This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
O, wither’d is the garland of the war! The soldier’s pole is fall'n; young boys and girls are level now with men; the odds is gone, and there is nothing left remarkable beneath the visiting moon.
Appetite | Good | Imagination | Thinking |
Or ere I could Give him that parting kiss which I had set Betwixt two charming words--comes in my father, And like the tyrannous breathing of the north Shakes all our buds from growing.
Appetite | Imagination |
Our wills and fates do so contrary run that our devices still are overthrown; our thoughts are ours, their ends none of our own.
Oft have I heard that grief softens the mind and makes it fearful and degenerate.
Despair | Ends | Expectation | Hope | Expectation |
All history shows the power of blood over circumstances, as agriculture shows the power of the seeds over the soil.
A Bookseller might be a King, but a King will never be a Bookseller.
Should the poor be flattered? No; let the candied tongue lick absurd pomp, and crook the pregnant hinges of the knee where thrift may follow fawning.
But I don't know how much more socializing I can do, Felipe. I only have the one dress. People will start to notice that I'm wearing the same thing all the time. You're young and beautiful, darling. You only need the one dress.
My friend Kate once went to a concert of Mongolian throat singers who were traveling through New York City on a rare world tour. Although she couldn't understand the words to their songs, she found the music almost unbearably sad. After the concert, Kate approached the lead Mongolian singer and asked, What are your songs about? He replied, Our songs are about the same things that everyone else's songs are about: lost love, and somebody stole your fastest horse.
Body | Energy | Friend | Memory | Order | Truth | Understanding | Writing |
There is so much about my fate that I cannot control, but other things do fall under the jurisdiction. I can decide how I spend my time, whom I interact with, whom I share my body and life and money and energy with. I can select what I can read and eat and study. I can choose how I'm going to regard unfortunate circumstances in my life-whether I will see them as curses or opportunities. I can choose my words and the tone of voice in which I speak to others. And most of all, I can choose my thoughts.
True wisdom gives the only possible answer at any given moment, and that night, going back to bed was the only possible answer.
Energy |
So I stood up and did a handstand on my Guru's roof, to celebrate the notion of liberation. I felt the dusty tiles under my hands. I felt my own strength and balance. I felt the easy night breeze on the palms of my bare feet. This kind of thing -- a spontaneous handstand--isn't something a disembodied cool blue soul can do, but a human being can do it. We have hands; we can stand on them if we want to. That's our privilege. That's the joy of a mortal body. And that's why God needs us. Because God loves to feel things through our hands.
To my taste, the men in Rome are ridiculously, hurtfully, stupidly beautiful. More beautiful even than Roman women, to be honest. Italian men are beautiful in the same way as French women, which is to say-- no detail spared in the quest for perfection. They’re like show poodles. Sometimes they look so good I want to applaud.