We Faded Quotes & Sayings

The memory of that first state of Freedom and paradisiac Unconsciousness has faded away into an ideal poetic dream. We stand here too conscious of many things: with Knowledge, the symptom of Derangement, we must even do our best to restore a little Order. Life is, in few instances, and at rare intervals, the diapason of a heavenly melody; oftenest the fierce jar of disruptions and convulsions, which, do what we will, there is no disregarding. — Thomas Carlyle

[New Orleans.] Katrina changed everything. Life here is different, every face altered. Yet we feel and sense the landscape not only in its hurricane-leveled, sodden depressions but - perhaps even more so now in the strangely comforting depths of our shared history. Even in the worst hit areas, not all is dissipated. Dense intricate attachments burrow too deep to underestimate or overlook. This is no featureless town to be rubbed off the map and cast aside. Here the band plays on.

Our kindred colors speak to the values of justice, faith and power; to curious combinations of passion, openness, irreverence and loyalty, to the values of individuality, sharing and compassion. Not least, we still enjoy the sounds of music and respond to succulent foods, to the magnificent flowering gardens, to the elements of grace and dreamy escape, and to the languid Southern charm typical of faded days gone by. — T.J. Fisher

My smile faded as we reached Ellsberg and I realized I would see Farah within minutes. Suddenly, I was terrified.
"We've been apart for a month," I said after Judd called Cooper to say we were nearly there. "While Farah made a great life for herself, I was letting myself starve to death in a shit motel. I'll ruin everything for her and she'll stop loving me."
"Angel, your sister needs you too."
"No, she doesn't," I said, panicking now. "She's got Cooper. She's got school and friends. I'm not good at anything. I'll mess everything up."
"Farah sees what I do and that's why she needs you. — Bijou Hunter

He caught me and held my gaze without welcome or warmth or any hint of what we had shared, and my sense of having violated something, of having looked where I shouldn't have faded, as I understood that this was what he wanted me to see all along, that I was there not as guard but as audience. I was there to see how different from me he was, how free of the foulness my father had shown him; and now that I had seen it, I knew our friendship had run its course. — Garth Greenwell

Life had been a suit I'd only put on for special occasions. Most of the time I kept it in the back of my closet, forgetting it was there. We were meant to die when it was barely stitched anymore, when the elbows and knees were stained with grass and mud, shoulder pads uneven from people hugging you all the time, downpours and blistering sun, the fabric faded, buttons gone. — Marisha Pessl

Sometimes, when I'm having a sort-through or a clear-out, I find photos of my youth, and it's a shock to see everything on black and white. I think my granddaughter believes we were actually grey-skinned, with dull hair, always posing in a shadowed landscape. But I remember the town as being almost too bright to look at when I was a girl. I remember the deep blue of the sky and the dark green of the pines cutting through it, the bright red of the local brick houses and the orange carpet of pine needles under our feet. Nowadays - though I'm not sure the sky is still occasionally blue and most of the houses are still there, and the trees still drop their needles - nowadays, the colours seem faded, as if I live in an old photograph. — Emma Healey

We gazed back over the fields to the farmhouse. Its white walls, faded wooden shutters and terra-cotta tiled roof peeped sleepily over the deep green domes of the orange trees, while the mountains looked benignly on - secure, solid and serene. Without exchanging a word, we both knew that this was going to be our new home. — Peter Kerr

Each night we watched the sun set no matter where we were, and we'd wake up early to witness it rising again. That was the thing about life: even when the days faded to black, you were always given another chance. A second moment to try again to rise from the ashes. — Brittainy C. Cherry

We still have a tradition certainly in English television; it's faded a bit in the last five years, but we still have a tradition where the important thing is the quality and the challenging nature of the programming. — Rowan Atkinson

Hmm?" She raised her eyebrows and looked up at him, then her cheerful expression faded. "Don't look at me like that."
"Like what?" he asked, though he knew damned well what she meant.
"Like ye think I'd be willing to have my wedding night lying in the dirt," she said, narrowing her eyes at him. "If ye believe that, you're quite mistaken."
"So we're only debating where, and not whether, to have a wedding night?" he asked. — Margaret Mallory

Back in the '70s - I remember the '70s: we were told there was global cooling. And everyone was told global cooling was a really big problem. And then that faded. — Ted Cruz

