, save the snails. And the supreme arrogance? Save the planet! Are these people kidding? Save the planet? We don't even know how to take care of ourselves; we haven't learned how to care for one another. We're gonna save the fuckin' planet? ... And, by the way, there's nothing wrong with the planet in the first place. The planet is fine. The people are fucked! Compared with the people, the planet is doin' great. It's been here over four billion years ... The planet isn't goin' anywhere, folks. We are! We're goin' away. Pack your shit, we're goin' away. And we won't leave much of a trace. Thank God for that. Nothing left. Maybe a little Styrofoam. The planet will be here, and we'll be gone. Another failed mutation; another closed-end biological mistake. — George Carlin

Fairness is a concept that holds only in limited situations. Yet we want the concept to extend to everything, in and out of phase. From snails to hardware stores to married life. Maybe no one finds it, or even misses it, but fairness is like love. What is given has nothing to do with what we seek. — Haruki Murakami

Evanton creaked his way toward the sound of the bell at a speed that made snails look fast - if he decided to answer the door at all. If you made the mistake of ringing the bell while he was already on the way, he got angry. Kaylin had learned this early. On the other hand, if he'd actually failed to hear the door when she was expected, and she failed to ring the bell a second time, he also got angry. It was very much lose-lose, with hope wedged in to add anxiety. — Michelle Sagara

I think everyone is aware how disgusting snails are, and that's why they are served in a bowl of wine and butter and called "escargots," which is a French word loosely translated as "denial. — Jim Gaffigan

James gave the huffle of a snail in danger. And nobody heard him at all. — A.A. Milne

Snails mate faster than Farnsworths."
Georgie gave her a chastening look. "Eliza."
"Well, it's true. I've watched."
"You've spied on Sir Roland?"
"No, I've spied on snails. — Tessa Dare

This (French-Kissing) is a really sexy thing to do, according to the French people, although you should bear in mind that they also like to eat snails. — Dave Barry

Well, Louie, you'll know then that Leviticus also tells us not to cut our beards, not to wear linen and wool together nor to eat crayfish or frogs or snails. I'm afraid that if we adhered to Leviticus the entire French nation would be an abomination in the eyes of the Lord. — Paula Boock

We are living in the World of Snails! Man is extremely slow! Whoever has a limited life, he has no right to be slow! Things must be done quickly! Slowness belongs to the immortals! — Mehmet Murat Ildan

Negroes don't even like snails! What they're doing is proving they're integrated. — Malcolm X

And Hortensio falls asleep happily and starts snoring, although nobody could hear him snoring, because nobody can hear the noises that snails make, all around the world. — Elena D. Calin

You're not a practiced hand at this. You've never really had a man and I get why. I fuckin' do. Down to my gut I do, baby. And we can go there when you're ready. Right now, all you have to know is, I'll make you tacos until you can't stand lookin' at them anymore, if that's what you want and I'll do it just because you want them. The bottom line is, you look out for me, I'll look out for you. I'll make you come as often as you want. I'll make you dinner, take you to dinner, take you to New York to see your friends, fly you to Paris 'cause you wanna eat snails, I don't give a fuck. But I won't do that in return for shit you do for me. That's what you give me. The only time it'll go bad is if you don't feel you get what you need from me and get it just because. — Kristen Ashley

A multitude of harlequin lifeforms bobbed and twirled and played in the depths of the Atlantic. Pink cucumbers with thorny backs. Algae. Starfish. Annelids with simple brains and a hundred toes. Sponges - like yellow, swollen hands - sucked in water and pushed out oxygen. Most amusing were the mysterious buggers who had no likeness on the previous earth; tiny beasts with exotic exoskeletons engraved with deep grid-like patterns, snails with horns, and slithering plants that looked like magenta weeping willows. — Jake Vander Ark

People often say that I have a child's eye. For example, I stare at ants gathering around sugar, or when I seek shelter from the rain, I gaze upon snails. These are things which you often do when you are a child aren't they? I have a very similar sensibility to that. — Rinko Kawauchi

