Quotes & Sayings About Stinging
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Top Stinging Quotes
Words are powerful. If you've been on the other end of stinging criticism, you know what I mean. Will one positive remark transform your family? Probably not. But keep it up. No one can resist the power of encouragement. — Max Lucado
When a bee stings, she dies. She cannot sting and live. When men sting, their better selves die. Every sting kills a better instinct. Men must not turn bees and kill themselves in stinging others. — Francis Bacon
7. But what kind of love is it, really? Don't fool yourself and call it sublimity. Admit that you have stood in front of a little pile of powdered ultramarine pigment in a glass cup at a museum and felt a stinging desire. But to do what? Liberate it? Purchase it? Ingest it? ... You might want to reach out and disturb the pile of pigment, for example, first staining your fingers with it, then staining the world. You might want to dilute it and swim in it, you might want to rouge your nipples with it, you might want to paint a virgin's robe with it. But still you wouldn't be accessing the blue of it. Not exactly. — Maggie Nelson
The world is a cruel mother, a matron of darkness, selfishness, greed, and misery. For most, their time suckling at her breast is naught but a scramble through stinging, tearing briars before a naked, shameful collapse as the flesh gives out. And yet in the bright eyes of every newborn, there lies a spark, a potential for goodness, the possibility of a life worth living. That spark deserves its chance. And though most of them will turn out to be as worthless as the parents who sired them, while the cruelty of the earth will tell them to release their innocence and join in the drawing of daggers, every now and then one manages to clutch to its beauty and refuses to release it into the dark. — Ed McDonald
I stamp out vast empires. I crush palaces in my rigid hands. I harden my heart against churches.
I blot out cemetaries. I feed the people with stinging nettles. I resurrect madness. I thrust my naked sword between the ribs of the world. I murder the world! — Harry Crosby
but still the mention of Mrs Burton and her luxuries had a certain stinging and stimulating effect upon her. She scorned, and yet would have been pleased to emulate that splendour. The account of it put her out of patience with her own humility, notwithstanding that she took pride in that humility, and felt it more consistent with the real dignity of her position than any splendour. And — Mrs. Oliphant
There was a second dinner scheduled for the following night, and I was dreading the disapproving glances by these women who had never worked a day in their lives. I was still a woman, and I still cared what I looked like; no matter what I accomplished with my career, nothing eliminates those stinging insecurities you develop as a child or teen. — Lynsey Addario
Pausing in front of her, her mother brushed the hair back from her face and smiled sweetly at her before she kissed her brow. "You've changed much, my little treasure."
A stinging wave of grief consumed her as she heard her mother's blessed voice again. Tears welled in her eyes. "I've missed you, Mama."
-Seren and her mother, in a dream. — Kinley MacGregor
Kizzy wanted to be a woman who would dive off the prow of a sailboat into the sea, who would fall back in a tangle of sheets, laughing, and who could dance a tango, lazily stroke a leopard with her bare foot, freeze an enemy's blood with her eyes, make promises she couldn't possibly keep, and then shift the world to keep them. She wanted to write memoirs and autograph them at a tiny bookshop in Rome, with a line of admirers snaking down a pink-lit alley. She wanted to make love on a balcony, ruin someone, trade in esoteric knowledge, watch strangers as coolly as a cat. She wanted to be inscrutable, have a drink named after her, a love song written for her, and a handsome adventurer's small airplane, champagne-christened Kizzy, which would vanish one day in a windstorm in Arabia so that she would have to mount a rescue operation involving camels, and wear an indigo veil against the stinging sand, just like the nomads.
Kizzy wanted. — Laini Taylor
THE BILL FOR DARRELL BOB HOUSTON THE BEET IS THE MOST INTENSE of vegetables. The onion has as many pages as War and Peace, every one of which is poignant enough to make a strong man weep, but the various ivory parchments of the onion and the stinging green bookmark of the onion are quickly charred by belly juices and bowel bacteria. Only the beet departs the body the same color as it went in. Beets consumed at dinner will, come morning, stock a toilet bowl with crimson fish, their hue attesting to beet's chromatic immunity to the powerful digestive acids and thoroughgoing microbes that can turn the reddest pimento, the orangest carrot, the yellowest squash into a single disgusting shade of brown. — Tom Robbins
A knife slash with a sharp blade almost never caused pain unless delivered with force. As the skin parted, there was only a stinging sensation. Spinning, — David Morrell
What does it mean to be the master of your own soul, the captain of your own mind? It means that you keep the final say on what you think, feel and do. No one fearful thought can overtake you, no one doubtful feeling can overthrow you from your path, no one memory of pain can turn you away from what is meant for you now; because when the waves of doubt come and the winds of fear blow and the rains of pain fall and feel like they're stinging you again - you say no. You say no. You say that you will be the master of your vessel and you will tell your mind to stay the course, you will tell your heart to stay fixed, you will tell your skin that it knows the touch of silken balms. You are the captain of your own ship. — C. JoyBell C.