The first pages of memory are like the old family Bible. The first leaves are wholly faded and somewhat soiled with handling. But, when we turn further, and come to the chapters where Adam and Eve were banished from Paradise, then, all begins to grow clear and legible. — Max Muller

wasn't Lily; it was Craig Simmons, the landscaper. Holding a sweat-stained baseball cap in his hand, the fortyish-something sandy-haired man stood on the front porch, still wearing his work boots, faded jeans and stained T-shirt. "Hello, Ms. Boatman, I just got back from lunch, noticed your car in the back drive and wondered if you had a chance to look through your house. I wanted to make sure everything is all right." "Yes, we went through the house, and nothing seems to be missing." That wasn't entirely true. She had only been to the library and kitchen, but according to Walt, Adam and Bill left empty — Bobbi Ann Johnson Holmes

And into the close and mirrored catacombs of sleep
We'll fall, and there in the faded light discover the bones,
The dust, the bitter remains of someone who might have been
Had we not taken his place. — Mark Strand

And then finally she came - and the whole world faded out around us and we were just alone on the crowded sidewalk. I've heard it called love.
("I Won't Take a Minute" aka "I'll Just Be a Minute" aka "Wait for Me Downstairs" aka "Finger Of Doom") — Cornell Woolrich

Memories are interesting. Interesting because they are faded yet detailed, pictured yet difficult to decipher, yelling yet mute, beautiful yet dreadful, magical yet logical, and familiar yet new. We listen; we encounter; we observe; we do; we learn; and, we talk. Everything we do or experience becomes our memory. Indeed, memories are interesting. — Suyog Ketkar

I can't believe you did this." He leaned close, his warm breath stirring the hair at her temple. "It's going to cost you." She stifled a smile, remembering their bet and the subsequent payout. "And I'm not settling for a kiss this time," he said. "Oh yeah?" "Yeah." He leaned in and feathered her lips with a kiss. "But we'll start there and see where it goes." Her smile quickly faded as he kissed her again, and soon all she heard was the beating of her own heart. — Denise Hunter

One more thing. The people and the friends that we have lost ... or the dreams that have faded ... never forget them. — Yuna

A young man - we can sketch his portrait at a dash. Imagine to yourself a Don Quixote of eighteen; a Don Quixote without his corselet, without his coat of mail, without his cuisses; a Don Quixote clothed in a woolen doublet, the blue color of which had faded into a nameless shade between lees of wine and a heavenly azure; face long and brown; — Alexandre Dumas

Believe me. There was nothing good in always being second place. Next to you, I may as well have been invisible - at least when it came to the ladies. If I'd known, we'd both end up as bachelors, I wouldn't have been so jealous of you.'
'Jealous?' Akkarin's smile faded. He turned away to stare at the horizon. 'No. Don't be jealous. — Trudi Canavan

Sunsets in themselves are generally superior to sunrises; but with the sunset we appreciate images drawn from departed peace and faded glory. — George Stillman Hillard

I eased back on my elbows, tilting my head back to look up at the sky, which was pinkish, streaked with red. This was the time we knew best, that stretch of day going from dusk to dark. It seemed like we were always waiting for nighttime here. I could feel the trampoline easing up and down, moved by our own breathing, bringing us in small increments up and back from the sky as the colors faded, slowly, and the stars began to show themselves. — Sarah Dessen

Do you know anyone who would be willing to die to save those five-thousand serial killers?"
"No. Everyone I know is too smart for that!"
"Yet Someone did die to save all of the serial killers, and all of the old women, and all of the soldiers, and all of the babies that the world has ever known. That one is Jesus Christ. He died for you and for me. He died for everyone, because in this world our sin has condemned us to death, and the only way that we can be saved was for someone who was Himself without sin to be willing to die in our place."
Molly was silent. Her bright smile had faded, and she felt tears well up in her eyes. — Joyce Swann

Once we erase ourselves, then there's no eraser. There never was anyone to erase. We've awakened from the dream and the dream has faded. — Frederick Lenz

Autumn is the Sabbath of the year; the time to think of all the past: nature's calm twilight before the darkness. It does make all men think at times; even the lightest and the worst. The distant days of our springtime, our faded summer, comes over us like a dream. We sit in the evening of our life in tender musings, and all that has been takes shadowy form again, and passes through the thoughts. — Cunningham Geikie

We return to the places we're from; we trample faded corners and pencil in new lines. — Anthony Doerr

We are all proprietary toward cities we love. 'Ah, you should have seen her when I loved her!' we say, reciting glories since faded or defiled, trusting her to no one else; that others should know and love her in her present fallen state (for she must fall without our vigilant love) is a species of betrayal. — Barbara Grizzuti Harrison

Gather up your telegrams
Your faded pictures, best laid plans
Books and postcards, 45's
Every sunset in the sky
Carry with you maps and string, flashlights
Friends who make you sing
And stars to help you find your place
Music, hope and amazing grace
Maybe what we leave
Is nothing but a tangled little mystery
Maybe what we take
Is nothing that has ever had a name — Mary Chapin Carpenter

