Thorn Quotes & Sayings

But the dream is never forgotten, only put aside and never out of reach: Where once the dream connected boys with the world of men, now it reconnects men with the spirit of boys. — John Thorn

A romantic, I think, picks the rose and is careless with the thorn. — Gene Tierney

Even when you tear its petals off one after another,
the rose keeps laughing and doesn't bend in pain.
"Why should I be afflicted because of a thorn?
It is the thorn which taught me how to laugh."
Whatever you lost through fate,
be certain that it saved you from pain. — Rumi

Only in art will the lion lie down with the lamb, and the rose grow without thorn. — Martin Amis

Nursing a bottle from a half-floor above, Johnny Jukes stared at her and knew. She was all edges. She stood erect on the wall, like the scabbard of a sword. She did not slouch. Her clothes were crisp, like whole numbers. They were dark, except for her boots, which were red. Thorn of love. A screeching solo tore off a dozen dancers' heads. (67) — Michael Blumlein

Many different kinds of sprouts lay torn. Green, purple and orange leaves lay scattered across the dark soil, and the thorn fence surrounding the bed had a fist-sized hole in it. Teacher eased himself into a squat, poked at the inside of the hole. Whatever made the hole had left blood on the thorns. The sprouts looked like wispy ghosts, pale and broken. Their delicate leaves and stems were riddled with bites. Life drained out of them like water dripping from a hanging cloth, and a breeze made them dance sadly. It felt like a funeral.
Teacher picked up a gnawed berry and gently squeezed it until purple juice dripped down his thumb. He placed the berry by the plant's roots.
Chandi's small face bunched up. "Are they dead?"
"They're dying, yes." Yuvali took her hand. "But their bodies will help other plants grow. — B.T. Lowry

The thorn is a bridge spanning the muddy depths of agony and sorrow so that one may on the other side dance to the drums of the rose of joy. — Aberjhani

You are lucky, Thorn. You are very lucky."
"Doubtless. Not every girl gets to be stabbed through the face."
"And by a duke of royal blood too! — Joe Abercrombie

I first met Brother Booker at the House of Peace, while delivering donated Christmas trees and lights during the holidays.
I had no grasp of the depth of the man's character, or the quality of the individuals he surrounded himself with. But I remember walking away amazed by the man, and marveling at the chaos that swirled around him...having researched his life and talked with many of his nearest and dearest, I am even more amazed today. — Willy Thorn

Disheartened, enraptured, and strangely lightheaded, Grady emerged from the trees and walked back through town to the island bridge, his ankles and hands marked up with thorn scratches. — Molly Ringle

I think,' said Lyndall, 'that he is like a thorn-tree, which grows up very quietly, without any one's caring for it, and one day suddenly breaks out into yellow blossoms. — Olive Schreiner

Without complexity, there's no intensity. — Alexandra Adornetto

The rose saith in the dewy morn,
I am most fair;
Yet all my loveliness is born
Upon a thorn. — Christina Rossetti

The shame, the roused feeling of exposure acted on his brain, made him heavy, unutterably heavy. — D.H. Lawrence

It was not the thorn bending to the honeysuckles, but the honeysuckles embracing the thorn. — Emily Bronte

The fool says 'I never intended to kill. I meant only to wound.' But I tell you that if you prick a finger with a poisoned thorn you may not claim innocence when the heart dies. Do not plant a weed and pretend surprise when it grows to strangle your garden. For, I tell you that hate is to kill, for from hatred grows death as surely as life grows from love. Therefore do not nurture hatred, but love, even for those who hate you in return. Hatred wins many battles, and yet love will triumph. — Michael Grant

From scarlet to powdered gold, to blazing yellow, to the rare ashen emerald, to the orange and black velvet of your shimmering corselet, out to the tip that like an amber thorn begins you, small, superlative being, you are a miracle, and you blaze — Pablo Neruda

I've been hounded by a reputation of being difficult when really what I'm being is truthful and honest. And I think that's been a thorn in my side. — Gabrielle Anwar

This move is called Qworegoys,
and the women of my grandmother's family taught it to their daughters just as they taught them to make thorn-bush fences to protect the hut from hyenas. — Ayaan Hirsi Ali