Grief is an artist of powers as various as the instruments upon which he plays his dirges for the dead, evoking from some the sharpest, shrillest notes, from others the low, grave chords that throb recurrent like the slow beating of a distant drum. Some natures it startles; some it stupefies. To one it comes like the stroke of an arrow, stinging all the sensibilities to a keener life; to another as the blow of a bludgeon, which in crushing benumbs. — Ambrose Bierce
I saw something moving round the foot of the bed, which at first I could not accurately distinguish. But I soon saw that it was a sooty-black animal that resembled a monstrous cat. It appeared to me about four or five feet long for it measured fully the length of the hearthrug as it passed over it; and it continued to-ing and fro-ing with the lithe, sinister restlessness of a beast in a cage. I could not cry out, although as you may suppose, I was terrified. Its pace was growing faster, and the room rapidly darker and darker, and at length so dark that I could no longer see anything of it but its eyes. I felt it spring lightly on the bed. The two broad eyes approached my face, and suddenly I felt a stinging pain as if two large needles darted, an inch or two apart, deep into my breast. I waked with a scream. — J. Sheridan Le Fanu
Ronan was suddenly afraid of him. He was afraid of him in the same way that he was afraid of the night horrors. Because they had killed him before, and they would kill him again, and he precisely remembered the pain of each death. He felt the fear in his chest, and in his face, and in the back of his head. Sharp and stinging, like a tire iron. — Maggie Stiefvater
I have known many gods. He who denies them is as blind as he who trusts them too deeply. I seek not beyond death. It may be the blackness averred by the Nemedian skeptics, or Crom's realm of ice and cloud, or the snowy plains and vaulted halls of the Nordheimer's Valhalla. I know not, nor do I care. Let me live deep while I live; let me know the rich juices of red meat and stinging wine on my palate, the hot embrace of white arms, the mad exultation of battle when the blue blades flame and crimson, and I am content. Let teachers and philosophers brood over questions of reality and illusion. I know this: if life is illusion, then I am no less an illusion, and being thus, the illusion is real to me. I live, I burn with life, I love, I slay, and am content. — Robert E. Howard
I just feel so guilty." Her stinging eyes burned with fresh tears. "I don't know why I can't ... I can't..."
"Make love to him?"
She nodded.
"Let him see you?"
She nodded again, tears sliding down her face. She mopped them up with the wet tissue she'd wadded in her fist.
"Are you scared he won't love you anymore, after he's seen how you look now?" her dad asked gently.
"No."
"Are you scared he won't be attracted to you anymore? That he won't want to be your lover?"
"No."
"What are you scared of, Vanka?"
"I don't feel the same way about myself, now. I don't even know how to explain it. I'm not ashamed. I don't feel ugly. But the way I was, who I was when we ... when we fell in love, I'm not that person, now."
"You're not in love with him anymore?"
"I am," her voice broke on a sob. "So in love. Like I never knew it could be. I thought I loved David. I thought I loved Mark. But, god, Dad, the way I love Galen... — Varian Krylov
I hate nature. I really do. Nature is composed entirely of sticks, dirt, fall-down places, biting and stinging things, and savageries too numerous to list. And I'm not the only one who feels this way. Man has been building cities since the year oughty-ought, just to get away from this stuff. — Sue Grafton
Legacy code. The phrase strikes disgust in the hearts of programmers. It conjures images of slogging through a murky swamp of tangled undergrowth with leaches beneath and stinging flies above. It conjures odors of murk, slime, stagnancy, and offal. Although our first joy of programming may have been intense, the misery of dealing with legacy code is often sufficient to extinguish that flame. — Michael C. Feathers
Indeed Christianity passes. Passes - it has gone! It has littered the beaches of life with churches, cathedrals, shrines and crucifixes, prejudices and intolerances, like the sea urchin and starfish and empty shells and lumps of stinging jelly upon the sands here after a tide. A tidal wave out of Egypt. And it has left a multitude of little wriggling theologians and confessors and apologists hopping and burrowing in the warm nutritious sand. But in the hearts of living men, what remains of it now? Doubtful scraps of Arianism. Phrases. Sentiments. Habits. — H.G.Wells
An unaccustomed weed of jealousy sprang up in Jamie's heart, stinging like nettles. He stamped firmly on it; he was fortunate indeed to know that his son enjoyed a loving relationship with his stepfather. There, that was the weed stamped out. The stamping, though, seemed to have left a small bruised spot on his heart; he could feel it when he breathed. — Diana Gabaldon
The stinging slap against her cheek whipped her head sideways. Her hand reflexively went to her burning face.