Wait." I began to pull off his jacket. "You forgot this."
"Keep it," he said without looking back. "I'll get it from you on Monday. When we discuss tutoring."
And Noah Hutchins - girl-using stoner boy and jacket-loaning savior - faded into the shadows. — Katie McGarry

And if I say to you that I am glad of everything we have done together, and sorry that we will not be here together in forty years, laughing at a faded photo of you impersonating a lion, it having withered well, you less so, as we stand fabulously old, in a city that understands what spirit it takes to be old, to be beautiful, to be much looked at, to be itself, to be never quite caught, to have a past, to be content, to have seen much, to have remained, to have continued ... — Jeanette Winterson

Excerpt from Winning Streak, Las Vegas Sinners Book 3, coming later this year:

Tonight's ensemble was typical Madden. Dark and faded but expensive jeans, a fitted, black Vegas is For Lovers t-shirt and some Doc Martin boots. Okay, those were a little unusual. "We're not going for a hike in the desert, are we?"

"Not exactly."

"What is 'not exactly'? I'm not a pee-behind-a-tree kind of girl. — Katie Kenyhercz

Were we just two more rootless jungle-dwelling erotomaniacs creamining in their pre-faded jeans over Historical New England, dreaming the old agrarian dream in their rent-a-car convertible — Philip Roth

Here and there, in some older houses, old faded daguerreotypes still hang on the walls ... They seem to us to be very simple ... compared with the artistic and skillful portraits made in later days ... Here was a photograph that at one time had been the last word, a very modern portrait ... Today it is just a part of cultural history. The small yellowed surface has acquired depth, an admonishing perspective. We hold in our hand a symbol of the structure and ideology of an epoch. — Isak Dinesen

We get to come back," Aelin said, pushing her hand harder and harder into her wound until the blood stopped, until it was only her tears that flowed. "Dorian, we get to come back from this loss - from this darkness. We get to come back, and I came back for you."
She was weeping now, weeping as that wind faded away and her wound knitted closed.
The prince's daggers had gone slack in his hands.
And on his finger, Athril's golden ring glowed.
"Fight it," she panted. The sun angled closer. "Fight it. We get to come back. — Sarah J. Maas

And once again I believe that nothing that's important really becomes lost. We just delude ourselves, thinking that we own the things, the moments and the others. Still with me are all the dead persons who I loved, all the friends who turned away, all the happy days that faded. I lost nothing but the illusion that everything could be mine forever. — Miguel Sousa Tavares

The dreams we had of finding meaning and fulfillment through our jobs have faded into the reality of professional politics, burnout, boredom and intense competition. — Vicki Robin

ONCE I STOOD on the bank of a rice paddy in rural Sichuan Province, and a lean and aging Chinese peasant, wearing a faded forty-year-old blue jacket issued by the Mao government in the early years of the Revolution, stood knee deep in water and apropos of absolutely nothing shouted defiantly at me, We Chinese invented many things! — Mark Kurlansky

He chuckled. "I cannot speak for other men, but I want the woman who stumbles over a word like virgin and can say whore without raising a blush." His smile faded and he spoke soberly. "Your soldier ... your first love ... and every circumstance that followed in some way brought you to me, and while I can wish that you had never had your heart hurt, that you had never suffered even a moment of doubt, of pain, of sadness ... of betrayal, I also know that you would in some way be changed. It would have made your life different. Mine also." North gave her hand a light squeeze. "Whether we are shaped by the circumstances of our lives, or by our perceptions of them, I still find I very much admire the shape you have become. — Jo Goodman

As the years pass by, we'll glance at faded photographs recalling memories shared with special friends and family, never wanting it to end. Memories are the only thing left within the end." Judy — M. William Phelps

Barbarians, we call them, while all the while we timidly cling to our Web like Visigoths crouching in the ruins of Rome's faded glory and proclaim ourselves civilized. — Dan Simmons

Is it within us all, when the memories of war have faded, to so want to be a part of something great that we throw aside the quiet, the calm, the mundane, the peace itself? Do we collectively come to equate peace with boredom and complacency? Perhaps we hold these embers of war within us, dulled only by sharp memories of the pain and the loss, and when that smothering blanket dissipates with the passage of healing time, those fires flare again to life. — R.A. Salvatore

For this world, which lives only through belief, being forgotten is our ultimate death curse. Had you not come, we would have slowly faded until nothing remained. Do not blame yourself for the machinations of fate. — Kathryn Tanquary