The artist is to be exempt from the moral laws that are binding on ordinary people. Just pronounce the magic word "Art," and everything is O.K. Rotting corpses with snails crawling over them are O.K.; kicking little girls in the head is O.K.; even a film like L'Age d'Or is O.K. — George Orwell

There's this sloth in the jungle walking from one tree to another, and it's mugged by a gang of snails, and when the police ask the sloth if it could identify any of its attackers, it says, 'I don't know; it all happened so quickly... — Iain Banks

We require only a grenade launcher, six pounds of industrial-strength licorice, two spells of Class VIII complexity, a shipping container, a side of bacon, an automobile, several homing snails, a ladder, and two people to act as bait. — Jasper Fforde

For I am the weakest, the youngest of them all. I am a child looking at his feet and the little runnels that the stream has made in the gravel. That is a snail, I say; that is a leaf. I delight in the snails; I delight in the leaf. I am always the youngest, the most innocent, the most trustful. You are all protected. I am naked — Virginia Woolf

I've actually felt sad for myself, picturing my slim, naked, pale body, floating just beneath the current, a colony of snails attached to one bare leg, my hair trailing like seaweed until I reach the ocean and drift down down down to the bottom, my waterlogged flesh peeling off in soft streaks, me slowly disappearing into the current like a watercolor until just the bones are left. — Gillian Flynn

History's political and economic power structures have always abhorred 'idle people' as potential troublemakers. Yet nature never abhors seemingly idle trees, grass, snails, coral reefs, and clouds in the sky. — R. Buckminster Fuller

Lately, however, the routine had begun to pall. Coprolites and Jurassic snails no longer held the fascination they once did, and the incessant backbiting and political manoeuvring endemic in upperechelon academia - which she had always known and accepted as part of the scholastic landscape - was proving more and more of an irksome distraction. The further she travelled into darkest PhD territory, the more the fossilised remains of extinct creatures dwindled in fascination; she was rapidly specialising herself beyond caring about her subject. Whether or not the world learned what the latest new megasaurus ate for lunch sixty million years ago, what difference did it make? — Stephen R. Lawhead

Most government officials are rushing headlong to solve the problems of 50 years ago, with their ears assailed by the sound of snails whizzing by. — Eric Johnston

But Princess Magnolia wore glass slippers on weekdays. Princess Magnolia was afraid of snails. Sunlight made Princess Magnolia sneeze. And at the moment, the Princess in Black was hog-tying a monster. — Shannon Hale

In the sago palms, you'll often find sago beetles which are about the size of your little finger. The Karowai put those on the fire until they're crispy and eat them. They taste a little bit like creamy snails. But compared to sago, the sago beetle is really pretty good. — Tim Cahill

In terms of size, mammals are an anomaly, as the vast majority of the world's existing species are snail-sized or smaller. It's almost as if, regardless of your kingdom, the smaller your size & the earlier your place on the tree of life, the more critical is your niche on Earth: snails & worms create soil, & blue-green algae create oxygen; mammals seem comparatively dispensable, the result of the random path of evolution over a luxurious amount of time. — Elisabeth Tova Bailey

If we were fossils of two snails
caught in a rock for millions of years.
Would we know we were together? — Natasha Tsakos

In the morning she found pieces of a bird
chopped and scattered by the fan
blood sprayed onto the mosquito net,
its body leaving paths on the walls
like red snails that drifted down in lumps.
She could imagine the feathers
while she had slept
falling around her
like slow rain. — Michael Ondaatje

Why are the bones of great fishes, and oysters and corals and various other shells and sea-snails, found on the high tops of mountains that border the sea, in the same way in which they are found in the depths of the sea? — Leonardo Da Vinci

He was fond of that early stage of intoxication which leads a man to believe that he can feel the earth revolving. The trees and houses still stand quietly in their places, the street-lamps have not yet acquired a twin, but the earth revolves; you feel it at last! But today even that displeased him. He walked on beside his intoxication and pretended they did not know each other. What a queer globe it was, whether it revolved or not! He could not help thinking of a drawing by Daumier, entitled "Progress". Daumier had drawn a number of snails crawling after each other; that was the pace of human development. But the snails were crawling in a circle.
And that was the worst of it. — Erich Kastner