"I told you no," Tobe said, barely above a whisper.
Daphne had no words. He'd never so much as hinted at touching her in anger before. She now understood what stunned speechless meant. — Hunter Shea
life. She leaned back in her chair, blinked back a tear and looked at her oak dining room table. The evening had taken her several hours to prepare. She concentrated on the two candles in the center. She watched as the flame flickered and wondered if one of them would go out. She heard the grandfather clock chime and one of the candles finally did burn out. More tears were stinging her eyes as she longingly looked at the door. She was becoming disconsolate and wanted to know what had become of her husband. Even on the most chaotic of days he had never forgotten their anniversary. He had always found a way — S.C. King
On the night Test faced the Great One, this is what he'll see ... twelve sharpshooters stinging, eleven eyebrows raising, ten spines a'bustin, nine noggins knocking, eight kicks a'kicking, seven punches punching, six suplexes smashing, five seconds of the people chanting The Rock's name ... four Rock Bottoms, three People's Elbows, on your two buckteeth, and an ass-kicking all over New Orleans! — Dwayne Johnson
Pain knocked upon my door and said That she had come to stay; And though I would not welcome her But bade her go away, She entered in. And like my own shade She followed after me, And from her stabbing, stinging sword, No moment was I free. And then one day another knocked Most gently at my door. I said, "No, Pain is here. There's not room for more." And then I heard His tender voice, "It is I, be not afraid." And from the day He entered in - Ah, the difference He made!6 — Charles R. Swindoll
It commenced raining one day and did not stop for two months. We went through ever different kind of rain they is, cep'n maybe sleet or hail. It was little tiny stinging rain sometimes, an big ole fat rain at others. It came sidewise an straight down an sometimes even seem to stand up from the ground. Nevertheless, we was expected to do our shit, which was mainly walking upland down the hills an stuff looking for gooks. — Winston Groom
Going to the woods is going home, for I suppose we came from the woods originally. But in some of nature's forests, the adventurous traveler seems a feeble, unwelcome creature; wild beasts and the weather trying to kill him, the rank, tangled vegetation, armed with spears and stinging needles, barring his way and making life a hard struggle. — John Muir
Necklace. The parchment curled, blackened, and took flame. Theon was aghast. "Have you gone mad?" His father laid a stinging backhand across his cheek. "Mind your tongue. You are not in Winterfell now, and I am not Robb the Boy, that you should speak to me so. I am the Greyjoy, Lord Reaper of Pyke, — George R R Martin
Rush Limbaugh is a principled conservative, master broadcaster and stinging social critic who has won his mammoth following through his own energy, individualism and wit. His daily radio show is the one reliable place ordinary citizens can turn to for a different perspective in the blizzard of propaganda and disinformation from the Northeastern media establishment. History will show that Limbaugh was a major force over the past decade in waking this country up from its p.c. coma. — Camille Paglia
And me all the while having to pee - coughing into the mike when my throat was tired and raw - eyes stinging and lips and chin crumpling in grief at his anger. The sweet tinkle of Electra on the bass and Iphy on the treble with Mama's voice counting, "One and two and ... " as the twins had their piano lesson inside the trailer. The gurgle and hum of the pumps that filtered my brother Arty's "Aqua Boy" tank. And the dim round moon of baby Fortunato's face peering at me from the dark of the risers above Papa. — Katherine Dunn
No!" I wrestled with the covers as tears fell unchecked down my cheeks. The night terror had seemed all too real. The stinging slap echoed on my skin and I pressed a palm to my tender face. annoyed at my weakness I bundled myself in blankets and padded barefoot to the deck. — Freedom Matthews
One of the most stinging criticisms made against Christians is that their minds are narrow and their hearts small. This may not be wholly true, but that such a charge can be made at all is sufficient cause for serious heart searching and prayer. — A.W. Tozer
I'll try to turn the other cheek....But I've only got two and they're both stinging. — Heather Blanton
nodded, because Mr. Keene was a grownup and you were supposed to agree with grownups at all costs (his mother had taught him that), but inside he was thinking: Oh, I've heard that bullshit before. It was about what the doctor said when he opened his sterilizer and the sharp frightening smell of alcohol drifted out, stinging his nostrils. That was the smell of shots and this was the smell — Stephen King