Wyatt squeezed my hand, and it was light enough now that I could see his free hand pointing to a tree silhouetted against the pale morning sky, one tiny star barely visible above it. I blinked and it was gone. The others dissolved into the morning almost as quickly and were replaced by a cloudless swath of pale sky, tinged blue around the edges. Above the surface, it might have been a moment where I glanced over at Wyatt and he understood. He would've maybe even leaned in and kissed it softly into my memory. It might have made me feel less lonely and lost. But beneath the water, we didn't move and we didn't speak, and my moment of peace faded slowly into the blue around us. — Jessi Kirby

I stared at our hands. "Am I ever going to see you again?"
"You better believe it," he said. "Didn't I promise you we could make out in a castle?"
Chuckling, I drew my hand back. "You did. And to take me on dates. Real dates with no swords or ghouls or angst."
"Well, there you go," he said. "As soon as we've saved the world from a demon invasion, it's you, me, and Applebee's."
I rolled my eyes, but I was grinning now. "Oh, the romance."
His smile slowly faded. "I will see you again," he said, serious this time. "I promise." He moved closer to me so that his translucent legs disappeared into the bed. "Mercer, I-"
And then, just like that, be blinked out and was gone. — Rachel Hawkins

Before Summer Rain


Suddenly, from all the green around you,
something-you don't know what-has disappeared;
you feel it creeping closer to the window,
in total silence. From the nearby wood

you hear the urgent whistling of a plover,
reminding you of someone's Saint Jerome:
so much solitude and passion come
from that one voice, whose fierce request the downpour

will grant. The walls, with their ancient portraits, glide
away from us, cautiously, as though
they weren't supposed to hear what we are saying.

And reflected on the faded tapestries now;
the chill, uncertain sunlight of those long
childhood hours when you were so afraid — Rainer Maria Rilke

For the next several minutes we forgot about scones and lollipops and SATs and politicians and the Secret Service and hovered in a blissful place, population of two - Max and me. When I was kissing Max, the rest of the world, and all my problems faded away. — Cassidy Calloway

For what is genius, I ask you, but the capacity to be obsessed? ... We have all been geniuses, you and I; but sooner or later it is beaten out of us, the glory faded, and by the age of seven most of us are nothing but wretched little adults. — Steven Millhauser

All the problems in this world, he had told me, stem from the precept that we ought not to care about one another just because we are strangers.

Why should we not care about what happens to strangers? Could you imagine the sort of world we might inhabit if we honestly and genuinely wanted to see one another living good, safe lives? Can you even think what it might look like if we all cared about strangers as much as we cared about loved ones, so that the line between the two faded over time, and the precept - the crippling precept - disappeared altogether? — Rose Christo

Without books we should very likely be a still-primitive people living in the shadow of traditions that faded with years until only a blur remained, and different memories would remember the past in different ways. A parent or a teacher has only his lifetime; a good book can teach forever.Without books we should very likely be a still-primitive people living in the shadow of traditions that faded with years until only a blur remained, and different memories would remember the past in different ways. A parent or a teacher has only his lifetime; a good book can teach forever. — Louis L'Amour

Well here we are, just the four of us that started out together,' said Merry. 'We have left all the rest behind, one after another. It seems almost like a dream that has slowly faded.'
'Not to me,' said Frodo. 'To me it feels more like falling asleep again. — J.R.R. Tolkien

What are we doing?" I asked, feeling restless. "Taking comfort." That made me smile, so I peered up at him. "You're taking comfort in me?" "Yes." My smile grew and I closed my eyes, giving myself over to the moment. Gradually, I heard a symphony of sounds rise around us. Wind played through the grass, rustled the small but plentiful leaves of a nearby lonely oak. Crickets and other insects chirped and hummed. I felt the beat of Jethro's heart in his fingertips and where I gripped his wrists. My heart slowed until it matched the rhythm of his. My restlessness eased until it faded away, eclipsed by the stillness, the comfort of being close, yet barely touching. And I took comfort in him. — Penny Reid

Honest. I know. But all the same ... woo!" It was a head-back, beaming, yelping shout of joyful excitement, spontaneous and startling, and every face turned; their apprehensiveness faded for a moment, and even Merriman, stern for the first instant, laughed aloud. "Yes!" he said. "We need that as much as the sword, Barney. — Susan Cooper

To write good religious science fiction, or indeed good religious fiction of any kind, is a challenge but one that it would be worthwhile trying to meet. It seems a pity the field has been apparently abandoned to pernicious rubbish like 'The Da Vinci Code', though this seems already, mercifully, to have faded away. In this, as in other areas, we could do with another C. S. Lewis to re-state the principles of Christianity in terms to stir the imagination. — Hal G.P. Colebatch

Autumn

Autumn: the year breathes dully towards its death,
beside its dying sacrificial fire;
the dim world's middle-age of vain desire
is strangely troubled, waiting for the breath
that speaks the winter's welcome malison
to fix it in the unremembering sleep:
the silent woods brood o'er an anxious deep,
and in the faded sorrow of the sun,
I see my dreams' dead colours, one by one,
forth-conjur'd from their smouldering palaces,
fade slowly with the sigh of the passing year.
They wander not nor wring their hands nor weep,
discrown'd belated dreams! but in the drear
and lingering world we sit among the trees
and bow our heads as they, with frozen mouth,
looking, in ashen reverie, towards the clear
sad splendour of the winter of the far south.