Eragon waited several minutes to be sure it was gone before he returned to clearing the rubble. "Maybe i should just call myself Snail Vanquisher," he muttered as he rolled a section of a pillar across the courtyard. "Eragon Shadeslayer, Vanquisher of Snails ... I would strike fear into the hearts of men wherever I went. — Christopher Paolini

Seconds slowed and passed before Nicholas's mind's eye like a parade of snails upon the garden path. — Raymond E. Feist

She went stealthily as a cat through this profusion of growth, gathering cuckoo-spittle on her skirts, cracking snails that were underfoot, staining her hands with thistle-milk and slug-slime, and rubbing off upon her naked arms sticky blights which, though snow-white on the apple-tree trunks, made madder stains on her skin; thus she drew quite near to Clare, still unobserved of him. — Thomas Hardy

Feel this," says Harold Bazin, and crouches and brings her hand to a curved wall which is completely studded with snails. Hundreds of them. Thousands.
"So many," she whispers.
"I don't know why. Maybe because they're safe from gulls? Here, feel this, I'll turn it over." Hundreds of tiny, squirming hydraulic feet beneath a horny, ridged top: a sea star. "Blue mussels here. And here's a dead stone crab, can you feel his claw? — Anthony Doerr

Were all these castle folk in their ornate finery no more than confused souls hiding inside costumes, as the hard shells of snails protected the helpless, naked things that lived within them? — Tad Williams

Didn't have Nintendo, we just poured salt on snails. — Al Yankovic

For, if after fifty you don't live the aspirations of the young, go away. Who needs needs spectacled snails, salivating on the Soma of youth. — Aporva Kala

He sat looking at it with his eyes protruding in the manner popularized by snails, looking like something stuffed by a taxidermist who had learned his job from a correspondence course and had only got as far as lesson three. — P.G. Wodehouse

But to return to your question, Vidanric's tendency to keep his own counsel ought to be reassuring as far as people hopping out with embarrassing words are concerned. If I were you
and I know it's so much easier to give advice than to follow it
I'd sit down with him, when no one else is at hand, and talk it out."
Just the thought of seeking him out for a private talk made me shudder. "I'd rather walk down the mountain in shoes full of snails."
It was Nee's turn to shudder. "Life! I'd rather do almost anything than that
— Sherwood Smith

His stomach could not tolerate the snails and lampreys and other rich food Captain Khorane so relished, and after his first meal at the captain's table he spent the rest of the day with one end or the other dangling over the rail. — George R R Martin

Surely you're joking Theodore?' he protested. 'You mean to say that each snail is both a male and a female?'
'Yes indeed,' said Theodore, adding with masterly understatement, 'it's very curious.'
'Good God,' cried Larry. 'I think it's unfair. All those damned slimy things wandering about seducing each other like mad all over the bushes, and having the pleasures of both sensations. Why couldn't such a gift be given to the human race? That's what I want to know. — Gerald Durrell

He had found that all snails have the capacity to do over one hundred miles per hour and find their way to a given location with pinpoint accuracy, but didn't because they were horribly lazy and couldn't be bothered. — Jasper Fforde

Just remember this, Missy, escargot ain't nothin' but snails with their noses stuck in the air. — Lois Greiman

I pity snails, and all that carry their homes on their backs. — J.R.R. Tolkien

Miss Kinsley regarded him with the look of disgust girls reserved for snails and frogs. "Any man who would suggest to a young woman that she should elope rather than listen to her papa's advice can only be up to no good."
"Elope?" Oliver queried, his eyes narrowing on Miss Kinsley. "This scoundrel proposed marriage to you?"
"Now, Miss Kinsley," Nathan began in his best placating voice, "we both know it wasn't like-"
"Quiet!" Oliver snapped at him. "Or I swear not even Maria will keep me from throttling you."
Nathan swallowed. Hard. — Sabrina Jeffries