There once was a Bald Man who sat down after work on a hot summer's day. A Fly came up and kept buzzing about his bald pate, and stinging him from time to time. The Man aimed a blow at his little enemy, but - whack - his palm come on his own head instead; again the Fly tormented him, but this time the Man was wiser and said: YOU WILL ONLY INJURE YOURSELF IF YOU TAKE NOTICE OF DISPICABLE ENEMIES. — Aesop
The ocean breeze returned, stinging his eyes, causing moisture to pool. He blinked it away before Claire could see, because ... Anthony Rawlings didn't apologize and he didn't cry ... that's the truth. — Aleatha Romig
she said, when I wear these boots no one fucks with me
when I tie my past like a scarf around my throat
I can freeze the blood
of every naive and unabashed up-and-comer
when I slide on my desire like glowing black stockings
I can make the uninitiated beg
for the feel of raw and stinging wood
and when I slip my angry black leather belt
from its rusty hook
the ambitious and guileless cower
like a thousand condemned souls
when I close my fist, my rings golden
with a youth well spent
the warriors of Gilead surrender
with a breathless whimper
and when my shoulders
feel the rough comfort of my serape woven with the fibers
of a fierce and relentless vengeance
you will soon realize
these are not my clothes after all, she says,
they are warning signs — Daniel Ames
Even now, as she walks down the long corridor, the crude jokes, the lewd propositions, the stinging remarks, the jeering catcalls and
the leering laughter echo in her ears. She can hear all the vile names she had been called post scandal. Hateful, ugly names that don't stop resonating in her head even after so many years. They never would. Some memories are etched too deeply to be erased completely. — Chandana Roy
He has tasted anger, and he knows he has to control it. He can feel it, waiting to burst from his mouth in a swarm of stinging black flies. — Hanya Yanagihara
Ethics is not a bitter wind in one's face, stinging a person with injunctions to act against his interest, but a breeze at one's back, aiding a person toward the achievement of life-enhancing values. Morality is not a burden to be resented or scrimped on, complied with only grudgingly. If Rand's theory of the nature of morality is correct, cutting moral corners amounts to cutting one's own throat. Far from being a necessary evil, ethics is a necessary ally, an indispensable tool for living. To the extent that a moral code accurately identifies a life-promoting course, morality is a tremendous benefactor. — Tara Smith
Rose," said my mother. For once in my life, she sounded unsure about herself. Scared, maybe. "Mia said you wanted to see me." I didn't answer. I didn't look at her. "What ... what do you need?" I didn't know what I needed. I didn't know what to do. The stinging in my eyes grew unbearable, and before I knew it, I was crying. Big, painful sobs seized my body. The tears I'd held back so long poured down my face. The fear and grief I'd refused to let myself feel finally burst free, burning in my chest. I could scarcely breathe. My mother put her arms around me, and I buried my face in her chest, sobbing even harder. "I know," she said softly, tightening her grip on me. "I understand. — Richelle Mead
Hate is a pointless emotion to have inside you. It is like eating a scorpion to punish it for stinging you. — Matt Haig
They were probably descended from people who learned that if you look too hard at anyone on horseback you receive a sharp stinging sensation such as might be obtained by a stick around the ear. Not looking up at people on horseback had become hereditary. People who stared at people on horseback in what was considered to be a funny way never survived long enough to breed. — Terry Pratchett
Your anger was a climate I inhabited like a desert in a dry frigid weather of high thin air and ivory sun, sand dunes the wind lifted into stinging clouds that blinded and choked me where the only ice was in the blood. — Marge Piercy
Sometimes it's like watching a wasp land on a stinging nettle: someone's going to get stung and you don't care. — Terry Pratchett
Every now and then we discover in the seething mass of humanity round us a person who does not seem to need anybody else, and the contrast with ourselves is stinging. — Ernest Dimnet
Devoutly the teachers point out huge fumigated domes; but beneath the statues there's no love, no love beneath the eyes set in crystal. Love is there, in flesh ripped by thirst, in the tiny hut struggling against the flood; love is there, in ditches where snakes of hunger wrestle, in the sad sea that rocks dead gulls, and in the darkest stinging kiss under pillows. — Federico Garcia Lorca
Veronica's hands wouldn't stop shaking. She held the revolver straight out from her body and breathed slowly, deeply, the hot-metal smell stinging her nostrils. She tried to relax her shoulders. — Rob Thomas
I opened the door of my mother's stand-alone wardrobe and let the smell of her wash over me. I loved having this one unspoiled part of her left just for me. I leaned forward, slipped my face in between the hanging silks and chiffons. Her scent was warm and possessive. If my idea of home had a smell, this would be it.