Christopher John Brennan — Christopher John Brennan

Why should we grope among the dry bones of the past, or put the living generation into masquerade out of its faded wardrobe? The sun shines to-day also. There — Ralph Waldo Emerson

We all learn to carry so much unnecessary regret. We drag it around behind ourselves and wear it sewn into the inner lining of our shadow. I think that the heart of every ghost story ever told is awash with the soft faded autumnal color of pure unredeemable regret. — Steve Vernon

Gently, I caressed along the puckered, angry scar slanting in a long, jagged line across my lower abdomen to where it crossed the smooth, silvered scar running in a horizontal line just above my pelvis, wishing she could somehow find comfort in my touch. Chills shook my body as I ran my fingers over the still sensitive skin, and just like every night, the bitterness and anger I found myself feeling faded away into sadness as I lost myself in this tangible reminder of my child. I loved her, so much. Steam filled the room, and I eased myself into the water, allowing myself to drift back to Daniel. I missed him, almost more than I could bear. This was never supposed to have happened to us. We were supposed to make it ... we should have made it. — A.L. Jackson

We're just recycled history machines, cavemen in faded blue jeans. — Jimmy Buffett

I gradually shrank in size until I was a teenager, then a child, and then, at last, a baby, crawling, until inevitably I was sucked naked and screaming through that portal every man's mother possesses, into a black hole where all light vanished. As that last glimmer faded, it occurred to me that the light at the end of the tunnel seen by people who have died and come back to life was not Heaven. Wasn't it much more plausible that what they saw was not what lay ahead of them but what lay behind? This was the universal memory of the first tunnel we all pass through, the light at its end penetrating our fetal darkness... — Viet Thanh Nguyen

We blocked out all loud noise, all hurts.
I continued loving Ms. Jennings until our eyes faded to rest.
And then I loved her in my dreams. — Brittainy C. Cherry

I once had a drinking contest with an artist on his yacht... It amused him as I took shot after shot, and I realized that this was the reason he'd invited us, his amusement. Looking back, I thought he didn't expect we'd have anything to say, that my questions about the artist's purpose, his existential quest for self in a communally-brutalized past, were not as amusing as they were thought-provoking, but I'll never know. As I swayed like a sailor in drunken bitterness, I felt something had been sacrificed to his art. He'd gone so far out on that boat there was no way for him to come back. I felt he no longer existed and was just the faded intention of color on canvas. His humanity had surely been washed away with the paint thinner. — Megan Rich

I protest against all our interest, all our effort at understanding being given to the young skins that look blooming in spite of trouble; for these too will get faded, and will know the older and more eating griefs which we are helping to neglect. In — George Eliot

A light, this side of the hills toward Argyle, / flowed like fog through the hollows, rose to the depth / of the hills, illumined me. I faded in it / as the world faded in me, dissolved in the light. / No one to know and nothing knowable. / Oh, we know that knowing is not our way; / but, the choice is ours, would make it our way, would leave / the world for the same world made knowable. — William Bronk

The virus in the movie 'Contagion' is based on the bird flu which came out of nowhere back in 2008. Everyone thought it was going to change the way we live and it just faded away. Wait a minute, I'm talking about President Obama. — Craig Ferguson

To avoid an unfortunate contrast, we had to replace the kitchen. Then we noticed that the living room looked old and faded. So we redecorated the living room, which then looked more inviting than the study we hadn't touched for ten years. So then we went to work on the study. Gradually, the refurbishment spread to the whole house. I hope the same happens to my life. I hope that the small things lead to great transformations. — Paulo Coelho

We are graduating members from the class of we made it, not the faded echoes of voices crying out names will never hurt me. Of course they did. But our lives will ever always continue to be a balancing act that has less to do with pain and more to do with beauty. — Shane Koyczan

Piece of cake." Brandon's grin had a certain very familiar male cockiness about it. "Dad says this time around I
was his sucker punch." His grin faded slightly and his expression grew more serious as he continued. "But when we
realized you were in danger, Dad went wild. I doubt if any car, even that old 'vette Dad used to drive, ever made the
kind of time on River Road your Buick made last night. Dad really is a hell of a driver, isn't he? — Jayne Ann Krentz