There's a great scene in The Texas Chain Saw Massacre [1974] that I'm obsessed with: Sally is being chased by Leatherface with a chainsaw. And she runs into thorn bushes. And she's getting tangled up in it because she's running fast. But Sally needs to move slowly in order to get through the bushes - she will get farther faster by going slowly because her hair and clothes won't get tangled and caught. There's something really beautiful about understanding that, while someone's chasing you with a chainsaw, you have to move more slowly in order to get away. — Christopher Bollen

Every rose has it's thorn, but that doesn't mean you have to put up with a ton of pricks. — Kelly Rossi

It is madness to hate all roses because you got scratched with one thorn. To give up on your dreams because one didn't come true. To lose faith in prayers because one was not answered, to give up on our efforts because one of them failed. To condemn all your friends because one betrayed you, not to believe in love because someone was unfaithful or didn't love you back. To throw away all your chances to be happy because you didn't succeed on the first attempt. I hope that as you go on your way, you don't give in nor give up! — Antoine De Saint-Exupery

Occupied Falklands are the thorn in my balls — Margaret Thatcher

Blue eyes glittered. A shock of golden hair - gone. The dust in the air swirled, coalesced into a thorn-twisted Shaman tattoo. — Lilith Saintcrow

It pleases him how Spell is how the word is made but also, in the hands of the magician, how the world is changed. One letter separates Word from World, and that letter is like the number one, or an 'I', or a shaft of light between almost closed curtains. There is an old letter called a thorn, which jags and tears at the throat as it's uttered. Later he learns that Grammar and Glamour share the same deeper root, which is further magic, and there can be neither magic without that root, nor plant. He's lost in it like Chid in Child, or God reversed into Dog. Somewhere inside him is a colon. A sentence can last for life. — Charles Lambert

My sins were the scourges which lacerated those blessed shoulders, and crowned with thorn those bleeding brows: my sins cried "Crucify him! crucify him!" and laid the cross upon his gracious shoulders. His being led forth to die is sorrow enough for one eternity: but my having been his murderer, is more, infinitely more, grief than one poor fountain of tears can express. — Charles Haddon Spurgeon

You live recklessly when you do not take God's law seriously or respond to the gospel properly. Reckless living can look like laziness and apathy. When you simply aren't motivated and tell yourself that God has forgiven you in Jesus, so you're not going to fight temptation and sin - that is reckless living, and it's far more dangerous than you realize. — Joe Thorn

Consciousness is much more than the thorn, it is the dagger in the flesh. — Emil Cioran

Forgotten Stars. Time in the Flame.
Missing Shard. The Only Rain.
Door of the Memory. Waves in the Silk.
Silent Birch. Thoughts of Lunatics.
Secret of the Flowers. Soaring of the Souls.
Heart in the Night. And a Kiss Unfolds.
Forgotten Voyager. Voyage in the Words.
Nothing of the World. Someone of the Hemisphere.
Trembling Stones. Sucking Tears.
The Next Gift. The World in the Kisses.
Missing Angels. The Woman of the Girl.
Guardian of the Rings. Thorn in the Pearl.
Whispering Sword. Touching exclaim.
Soul in the Truth. Heat in the Flame.
Thy name, my name, Thy name!
Came. Became. To Remain. — Jasleen Kaur Gumber

But the citizens of Cincinnati loved their Reds because they won, no matter what their addresses had been the year before. They rooted for the Old-English 'C' on the players' shirts. — John Thorn

When the roses are gone, nothing is left but the thorn. — Ovid

What are you doing?" Kody
"Going to ruin Thorn's day." Nick
"Do you think that's wise?" Kody
"Nat at all." Nick — Sherrilyn Kenyon

Mike's breath caught, as if on a thorn. — Stephen King

There is a whole generation of romance readers and writers who suffer from what I like to think of as 'Thorn Birds' Fever. — Sarah MacLean

As the game enters its glorious final weeks, the chill of fall signals the reality of defeat for all but one team. The fields of play will turn brown and harden, the snow will fall, but in the heart of the fan sprouts a sprig of green. — John Thorn

And indeed he had no sooner come to the field than he saw all the toadstools leaning over one way, and that the way he was going; for just as thorn trees all lean away from the sea, so toadstools and every plant that has any touch of mystery, such as foxgloves, mulleins and certain kinds of orchis, when growing anywhere near it, all lean towards Elfland. By this one may know before one has heard a murmur of waves, or before one has guessed an influence of magical things, that one comes, as the case may be, to the sea or the border of Elfland. — Lord Dunsany