Home. Mother. Oh God, please. My face crumpled, and my knees gave out. I pitched forward into her hanging clothes, grabbing at her blouses and dresses, smelling of gardenias and dusk. I fell to the closet floor, pulling some with me. I toppled amongst her shoes; stinging eyes squeezed shut, mouth frozen open in a silent "O." They were out there somewhere, their lifeless bodies, still and cold, and they would never be coming home again. I curled my legs inside the wardrobe and pulled the door closed, shutting myself away with her memory. — Kirby Howell
Of course he knew what kinds of thoughts these were: the not-always-true ones, conveniently forgetting the other times, when he and Christine had bickered at the smallest thing, aggravated by the other's mere constant presence, and sometimes even said awful things
irreversible and stinging
that lingered like a foul odor for a long time afterward. Then there were long stretches of calm. And yet the bickering, the irritation, that too was part of the delicate glue that kept them together, still feeling something, even when they grew, sometimes for long periods, bored with each other, tired of each other, before settling back into their more usual, tamed and tamped down but still real and extant love. — Daphne Kalotay
That's the funny thing about children. When they were around, you wanted peace and quiet. A mere moment to yourself. You felt absolutely desperate to go more than three minutes without hearing the word Moooooooom echoing throughout the house. To go to the bathroom or - if luck was really on your side - to take an uninterrupted shower. Yet, when they were absent, no matter how infrequently that happened, it felt as though someone had amputated your limb and left a stinging open wound in its place. And you craved them like a cold beer on a blistering summer day. — Emily Liebert
It doesn't even - " one word "hurt " was supposed to come out of my mouth. Instead, a string of obscenities to make a lifelong sailor proud shoot out.
"What thefuck are you doing? Shit! You don't pour it on like that, you fucking jackhole! Fuck!"
I'm seething in pain, the sting agonizing. Ashton isn't paying any heed, turning my hand this way and that to examine it closer.
"Looks clean."
"Yeah, because you just bleached the shit out of it!"
"Relax. It'll stop stinging soon. Distract yourself by staring at me while we wait for this to settle down. That's how you got yourself into this mess to begin with ... — K.A. Tucker
More than anything, she wanted to remember him like this; she loved his biting words and his stinging hand, but his kiss. His kiss gave her hope. — Stylo Fantome
I sighed, sinking back, head filling with pleasant images; pictures Pietr floated to the surface. Kisses scorched along my face and neck. "Pietr ... "
There was a growl, and I felt fingers at the waistband of my jeans. The button opened and a hand traced along the top of my underpants.
"No," I said. The kissing resumed, harder. "Jessica." The word rumbled in someone's throat. Not Pietr's. To him, I was Jess.
"No," I insisted, trying to pry my eyes open. Something was wrong ... Not Pietr ... I pushed at the chest above me, my eyelids stinging as I willed them apart.
"Relax ... " a voice said, lips dragging along the cornerof my jaw, filling my head with honey, sticky and sweet ... — Shannon Delany
Resentment-why, it is purification; it is a most stinging and painful consciousness! — Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Stop.
Breathe those useless breaths. Drop this piece of life you're holding to your lips. Where are you? How long have you been here? Stop now. You have to stop.