As she felt his fangs against her neck, she was in another world.
There was screaming. A woman was somewhere in agony. Everything was black, and the tormented scream was overwhelming, echoing through the emptiness. After the screaming subsided, there was panting, loud and steady, and it wasn't as dark anymore. There was a room visible now, in a reddish light. A pale man with black hair hovered over a woman dressed in white. She lay on a bed, looking disheveled and sweaty. Her brown-black hair clung to her wet forehead and shoulders. She was covered in blood. The man sat next to her, and held her close to him. He stroked her hair as her chest heaved desperately.
"I love you, my dearest Katerina," he said, cradling her in his strong arms. "Soon, we'll be together forever." Everything faded to black once more, and the woman stopped breathing. All was silent and still. — Dawn Bonney

Remember with your heart. Go back, go back and go back. The skies of this world were always meant to have dragons. When they are not here, humans miss them. Some never think of them, of course. But some children, from the time they are small, they look up at the blue summer sky and watch for something that never comes. Because they know. Something that was supposed to be there faded and vanished. Something that we must bring back, you and I. — Robin Hobb

At home we didnt talk about religion. So gradually the question faded away by itself and disappeared from the agenda. When I was nineteen my father died; my response to his death was atheistic. — Sergei Prokofiev

One of them stepped from the crowd. It was Zeebo, the garbage collector. "Mister Jem," he said, "we're mighty glad to have you all here. Don't pay no 'tention to Lula, she's contentious because Reverend Sykes threatened to church her. She's a troublemaker from way back, got fancy ideas an' haughty ways - we're mighty glad to have you all." With that, Calpurnia led us to the church door where we were greeted by Reverend Sykes, who led us to the front pew. First Purchase was unceiled and unpainted within. Along its walls unlighted kerosense lamps hung on brass brackets; pine benches served as pews. Behind the rough oak pulpit a faded pink silk banner proclaimed God Is Love, the church's only decoration except a roto-gravure print of Hunt's The Light of the World. — Harper Lee

As you say," Tyrion grinned. "If I were Volantene, and free, and had the blood, you'd have my vote for triarch, my lady."
"I am no lady," the widow replied, "just Vogarro's whore. You want to be gone from here before the tigers come. Should you reach your queen, give her a message from the slaves of Old Volantis." She touched the faded scar upon her wrinkled cheek, where her tears had been cut away. "Tell her we are waiting. Tell her to come soon. — George R R Martin

We scoffed at the kids who weren't like us, the ones who already talked about careers, or bliddy mortgages and pensions. Kids wanting to be old before they were young. Kids wanting to be dead before they'd lived. They were digging their own graves, building the walls of their own damn jails. Us, we hung to our youth. We were footloose, fancy free. We said we'd never grow boring and old. We plundered charity shops for vintage clothes. We bought battered Levis and gorgeous faded velvet stuff from Attica in High Bridge. We wore coloured boots, hemp scarves from Gaia. We read Baudelaire and Byron. We read our poems to each other. We wrote songs and posted them on YouTube. We formed bands. We talked of the amazing journeys we'd take together once school was done. Sometimes we paired off, made couples that lasted for a little while, but the group was us. We hung together. We could say anything to each other. We loved each other. — David Almond

We talk of strong personalities, and they are strong, until the not-every-day when we see them as we might see one woman alone in a desert, and know that all the strength we thought we knew was only courage, only her lone song echoing among the stones; and then at last when we have understood this and made up our minds to hear the song and admire its courage and its sweetness, we wait for the next note and it does not come. The last word, with its pure tone, echoes and fades and is gone, and we realize - only then - that we do not know what it was, that we have been too intent on the melody to hear even one word. We go then to find the singer, thinking she will be standing where we last saw her. There are only bones and sand and a few faded rags. — Gene Wolfe

I felt guilty that I hadn't thought of Kizuki right away, as if I had somehow abandoned him. Back in my room, though, I came to think of it this way: two and a half years have gone by since it happened, and Kizuki is still seventeen years old. Not that this means my memory of him has faded. The things that his death gave rise to are still there, bright and clear, inside me, some of them even clearer than when they were new. What I want to say is this: I'm going to turn twenty soon. Part of what Kizuki and I shared when we were sixteen and seventeen has already vanished, and no amount of crying is going to bring that back. I can't explain it any better than this, but I think that you can probably understand what I felt and what I am trying to say. — Haruki Murakami

Together we will build an America where hope is a new job with a paycheck, not a faded word on an old bumper sticker. — Mitt Romney

Henri said our names were fitting because we were destined to be together in our old age, like our great-great-aunts. Two gray old ladies in the bodies of teenage girls. Someday we'd live in a big house with faded curtains, a dozen or so cats, and a handful of our marbles long ago lost. On all accounts - our destiny, her clairvoyance, and our soon-to-be missing marbles - I believed her. — Jessica Taylor