Everyone used to chuck snails at each other at school, and I used to try and save them. And not only did I get in trouble for it, I got suspended for doing it. For saving the snails I kept about four or five hundred of them at the back of the class
in Snail Land. We were like six or seven or something, people didn't even realise what they were doing. I had a strange compassion for snails. And the teacher just chucked them all in the trash in the end. — Robert Pattinson

A large grey stone lay in the centre of the grass and he stared moodily at it or watched the great snails. They seemed to love the little shut-in bay with its walls of cool rock, and there were many of them of huge size crawling slowly and stickily along its sides. — J.R.R. Tolkien

In Valencia, when you catch snails for your paella, you feed them rosemary for a few days, both to purge them and to give them flavor. — Jeffrey Steingarten

Scientists are educated from a very early time and a very early age to believe that the greater scientist is the scientist who makes discoveries or theories that apply to the greatest ambit of things in the world. And if you've only made a very good theory about snails, or a very good theory about some planets but not about the universe as a whole, or about all the history of humankind, then you have in some sense accepted a lower position in the hierarchy of the fame of science as it's taught to you as a young student. — Richard Lewontin

The lancet fluke (Dicrocoelium) infects the brain of ants by taking control and driving them to climb to the top of a blade of grass where they can be eaten by a cow. The ingested fluke then lays eggs in the cow gut. Eventually, the eggs exit the cow, and hungry snails eat the dung (and fluke eggs). The fluke enters the snail's digestive gland and gets excreted in sticky slime full of a seething mass of flukes to be drunk by ants as a source of moisture. — Darrel Ray

Since we're all snails riding on the razor's edge, we might as well say it as it is. — Peter Tieryas

I contend that the continued racial classification of Homo sapiens represents an outmoded approach to the general problem of differentiation within a species. In other words, I reject a racial classification of humans for the same reasons that I prefer not to divide into subspecies the prodigiously variable West Indian land snails that form the subject of my own research. — Stephen Jay Gould

Men! She could not understand why so many women feared them. Hadn't the gods made them with the most vulnerable part of their guts hanging right out of their bodies, like a misplaced bit of bowel? Kick them there and they curled up like snails. Caress them there and their brains melted. — Stephen King

intrigues of love are unfolding as they do among the young, and as they do as well among the snails on the lettuce and the shiny green beetles that plague the kale. Murmurings, the shrug of a shoulder, the step forward, the step back. Toby — Margaret Atwood

Some beliefs may be subject to such instant, brutal and unambiguous rejection. For example: no left-coiling periwinkle has ever been found among millions of snails examined. If I happen to find one during my walk on Nobska beach tomorrow morning, a century of well nurtured negative evidence will collapse in an instant. — Stephen Jay Gould

I learned snails don't have ears. They live in silence. They go slowly. Slowly, slowly in silence. — Billy Collins

Moss grows where nothing else can grow. It grows on bricks. It grows on tree bark and roofing slate. It grows in the Arctic Circle and in the balmiest tropics; it also grows on the fur of sloths, on the backs of snails, on decaying human bones ... It is a resurrection engine. A single clump of mosses can lie dormant and dry for forty years at a stretch, and then vault back again into life with a mere soaking of water. — Elizabeth Gilbert

The Everglades was the only place on earth where alligators (broad snout, fresh water, darker skin) and crocodiles (pointy snout, salt water, toothy grin) lived side by side. It was the only home of the Everglades mink, Okeechobee gourd, and Big Cypress fox squirrel. It had carnivorous plants, amphibious birds, oysters that grew on trees, cacti that grew in water, lizards that changed colors, and fish that changed genders. It had 1,100 species of trees and plants, 350 birds, and 52 varieties of porcelain-smooth, candy-striped tree snails. It had bottlenose dolphins, marsh rabbits, ghost orchids, moray eels, bald eagles, and countless other species that didn't seem to belong on the same continent, much less in the same ecosystem. — Michael Grunwald

It is not a matter of indifference whether we like oysters or clams, snails or shrimp, if only we know how to unravel the existential significance of these foods. — Jean-Paul Sartre