But he who dares not grasp the thorn
Should never crave the rose. — Anne Bronte

I forgave her, of course. I always did; I had to, because there were only the two of us. The two of us on our thorn-encircled island, waiting for rescue; and, on the mainland, everyone else. — Margaret Atwood

What is clear is that Scripture requires both head and heart, and you need to see it not just as a text but as the very words of God. This will encourage you to pay close attention to the very words he uses, but it will also compel you to feast on those words as light-shedding, wisdom-dispensing, and life-giving counsel from on high.

For all your longing for God to speak, to make his will plain and his plan clear, you should be daily immersed in God's Word. This is his voice, his will, and his plan made known to you. Consider these words, "Make your face shine upon your servant, and teach me your statutes." God's face shines on you when you are learning - experientially - his Word. — Joe Thorn

Pull the thorn of existence out of the heart! Fast!
For when you do, you will see thousands of rose gardens in yourself. — Rumi

Mister Thorn, something tells me you could sell salvation to a priest. — Richelle Mead

It astounds me that out of all the flowers in the garden, the rose would fall in love with the thorn. — H R Brock

Later, I would ask Shaya to help me compose a formal response to Katrice's letter, something a long the lines of I am the Thorn Queen. F*** Off. — Richelle Mead

Keep score, which is what the Talmud recognizes as a distinction between work and play that renders a game unfit for the Sabbath. — John Thorn

This spring as it comes bursts up in bonfires green,
Wild puffing of emerald trees, and flame-filled bushes,
Thorn-blossom lifting in wreaths of smoke between
Where the wood fumes up and the watery, flickering rushes.
I am amazed at this spring, this conflagration
Of green fires lit on the soil of the earth, this blaze
Of growing, and sparks that puff in wild gyration,
Faces of people streaming across my gaze. — D.H. Lawrence

It looks like a typical voodoo sacrifice. (Fang)
Well, slap my ass and call me Sally if you're not bright. (Thorn) — Sherrilyn Kenyon

A thorn in the flesh is nothing compared to a thorn in the conscience. — Adrian Rogers

To defend his purity, Saint Francis of Assisi rolled in the snow, Saint Benedict threw himself into a thorn bush, and Saint Bernard plunged into an icy pond ... You - what have you done? — Josemaria Escriva

Break not the rose; its fragrance and beauty are surely sufficient, resting contented with these, never a thorn shall you feel. — John Hay

But ne'er the rose without the thorn. — Robert Herrick

The longstanding thorn in your side Captain Numos is stupid. In fact, Numos is so dense that I'm surprised he doesn't have his own event horizon. — Jack Campbell

It was like being pleased y a thorn bush, feeling fond of every prickle. Another second and he was going to say something ridiculous like that. — C.S. Pacat

Sovereign of beauty, like the spray she grows;Compass'd she is with thorns and canker'd bower.Yet, were she willing to be pluck'd and worn,She would be gather'd, though she grew on thorn. — Robert Greene

Is it the smoke?' the boy said, shivering slightly. 'I've never touched the stuff, myself, but how it claws at one ... like a thorn in every one of your fingers, and a string around your heart ... and one fees it always. Nagging. Nagging. — Eleanor Catton

I have a faithful joy and a joy that is lost. One is like a rose, the other, a thorn. The one that was stolen I have not lost. — Gabriela Mistral

Not being able to rebound better was a thorn in our foot. — Gary Payton

Sweet love, sweet thorn, when lightly to my heart. I took your thrust, whereby I since am slain, And I lie disheveled in the grass apart, A sodden thing bedrenched by tears and rain. — Edna St. Vincent Millay

Her returned in the evening, drier, sharper, a man with a closer kinship with a thorn bush. — Jose Eduardo Agualusa

Eddie asks, So what next?
And Jesus, his eyes dark but laced with a hint of mercy, the thorn scars just barely visible at his hairline, says, Damned if I know. — Tom Piccirilli

Just because I am increasingly bored by sabermetric arcana doesn't mean anyone else has to be; it remains good for people who like that sort of thing. — John Thorn