In all things there is beauty. In the glint of dew clinging to the strands of a spider's web; in the way the setting sun winks off shards of broken glass; in the rainbow forming in the soap suds in a sink full of dirty dishes; in a blade of grass which manages to force its way, with patience and time, through the all too willing grasp of sidewalk cement. It is in the faded brown of leaves, turning, twisting against their fate, as they fall to the ground, light and dry as brittle bones, and in the bare, thin-tipped branches, denuded by a change in season. It is in the way a stranger's laughter cradles you if you let it. It is in the intricate scars of a lover's back and in our upturned eyes when we ask for forgiveness. — Marta Curti

All I know is that I am walking on a bridge. Amidst the mist the point where it started appears faded and the bridge ends in bright light that makes it too hard to even look. I need to cross this and I am walking. But, my Lord, I am tired!

I love this blue; I wish if I could see the depth of the river beneath, come back to the surface, float and then to be carried away by the tranquil waves to the banks where a thousand lilies will bloom, look at the sun and say 'we love you'.

O Lord, remember, they are my eyes that longed for a life the boon of your sight! — Preeth Nambiar

Our revels now are ended. These our actors,
As I foretold you, were all spirits and
Are melted into air, into thin air:
And, like the baseless fabric of this vision,
The cloud-capp'd towers, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve
And, like this insubstantial pageant faded,
Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff
As dreams are made on, and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep. — William Shakespeare

Words and form! We have a totally clear view of the world when we're fourteen years old, maybe sooner. But then we need another fifty years in order to create a language that can express those impressions. And in the mean time, of course, they've faded away. — Hakan Nesser

Success only means doing something sincerely and wholeheartedly. I think life is a process. Through the ages, the end of heroes is the same as ordinary men. They all died and gradually faded away in the memory of man. But when we are still alive, we have to understand ourselves, discover ourselves and express ourselves. In this way, we can progress, but we may not be successful. — Bruce Lee

He propped his hands on his hips, shook his head slightly and turned his gaze from the front of the building to meet her eyes, dead on. "It sounds ridiculous, but I want you to have dinner with me. Since we have an early night."
Those truths clamored louder. She shook her head.
"Why not?"
"I don't have time, Rogan." [ ... ]
"You don't have time to eat?" he asked.
Kennedy blew out a breath. "I don't have time for dating games."
"Good, neither do I."
"Then what's this?"
He let go of her and lifted his shoulders, hands out. "Flirtation?"
Something intangible popped, and the tension faded. She smiled. "I expected you to say foreplay. — Natalie J. Damschroder

After Mengistu consolidated his power in 1978, his personality gradually began to change. His ability to listen and his patience faded away. We could now see these qualities were pretences only; he had been putting on his best behavior in his bid for support. — Mengistu Haile Mariam

Nonetheless, after we've dropped off the birds and volunteered to go back to the woods to gather kindling for the evening fire, I find myself wrapped in his arms. His lips brushing the faded bruises on my neck, working their way to my mouth. Despite what I feel for Peeta, this is when I accept deep down that he'll never come back to me. Or I'll never go back to him. I'll stay in 2 until it falls, go to the Capitol and kill Snow, and then die for my trouble. And he'll die insane and hating me. So in the fading light I shut my eyes and kiss Gale to make up for all the kisses I've withheld, and because it doesn't matter any more, and because I'm so desperately lonely I can't stand it.
Gale's touch and taste and heat remind me that at least my body's still alive, and for the moment it's a welcome feeling. I empty my mind and let the sensations run through my flesh, happy to lose myself. — Suzanne Collins

When Earth's last picture is painted And the tubes are twisted and dried When the oldest colors have faded
And the youngest critic has died
We shall rest, and faith, we shall need it
Lie down for an aeon or two
'Till the Master of all good workmen Shall put us to work anew
And those that were good shall be happy They'll sit in a golden chair
They'll splash at a ten league canvas With brushes of comet's hair
They'll find real saints to draw from Magdalene, Peter, and Paul
They'll work for an age at a sitting And never be tired at all.
And only the Master shall praise us. And only the Master shall blame.
And no one will work for the money.
No one will work for the fame.
But each for the joy of the working, And each, in his separate star,
Will draw the thing as he sees it.
For the God of things as they are! — Rudyard Kipling

I know more about what it's like to be elderly and infirm and kind of stupid, the way you get forgetful, but on the other hand I'm a littler, wiser, dare we say? The word 'wisdom' has kind of faded out of our vocabulary, but yeah, I'm a little wiser. — John Updike