Squeeze shut your stinging eyes, and take another bite. — Isaac Marion
Syn sucked hard on Furi's neck making him cry out at the stinging feeling. "You drive me crazy Furious but I love you anyway." Syn — A.E. Via
It's true that the audience gasped when Nina did her thirty-two fouettees. They began applauding when she was just half way through, so loudly that she couldn't hear the music and had to hope the conductor would simply follow her. With each whip of her leg she spun faster, beads of sweat flying, stinging her eyes - and yet she finished cleanly, precisely, and counted calmly to five before releasing the pose. Secretly, though, Nina finds it cheap, these technical feats. A cheap way to impress, nothing subtle or artful - just virtuostic display, demanding of applause and dropped jaws. Nina wants to do more than fancy tricks; she wants her body to sing, her eyes and her hands and the very angle of her head to convey every nuance of the music, and each facet of whichever character she is called on to play. — Daphne Kalotay
The bowed head, the buried face. She is silent, she will never speak, never forgive, never reach a hand, never leave this frozen present tense. All waits, suspended. Suspended the autumn trees, the autumn sky, anonymous people. A blackbird, poor fool, sings out of season from the willows by the lake. A flight of pigeons over the houses; fragments of freedom, hazard, an anagram made flesh. And somewhere the stinging smell of burning leaves. — John Fowles
Marry me, Lada. It is the perfect solution." Lada laughed. Mehmed's smile grew, until he realized her laugh was not a sweet breeze of delight, but a brutal desert wind carrying stinging sand in its wake. "I will never marry. — Kiersten White
Feathery Stokers - There is no definitive list but here are some examples. Men who didn't eat red meat were Feathery Strokers. Men who used postshave balm instead of slapping stinging aftershave onto their tender skin were Feathery Strokers. Men who noticed your shoes and handbags were Feathery Strokers. (Or Jolly Boys.) Men who said pornography was exploitation of women were Feathery Strokers. (Or liars.) Men who said pornography was exploitation of men as much as women were of the scale. All straight men from San Francisco were Feather Strokers. All academics with beards were Feathery Stokers. Men who stayed friends with their ex-girlfriends were Feathery Strokers. Especially if they called them their "ex-partner." Men who did Pilates were Feathery Strokers. Men who said, "I have to take care of myself right now" were screaming Feathery Strokers. (Even I'd go along with that.) ~Jacqui — Marian Keyes
Go and catch a falling star, Get with child a mandrake root, Tell me where all past years are, Or who cleft the Devil's foot. Teach me to hear the mermaids singing, Or to keep off envy's stinging, And find What wind Serves to advance an honest mind. Decide what this is about Write a second verse yourself — Diana Wynne Jones
And then it hits me like a fast, open-palmed, stinging smack in the face.
Having a ghost boyfriend
WAS
weird — Lisa Schroeder
If you and I want to stir up a resentment tomorrow that may rankle across the decades and endure until death, just let us indulge in a little stinging criticism - no matter how certain we are that it is justified. — Dale Carnegie
Advice from a Caterpillar
Chew your way into a new world.
Munch leaves. Molt. Rest. Molt
again. Self-reinvention is everything.
Spin many nests. Cultivate stinging
bristles. Don't get sentimental
about your discarded skins. Grow
quickly. Develop a yen for nettles.
Alternate crumpling and climbing. Rely
on your antennae. Sequester poisons
in your body for use at a later date.
When threatened, emit foul odors
in self-defense. Behave cryptically
to confuse predators: change colors, spit,
or feign death. If all else fails, taste terrible. — Amy Gerstler
The ocean ... cold and wild the surf, rushing in to overwhelm
the beach, the wind, stinging my cheeks, enveloping me
in total freedom. — Scott Holman
inner cheek, heart hammering, realizing he'd wasted two valuable bullets on a dime store scare. Only one bullet left. Then he was out of ammo. Roy checked his watch. Not even 4am yet. Hours to go before dawn. Might as well be days. Breathe. Remember to breathe. He took in air through his nostrils, tried to let it out slowly. His hands were shaking, and sweat was stinging his eyes despite the cool temperature. Roy holstered his sidearm, and drew his KA-BAR knife from his belt sheath, clutching it to his chest. Okay, stay calm. Find a place — Jack Kilborn
Stigmata of Love
A light which lives on what the flames devour,
a grey landscape surrounding me with scorch,
a crucifixion by a single wound,
a sky and earth that darken by each hour,
a sob of blood whose red ribbon adorns
a lyre without a pulse, and oils the torch,
a tide which stuns and strands me on the reef,
a scorpion scrambling, stinging in my chest
this is the wreath of love, this bed of thorns
is where I dream of you stealing my rest,
haunting these sunken ribs cargoed with grief.
I sought the peak of prudence, but I found
the hemlock-brimming valley of your heart,
and my own thirst for bitter truth and art. — Federico Garcia Lorca
The pair of them were again in the eye of a storm of misery - their world was a storm of misery and they were caught in its center, in the deceptive stillness that had allowed them to forget, once upon a time, that all around them was a stinging whirl of hatred that would catch them - it was everywhere and everything and they'd been fools to think they could leave their small safe place and not be caught in that vortex like every other living creature in Eretz. — Laini Taylor
I also had the distinct impression that, when he'd leaned into my space, he'd tried to smell me, and he'd managed to do it without coming across as a creepy creeper. Admittedly, if he were less epically good-looking, he might have come across as a creepy creeper. But, as he had the body of a gladiator and the face of a movie star, I felt flustered, flattered, and turned on. The fact that I felt flattered made me feel like an idiot. I hated this about myself. I hated that, even though I knew better, good looks negated odd behavior. His odd behavior being that he was attempting to use all five of his senses to experience me while trapping us in an elevator; I didn't doubt that, if I'd given him any indication that I was in favor of his advances, he would have tried to taste me as well. I shivered at the thought, a wave of warmth spreading from my chest to the pit of my stomach, stinging and sudden, like a hot flash. — L. H. Cosway
CHORONZON: I am a dire wolf, prey-stalking, lethal prowler.
