Echoing Words

My Friend shall forever be my Friend,
and reflect a ray of God to me

Henry David Thoreau
A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers

Excuse me while I kiss the sky

Jimi Hendrix
Purple Haze

l(a
le
af
fa
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one
l
iness

e.e. cummings
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What did the snail say as he rode on the back of a turtle?
Wheeeeee!

That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.

Neil Armstrong

Great spirits have often encountered violent opposition from weak minds.

Albert Einstein

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message He is Dead.
Put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.

He was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last forever: I was wrong.

The stars are not wanted now; put out every one,
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun,
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the woods;
For nothing now can ever come to any good.

W.H. Auden
Funeral Blues

Liberties are not given, they are taken.

Aldous Huxley

We don’t read and write poetry because it’s cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. And medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for. To quote from Whitman, ‘O me! O life!… of the questions of these recurring; of the endless trains of the faithless… of cities filled with the foolish; what good amid these, O me, O life?’ Answer. That you are here – that life exists, and identity; that the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse. That the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse. What will your verse be?

John Keating
“Dead Poets Society”

Listen to the MUSTN’TS, child
Listen to the DON’TS
Listen to the SHOULDN’TS
The IMPOSSIBLES, the WON’TS
Listen to the NEVER HAVES
Then listen close to me –
Anything can happen, child
ANYTHING can be.

Shel Silverstein
Where the Sidewalk Ends