"Love"
“My bounty is as boundless as the sea, my love as deep; the more I give to thee, the more I have, for both are infinite.”
“O, spirit of love, how quick and fresh art thou.”
“They do not love that do not show their love.”
“The course of true love never did run smooth.”
“So long as I can breathe or I can see, so long lives your love which gives life to me.”
“When you depart from me sorrow abides, and happiness takes his leave.”
“Love sought is good, but given unsought is better.”
“Love for thy love, and hand for hand I give.”
“Love from one side hurts, but love from two sides heals.”
“Love goes toward love, as schoolboys from their books; but love from love, toward school with heavy looks.”
“Love goes to love like schoolboys from their books. But love from love, towards school with heavy looks.”
“Love looks not with eyes, but with the mind.”
“My only love sprung from my only hate.”
“A friend is one who knows who you are, understands where you have been, accepts what you have become, and still gently allows you to grow.”
“So dear I love him that with him, all deaths I could endure. Without him, live no life.”
“When I saw you I fell in love, and you smiled because you knew.”
“Love is the most beautiful of dreams and the worst of nightmares.”
“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.”
"When the man loves the one woman and the one"
When the one man loves the one woman and the one
woman loves the one man, the very angels leave
heaven and come sit in that house and sing for joy
Love is the flower of life, and blossoms unexpectedly
and without law, and must be plucked where it is found,
and enjoyed for the brief hour of its duration
Love is wanting what you have, not having
what you want.
Growth of the soul is our goal, and there are many
ways to encourage that growth, such as through love,
nature, healing our wounds, forgiveness, and service.
The soul grows well when giving and receiving love.
I nourish my soul daily by loving others and being
vulnerable to their love. Love is, after all, a verb,
an action word, not a noun
Happiness and love are just a choice away
To write a good love letter, you ought to begin
without knowing what you mean to say, and finish
without knowing what you have written
Love is always saying you’re sorry
Love is life…and if you miss love,
you miss life
Heaven is the perfect,
unconditional love for another
Wicked men obey from fear;
good men, from love
To love someone means to see him as
God intended him
You love simply because you
cannot help it
A woman unsatisfied must have luxuries.
But a woman who loves a
man would sleep on a board
Love is being stupid together
Love cures people - both the ones
who give it and the ones who
receive it
Spread love everywhere you go: first of all
in your own house. Give love to your children,
to your wife or husband, to a next door neighbor…
Let no one ever come to you without leaving better
and happier. Be the living expression of God’s kindness;
kindness in your face, kindness in your eyes, kindness in
your smile, kindness in your warm greeting…
Please Hear What I'm Not Saying
Don't be fooled by me.
Don't be fooled by the face I wear for I wear a mask,
a thousand masks,
masks that I'm afraid to take off,
and none of them is me.
Pretending is an art that's second nature with me,
but don't be fooled, for God's sake don't be fooled.
I give you the impression that I'm secure,
that all is sunny and unruffled with me,
within as well as without,
that confidence is my name and coolness my game,
that the water's calm and I'm in command and that I need no one,
but don't believe me.
My surface may seem smooth but my surface is my mask,
ever-varying and ever-concealing.
Beneath lies no complacence.
Beneath lies confusion, and fear, and aloneness.
But I hide this.
I don't want anybody to know it.
I panic at the thought of my weakness exposed.
That's why I frantically create a mask to hide behind,
a nonchalant sophisticated facade,
to help me pretend,
to shield me from the glance that knows.
But such a glance is precisely my salvation,
my only hope, and I know it.
That is, if it's followed by acceptance,
if it's followed by love.
It's the only thing that can liberate me from myself,
from my own self-built prison walls,
from the barriers I so painstakingly erect.
It's the only thing that will assure me of what I can't assure myself,
that I'm really worth something.
But I don't tell you this.
I don't dare to, I'm afraid to.
I'm afraid your glance will not be followed by acceptance,
will not be followed by love.
I'm afraid you'll think less of me,
that you'll laugh, and your laugh would kill me.
I'm afraid that deep-down I'm nothing
and that you will see this and reject me.
So I play my game, my desperate pretending game,
with a facade of assurance without and a trembling child within.
So begins the glittering but empty parade of masks,
and my life becomes a front.
I tell you everything that's really nothing,
and nothing of what's everything,
of what's crying within me.
So when I'm going through my routine
do not be fooled by what I'm saying.
Please listen carefully and try to hear what I'm not saying,
what I'd like to be able to say,
what for survival I need to say,
but what I can't say.
I don't like hiding.
I don't like playing superficial phony games.
I want to stop playing them.
I want to be genuine and spontaneous and me
but you've got to help me.
You've got to hold out your hand
even when that's the last thing I seem to want.
Only you can wipe away from my eyes
the blank stare of the breathing dead.
Only you can call me into aliveness.
Each time you're kind, and gentle, and encouraging,
each time you try to understand because you really care,
my heart begins to grow wings--
very small wings,
very feeble wings,
but wings!
With your power to touch me into feeling
you can breathe life into me.
I want you to know that.
I want you to know how important you are to me,
how you can be a creator--an honest-to-God creator--
of the person that is me if you choose to.
You alone can break down the wall behind which I tremble,
you alone can remove my mask,
you alone can release me from my shadow-world of panic,
from my lonely prison,
if you choose to.
Please choose to.
Do not pass me by.
It will not be easy for you.
A long conviction of worthlessness builds strong walls.
The nearer you approach to me the blinder I may strike back.
It's irrational, but despite what the books say about man
often I am irrational.
I fight against the very thing I cry out for.
But I am told that love is stronger than strong walls
and in this lies my hope.
Please try to beat down those walls
with firm hands but with gentle hands
for a child is very sensitive.
Who am I, you may wonder?
I am someone you know very well.
For I am every man you meet
and I am every woman you meet.
~ Charles C. Finn, September 1966
What's a Mother Worth?
I humbly appraise my mother's worth,
It began with pain to give me birth,
Which triggered off a love so strong,
Blossoming into a life-long bond.
When needed, she was always there,
Someone I realized would always care.
And the older I got the more I knew,
A mother's love sincere and true.
Now as I watch Mum age in years,
I'm happy to help and ease her fears.
Privileged now to play my part,
As she did for me from the very start.
| "Misfortune shows those who are not really friends." | |
| "Without friends no one would choose to live, though he had all other goods." | |
| "A good friend can tell you what is the matter with you in a minute. He may not seem such a good friend after telling." | |
| "The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances: if there is any reaction, both are transformed." | |
| "Friendship make prosperity more shining and lessens adversity by dividing and sharing it." | |
| "The shifts of Fortune test the reliability of friends." | |
| "It is wise to apply the oil of refined politeness to the mechanisms of friendship." | |
| "Don't walk behind me, I may not lead. Don't walk in front of me, I may not follow. Just walk beside me and be my friend." | |
| "He who has a thousand friends has not a friend to spare, And he who has one enemy will meet him everywhere." |