MORPHEUS: I am a hunter, horse-mounted, wolf-stabbing.
CHORONZON: I am a horsefly, horse-stinging, hunter-throwing.
MORPHEUS: I am a spider, fly-consuming, eight legged.
CHORONZON: I am a snake, spider-devouring, posion-toothed.
MORPHEUS: I am an ox, snake-crushing, heavy-footed.
CHORONZON: I am an anthrax, butcher bacterium, warm-life destroying.
MORPHEUS: I am a world, space-floating, life-nurturing.
CHORONZON: I am a nova, all-exploding ... planet-cremating.
MORPHEUS: I am the Universe
all things encompassing, all life embracing.
CHORONZON: I am Anti-Life, the Beast of Judgment. I am the dark at the end of everything. The end of universes, gods, worlds ... of everything. Sss. And what will you be then, Dreamlord?
MORPHEUS: I am hope. — Neil Gaiman
I come from under the hill, and under the hills and over the hills my paths led. And through the air, I am he that walks unseen.
I am the clue-finder, the web-cutter, the stinging fly. I was chosen for the lucky number.
I am he that buries his friends alive and drowns them and draws them alive again from the water. I came from the end of a bag, but no bag went over me.
I am the friend of bears and the guest of eagles. I am Ringwinner and Luckwearer; and I am Barrel-rider. — J.R.R. Tolkien
The accession of not one but three illegal drug users in a row to the US presidency constitutes an existential challenge to the prohibitionist regime. The fact that some of the most successful people of our time, be it in business, finances, politics, entertainment or the arts, are current or former substance users is a fundamental refutation of its premises and a stinging rebuttal of its rationale. A criminal law that is broken at least once by 50% of the adult population and that is broken on a regular basis by 20% of the same adult population is a broken law, a fatally flawed law. How can a democratic government justify a law that is consistently broken by a substantial minority of the population? What we are witnessing here is a massive case of civil disobedience not seen since alcohol prohibition in the 1930 in the US. On what basis can a democratic system justify the stigmatization and discrimination of a strong minority of as much as 20% of its population? — Jeffrey Dhywood
No patience. No kisses. No hugs. Just a tweezers and some rubbing alcohol, and a stinging sensation that never goes away. — A.S. King
The tears were back, stinging just behind my eyes. There was blood all over my penguins. I didn't give a damn about the walls and carpet. They could be replaced, but I'd collected those damned stuffed toys over years. — Laurell K. Hamilton
Time, which shows so vacant, indivisible, and divine in its coming, is slit and peddled into trifles and tatters. A door is to bepainted, a lock to be repaired. I want wood, or oil, or meal, or salt; the house smokes, or I have a headache; then the tax; and an affair to be transacted with a man without heart or brains; and the stinging recollection of an injurious or very awkward word,
these eat up the hours. — Ralph Waldo Emerson
My lips and eyes and heart were stinging when you kissed me in the dark. - Jack Garton to Jennifer Hammer, 2008 (age 24) — Jeanette Lynes
It's interesting to try to imagine how early humans discovered what was edible and what wasn't. Who figured out that when you cooked stinging nettles, the sting would go away completely? How many people had to die before the relative toxicity of wild mushrooms became widely known? — Kate Christensen
Not until you finally try to put down the stuff do you realize, with stinging clarity, precisely why you picked it up in the first place. All life, in this freshly nerve-flayed state, boils down to a choice of hells. The hell of being fucked-up on drugs or the hell of being fucked-up without them. — Jerry Stahl
Marketa pressed her hand against her stinging cheek. She was too stunned to cry, for her mother had never struck her before. She looked at her twin sisters, whose faces blanched, and they clutched each other in fear. — Linda Lafferty
I do not know how long this machine has carried us when the roaring finally ceases. My back, my limbs - every bit of me aches. The master eagle lies quiet and still. I do not believe he sleeps. I sense his desperation with each shallow breath he takes. Perhaps he plots as I do. If I could move my lips I would whisper to him. I would tell him I have a plan.
The iron fist opens, and dust pours in stinging my eyes. It opens wider and tilts forward, forcing us to fall to the ground. We do not land with a crunch on jagged terrain. There is only the smooth thud of a sandy floor.