I can tell we're going to get along like Batman and the Joker. (Fang) Just remember one thing, world. I'm the best friend you'll ever have or the last enemy you'll ever make. (Thorn) — Sherrilyn Kenyon

Party name of Thorn? Tristran of that set? — Neil Gaiman

The air was cold to the lungs, the long grass dripping wet, and the herbs on it gave out their spiced astringent scent. In a little while on all sides the Cicada would begin to sing. The grass was me , and the air, the distant invisible mountains were me, the tired oxen were me. I breathed with the slight night-wind in the thorn trees. — Isak Dinesen

The thorn tree just began to bud
And greening stained the sheltering hedge,
An many a violet beside the wood
Peeped blue between the withered sedge;
The sun gleamed warm the bank beside,
'Twas pleasant wandering out a while
Neath nestling bush to lonely hide,
Or bend a musings o'er a stile. — John Clare

Why we play as children is not because it is our work or because it is how we learn, though both statements are true; we play because we are wired for joy, it is imperative as human beings. — John Thorn

A Mixed-breed Apple
A little mixed-breed apple,
half red, half yellow, tells this story.
A lover and beloved get separated.
Their being apart was one thing,
but they have opposite responses.
The lover feels pain and grows pale.
The beloved flushes and feels proud.
I am a thorn next to my master's rose.
We seem to be two, but we are not. — Rumi

A little thorn may cause much suffering. A little cloud may hide the sun. Little foxes spoil the vines; and little sins do mischief to the tender heart. These little sins burrow in the soul, and make it so full of that which is hateful to Christ, that he will hold no comfortable fellowship and communion with us. A great sin cannot destroy a Christian, but a little sin can make him miserable ... — Charles Spurgeon

Sometimes life touches one person with a bouquet and another with a thorn bush, But the first may find a wasp in the flowers, and the second may discover roses among the thorns. — Billy Graham

Fear not, my doves!" Thorn jumped as someone flung an arm around her shoulders. The strange woman who had watched Thorn fight Brand a few days before thrust her gray-stubbled skull between her and her mother. "For the wise Father Yarvi has placed your daughter's education in my dextrous hands."
Thorn hadn't thought her spirits could drop any lower, but the gods had found a way. "Education?"
The woman hugged them tighter, her smell a heady mix of sweat, incense, herbs and piss. "It's where I teach and you learn."
"And who ... " Thorn's mother gave the ragged woman a nervous look, "or what ... are you?"
"Lately, a thief." When that sharpened nervousness into alarm she added brightly, "but also an experienced killer! — Joe Abercrombie

Storytellers lie was right up there at the top of Johnnyboy's rules-to-live-by list with Ignore heroes and Never make decisions based on fear. — Thorn Kief Hillsbery

Is love a tender thing? It is too rough, too rude, too boisterous, and it pricks like thorn. — William Shakespeare

(...) he was beginning to be himself. And now he wanted madly to be free to go on. A home, his work, and absolute freedom to move and to be, in her, with her, this was his passionate desire. He thought in a kind of ecstasy, living an hour of painful intensity. — D.H. Lawrence

The thorn in the cushion of the editorial chair. — William Makepeace Thackeray

The second evening, the daughters got him drunk again and Gaia, the youngest, slept with him and got pregnant as well. The fruit of their incestuous intercourse would one day prove to be a thorn in the side of Abraham's seed to come. The firstborn bore a son and called him Moab. The younger one bore a son and called him Ben-ammi. These two would be the fathers of the Moabites and the Ammonites. — Brian Godawa

I'm scared," Nico mumbled. He was fiddling with something - a little metal toy soldier of some kind.
"Stop talking!" Dr. Thorn said. "Face me! — Rick Riordan

The thorn from the bush one has planted, nourished and pruned pricks more deeply and draws more blood. — Maya Angelou

If I hold you in my heart, you'll wither;
Become a thorn if I hold you in my eyes.
No, I'll make a place for you within my soul instead
So you'll be my love in lives beyond this life. — Rumi

Patience does not mean to passively endure. It means to be farsighted enough to trust the end result of a process. What does patience mean? It means to look at the thorn and see the rose, to look at the night and see the dawn. Impatience means to be so shortsighted as to not be able to see the outcome. The lovers of God never run out of patience, for they know that time is needed for the crescent moon to become full. — Elif Shafak

