Don't we forgive everything of a lover? We forgive selfishness, desire, guile. As long as we are the motive for it...There are some European words you can never translate properly into another language.
Michael OndaatjeRead
I'll be looking at the moon, but I'll be seeing you.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote expresses a deep sense of longing and connection, where the act of observing the moon reminds the speaker of a loved one.
In this quote, Michael Ondaatje eloquently conveys the idea that certain experiences or sights, like looking at the moon, can evoke profound memories and feelings of love for someone who may be physically absent. The moon serves as a symbol of beauty and distance, reflecting how the speaker maintains a connection to that person through shared thoughts and emotions, even in separation.
Themes
MoonLoveLongingConnectionMemory
In practice
Example use cases
In a romantic letter to express how much someone is missed.
More from Michael Ondaatje
All quotes →When we are young we do not look into mirrors. It is when we are old, concerned with our name, our legend, what our lives will mean to the future. We become vain with the names we own, our claims to have been the first eyes, the strongest army, the cleverest merchant. It is when he is old that Narcissus wants a graven image of himself.
Michael OndaatjeRead
Water is the exile, carried back in cans and flasks, the ghost between your hands and your mouth.
Michael OndaatjeRead
You must talk to me, Caravaggio. Or am I just a book? Something to be read, some creature to be tempted out of a loch and shot full of morphine, full of corridors, lies, loose vegetation, pockets of stones.
Michael OndaatjeRead
You don't want to write your own opinion, you don't want to just represent yourself, but represent yourself through someone else.
Michael OndaatjeRead
A man in a desert can hold absence in his cupped hands, knowing it is something that feeds him more than water.
Michael OndaatjeRead
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Then Aragorn stooped and looked in her face, and it was indeed white as a lily, cold as frost, and hard as graven stone. But he bent and kissed her on the brow, and called her softly, saying: 'Éowyn Éomund's daughter, awake! For your enemy has passed away!' - Aragorn & Éowyn
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The truth is, I often like women. I like their unconventionality. I like their completeness. I like their anonymity.
Virginia WoolfRead