There is a quick, loud smash, like metal slamming into metal. Footsteps approach us - one set. The netting digs into my shoulders from my heaving breath. I close my eyes and try to suppress my panic, knowing that while my hands are bound, I am helpless. — Quoleena Sbrocca
One invited artists to social events, but only for the pleasure of their company. To invite singers or dancers to perform for their supper was inexpressively vulgar, and deserved a prompt and stinging rebuke. — Kerry Greenwood
If you ever leave me again,' she said, her eyes stinging, 'I swear to all the gods-'
Percy had the nerve to laugh. Suddenly the lump of heated emotions melted inside Annabeth.
'Consider me warned,' Percy said. 'I missed you, too. — Rick Riordan
As dye soaks fibres, drawn into them to change their colour forever, so does a memory, stinging or sweet, change the fibre of a man's character. — Robin Hobb
Goe and catche a falling starre, Get with child a mandrake root, Tell me, where all past yeares are, Or who cleft the Divel's foot. Teach me to hear Mermaides' singing, Or to keep of envies stinging, And finde What winde Serves to advance an honest minde. — John Donne
Skinners guts were in turmoil from the beer and curry at the weekend and a viscous, silent eye-stinging killer of a fart slipped out of him, as poignantly weeping as a lover's last farewell, just as the lift stopped at the next floor to let in two men wearing overalls. Everybody suffered in silence. As the workmen got off at the following level, Skinner seized the opportunity, announcing, - That is minging, looking towards the departing workers. He knew that when it came to farting everybody turned into Old Etonian High Court Judges. Men would always be suspected before women and men in working clothes would always be blamed before men in suits. Those were the rules.
From "The Bedroom Secrets Of The Master Chefs — Irvine Welsh
Satan understands the power of men and women united in righteousness. He is still stinging from his banishment into eternal exile after Michael led the hosts of heaven, comprised of valiant men and women united in the cause of Christ, against him. — Sheri L. Dew
Was awakened abruptly just after dawn by a tiny stinging sensation on top of my head. I blinked and put up a hand to investigate. The movement startled a large gray jay who had been pulling hairs out of my head, and he shot up into a nearby pine tree, screeching hysterically. "Serve you right, mate," I muttered, rubbing the top of my head, but couldn't help smiling. I had been told often enough that my hair looked like a bird's nest first thing in the morning; perhaps there was something to it, after all. — Diana Gabaldon
It wasn't like the other songs. There was no story, no conversation. This was just the feeling, without words or pictures, and it had nothing to do with Luther or his clean, stinging guitar. It was the sound of being outside, of being alien. It was the pulse that ran under everything and never let you forget that you were strange, that the world hurt just to touch. — Brenna Yovanoff
Now I'm floating like a butterfly
Stinging like a bee I earned my stripes
I went from zero, to my own hero — Katy Perry
blood blooming underneath the stinging bite of steel. II. — Amanda Lovelace
For this, be sure, tonight thou shalt have cramps,
Side-stitches that shall pen thy breath up. Urchins
Shall forth at vast of night that they may work
All exercise on thee. Thou shalt be pinched
As thick as honeycomb, each pinch more stinging
Than bees that made 'em. — William Shakespeare
This building disguised as a house of worship, was rather like a hive. A backward hive, for honeybees, at least, have the good sense to worship the female that gifts them all with life. They do not hold their drones in such high esteem. But here, is the hive of hornets, the males flitted flower to flower, pollinating, and stinging and injecting their poison. — Ellen Hopkins
My eyes were stinging, my body shaking, and my heart seemed to be just aching deep in my chest. ( ... )
I should have let myself smash down the rocks. It would have hurt a whole lot less — Keri Arthur
And I feel like the Queen of Water. I feel like water that transforms from a flowing river to a tranquil lake to a powerful waterfall to a freshwater spring to a meandering creek to a salty sea to raindrops gentle on your face to hard, stinging hail to frost on a mountaintop, and back to a river again. — Maria Virginia Farinango
The stinging insects clung to one another and floated in clumps the size of basketballs, the ants on bottom giving their lives to save those on top. They — Judith Richards
Solzhenitsyn recounted a party conference in Moscow that ended with a tribute to Stalin. Everyone stood and clapped wildly for three minutes, then four, then five ... and then no one dared to be the first to stop. After eleven minutes of increasingly stinging palms, a factory director on the platform finally sat down, followed by the rest of the grateful assembly. He was arrested that evening and sent to the gulag for ten years.278 — Steven Pinker