Put a thorn in every enjoyment, a worm in every gourd, that would either prevent my being wholly thine, or in any measure retard my progress in the divine life. — Thomas Cogswell Upham

The deepwood is vanished in these islands
much, indeed, had vanished before history began
but we are still haunted by the idea of it. The deepwood flourishes in our architecture, art and above all in our literature. Unnumbered quests and voyages have taken place through and over the deepwood, and fairy tales and dream-plays have been staged in its glades and copses. Woods have been a place of inbetweenness, somewhere one might slip from one world to another, or one time to a former: in Kipling's story 'Puck of Pook's Hill,' it is by right of 'Oak and Ash and Thorn' that the children are granted their ability to voyage back into English history. — Robert Macfarlane

I don't think I'm a thorn in the industry, I'm just another part of it. — Neil Young

Maybe, it is not the thorn on the rose that we should see, but the beauty of the gesture. — Shannon L. Alder

We are fans because the game also appeals to our local pride, our pleasure in thinking of ourselves as, yes, Americans but nonetheless different from residents of other towns, other states, other regions. — John Thorn

Vialine counted the points off on her small fingers. "So quickness to strike, and cleverness, and aggression without conscience, honor or pity."
Thorn held up her empty hands. "They've got me everything I have. — Joe Abercrombie

A thorn in your side will drive you to find someone or thing to remove it. Therefore, don't hate your enemies. Thank them. Without them, you wouldn't have traveled as far in your life to find peace and happiness. — Shannon L. Alder

I was a thorn rushing to be with a rose, vinegar blending with honey ... Then I found some dirt to make an ointment that would honor my soul ... Love says, You are right, but don't claim these changes. Remember, I am wind. You are an ember I ignite. — Rumi

I jerked my phone out of my pocket and took a sharp left to follow the bold green line. I didn't fail to notice my walking icon had been replaced with a bicycle. Stupid Google. Doesn't have a "Succubus on Steroids" setting.

J.M. Friedman. Succubus in Seattle (Kindle Locations 1198-1199). — J.R. Thorn

For many in baseball September is a month of stark contrast with April, when everyone had dared to hope. If baseball is a lot like life, as pundits declare, it is because life is more about losing than winning. — John Thorn

The bee, though it finds every rose has a thorn, comes back loaded with honey from his rambles; and why should not other tourists do the same? — Thomas Chandler Haliburton

Nature shaped the claw to trap, and the tooth to kill, but the thorn ... the thorn's only purpose is to hurt. — Mark Lawrence

Finally, for all of us but a lucky few, the dream of playing big-time baseball is relinquished so we can get on with grown-up things. — John Thorn

In response to the challenge of strangers, sport arose as a sublimated representation of a community's armed might as well as its pride of place and clan. — John Thorn

Pity is for this life, pity is the worm inside the meat, pity is the meat, pity is the shaking pencil, pity is the shaking voice
not enough money, not enough love
pity for all of us
it is our grace, walking down the ramp or on the moving sidewalk, sitting in a chair, reading the paper, pity, turning a leaf to the light, arranging a thorn. — Jane Austen

If I Separated Myself
From You ... I Would Turn
Entirely Thorn! — Rumi

Too many disciples neglect their thorn-like qualities. For instance: Opting for singleness doesn't count if you can't attract a mate. Patience doesn't count if you are too cowardly to defend what is right. Forgiveness doesn't count if the offender never respected you enough to ask for it. Don't label your character flaws as noble sacrifices.
pg 47 — Michael Ben Zehabe

The puritan through life's sweet garden goes to pluck the thorn and cast away the rose. — Kenneth Hare

The sharp thorn often produces delicate roses. — Ovid

And if I die? (Fang)
I'll know and I won't be happy. Remember, wolf, I'm one of the few beings who can follow you into the afterworld and seriously fuck you up there. Don't fail me. (Thorn) — Sherrilyn Kenyon

In my mind the city of Ariel is a thorn in Israel's side and a serious obstacle to peace. — Theodore Bikel

I dip my forefinger in the watery blood of your impotent mad redeemer, and write over his thorn-torn brow: The true prince of evil- the king of the slaves! — Anton Szandor LaVey