Grandpa did everything at his own pace, a speed that my sister and I referred to as 'when snails attack.' ... My grandparents' house was only about ten miles from ours, but the ride there would necessitate sandwiches packed for the trip, and several books to keep us occupied. — Jenny Lawson

Heavenly Bastard in the Sky, these cockroaches were sadomasochists, looking for the most painful way to die. Once I swallowed one absent-mindedly drinking my tea. Traumatised, I rang the local chemist. The voice on the line was gently reassuring: cockroaches were not poisonous, ingesting one would cause me no harm. Though, the chemist added, in terms of protein they were not as nutritious as snails. — Xiaolu Guo

Though snails are exceedingly slow,
There is one thing I'd like to know.
If I out run 'em round the yard,
How come they beat me to the chard? — Allen Klein

Beware. Beware. Beware of the big, green dragon that sits on your doorstep. He eats little boys, puppy dog tails and big, fat snails. Beware. Take care. Beware. — Ed Wood

After counting all the sheep in the world
I enumerate the wildebeests, snails,
camels, skylarks, etc.,
then I add up all the zoos and aquariums,
country by country.
By early light I am asleep
in a nightmare about drowning in the Flood, — Billy Collins

Although once the center of activity for tens of thousands of men, the island is quiet except for JMSDF supply flights and visits by US Navy fighters from Atsugi that use the runway for landing practice. In addition to several hundred JMSDF personnel, the island is home to friendly feral cats, turkeys of unknown origin, songbirds, East African land snails, scorpions and centipedes. — Dan King

The intriguing placidity from the slothful pace of a snail is truly very peaceful. Our world is in need of this calmness to pacify itself — Munia Khan

Winter's here, and you feel lousy: You're coughing and sneezing; your muscles ache; your nose is an active mucus volcano. These symptoms
so familiar at this time of year
can mean only one thing: Tiny fanged snails are eating your brain. — Dave Barry

Shun delays, they breed remorse;Take thy time while time is lent thee;Creeping snails have weakest force,Fly their fault lest thou repent thee.Good is best when soonest wrought,Linger'd labours come to nought. — Robert Southwell

In our culture, snails are not considered valiant animals - we are constantly exhorting people to "come out of their shells" - but there's a lot to be said for taking your home with you wherever you go. — Susan Cain

Lovers are not snails; they don't have to protrude from their shells and meet each other halfway. Meet me within your own self. — Jerzy Kosinski

MEXICAN PURPLE Although the source of this exclusive dye was long a Phoenician trade secret, by the time of the classical Greeks it was known to be manufactured from a gland of the murex sea snail. Surprisingly, while traveling in Mexico in the 1830s, Thomas Gage observed that traditional purple dye manufacture there used the same techniques to create dye from the same sea snails.95 — S.C. Compton

I think that for me, growing up, my dad was in the Navy; we went all over the world. I love things the weirder the better. The idea I could eat things like snails or frogs legs or things like that was mind-blowingly cool. — Graham Elliot

I took out the book once more. Snails can sleep for three years without eating. Snail comas. Welcome to my world. — Shelly Crane

Ask the world to reveal its quietude- not the silence of machines when they are still, but the true quiet by which birdsongs, trees, bellworts, snails, clouds, storms become what they are, and are nothing else. — Wendell Berry

The French are sawed-off sissies who eat snails and slugs and cheese that smells like people's feet. Utter cowards who force their own children to drink wine, they gibber like baboons even when you try to speak to them in their own wimpy language. — P. J. O'Rourke

Somewhere there was a book of love, with all the symptoms written down in red ink: Dizziness and Desire. A tendency to stare at the night sky, searching for a message that might be found up above. A lurching in the pit of the stomach, as if something much too sweet had been eaten. The ability to hear the quietest sounds--snails munching the lettuce leaves, moths drinking nectar from the overripe pears on the tree by the fence, a rabbit trembling in ivy-just in case he might be there, which was what mattered all along. Real hunger, just to see him, as if this would ever be enough. — Alice Hoffman