We watched each other in the candlelight and suave music, and because laughter was the only weapon we had, we laughed until the chill of his story faded, and was gone. — Lauren Groff

Time had erased me a little, rubbed me out. I had faded like a photograph buried under soil. I was tanned and older, weathered and experienced and fat. I was what we all become, a by-product of the torture of ourselves. — David Whitehouse

In your city faded off the brown, NINO. She insists she got more class, WE KNOW. — Drake

How may one describe enchantment? As he sang, his countenance softened, and without benefit of costume or any other artifice of the stage, the Gaspari I knew faded and was transfored into something eerily beautiful. A delicate hand, rising and turning like a vine, seemed to unfurl this otherworldy sound into the air. Though I could not translate the words, there was no need, for the sound went straight to my soul, transcending the poor and broken language we mortals must use. I slipped gratefully out of my body and floated on the current of music, feeling that all of us round the table were a single spirit, a single being. I was filled with such love. The voice soared, wave upon wave, until the last note, quivering with tenderness, put us ashore again too soon. — Debra Dean

Sin spied a straw-covered head peeping over the side of the wagon. Once the man disappeared from sight, the woman scrambled from the cart, with the boy one step behind. No one seemed to notice her peculiar activity, or if they did, they ignored it. She took a moment to dust the straw off them, but somehow she missed a piece that hung in the midst of one coppery curl. It bobbed as she moved.
Simon laughed as she took the boy's hand and led him through the crowd. "Why was she hiding?"
"She seeks to escape royal custody."
The mirth faded from Simon's eyes. "Should we notify the guards?"
"Nay, I think we can manage to retake her."
"Then what are we waiting for?"
"I have no idea. I simply like watching her maneuver."
-Simon, Sin, Callie & Jamie — Kinley MacGregor

If we didn't live venturously, plucking the wild goat by the beard, and trembling over precipices, we should never be depressed, I've no doubt; but already should be faded, fatalistic and aged. — Virginia Woolf

She looked beautiful,standing there barefoot in her faded jeans. I wanted to take her in my arms, and lift her, and carry her into some untroubled future.
Instead, I left her where she was. That's not the world we live in, she'd said, and how right she was, — Stephen King

And like the baseless fabric of this vision,
The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great globe itself
Yea, all which it inherit - shall dissolve,
And like this insubstantial pageant faded,
Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff
As dreams are made on, and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep. Sir, I am vexed.
Bear with my weakness. My old brain is troubled.
Be not disturbed with my infirmity.
If you be pleased, retire into my cell
And there repose. A turn or two I'll walk
To still my beating mind. — William Shakespeare

She had died, I just never told her. So still, we walk, eat and sleep together, in fear one day she'll come to realize it. — Anthony Liccione

Children's Song
We live in our own world,
A world that is too small
For you to stoop and enter
Even on hands and knees,
The adult subterfuge.
And though you probe and pry
With analytic eye,
And eavesdrop all our talk
With an amused look,
You cannot find the centre
Where we dance, where we play,
Where life is still asleep
Under the closed flower,
Under the smooth shell
Of eggs in the cupped nest
That mock the faded blue
Of your remoter heaven. — R.S. Thomas

I never really recovered from the shock of discovering that women do what we do; they save their best pairs for the nights when they are going to sleep with somebody. When you live with a woman, these faded, shrunken tatty scraps suddenly appear on radiators all over the house; your lascivious schoolboy dreams of adulthood as a time when you are surrounded by exotic lingerie for ever and ever amen ... those dreams crumble to dust. — Nick Hornby

Amelie seemed to focus on her again. For a few seconds she regarded her, frowning, and then smiled just a little. "So I recall," she said. "Not all wars are waged with bullets and swords, indeed. Some are wars of wills and ideas. It's good we both remember that." The smile faded. "But not all ideas win the war, and not all wills are strong enough. Darkness can descend so easily. — Rachel Caine

My sister Emily first declined. The details of her illness are deep-branded in my memory, but to dwell on them, either in thought or narrative, is not in my power. Never in all her life had she lingered over any task that lay before her, and she did not linger now. She sank rapidly. She made haste to leave us. Yet, while physically she perished, mentally, she grew stronger than we had yet known her. Day by day, when I saw with what a front she met suffering, I looked on her with anguish of wonder and love. I have seen nothing like it; but, indeed, I have never seen her parallel in anything. Stronger than a man, simpler than a child, her nature stood alone. The awful point was, that, while full of ruth for others, on herself she had no pity; the spirit inexorable to the flesh; from the trembling hand, the unnerved limbs, the faded eyes, the same service exacted as they had rendered in health. To stand by and witness this, and not dare to remonstrate, was pain no words can render. — Charlotte Bronte