It is difficult to undo our own damage, and to recall to our presence that which we have asked to leave. Annie Dillard More Quotes by Annie Dillard More Quotes From Annie Dillard He judged the instant and let go; he flung himself loose into the stars. Annie Dillard instant stars letting-go I have since only rarely seen the tree with the lights in it. The vision comes and goes, mostly goes, but I live for it, for the moment when the mountains open and a new light roars in spate through the crack, and the mountains slam. Annie Dillard vision light tree We still and always want waking. Annie Dillard waking want inspirational You are wrong if you think that you can in any way take the vision and tame it to the page. The page is jealous and tyrannical; the page is made of time and matter; the page always wins. Annie Dillard jealous winning thinking We wake, if we ever wake at all, to mystery, rumors of death, beauty, violence. Annie Dillard rumor mystery violence Every day is a god, each day is a god, and holiness holds forth in time. Annie Dillard holiness each-day I used to have a cat, an old fighting tom, who would jump through the open window by my bed in the middle of the night and land on my chest. I'd half-awaken. He'd stick his skull under my nose and purr, stinking of urine and blood. Some nights he kneaded my bare chest with his front paws, powerfully, arching his back, as if sharpening his claws, or pummeling a mother for milk. And some mornings I'd wake in daylight to find my body covered with paw prints in blood; I looked as though I'd been painted with roses. Annie Dillard cat mother morning Fiction keeps its audience by retaining the world as its subject matter. People like the world. Many people actually prefer it to art and spend their days by choice in the thick of it. Annie Dillard choices people art I am a fugitive and a vagabond, a sojourner seeking signs. Annie Dillard fugitive sojourners vagabonds I am sorry I ran from you. I am still running, running from that knowledge, that eye, that love from which there is no refuge. For you meant only love, and love, and I felt only fear, and pain. So once in Israel love came to us incarnate, stood in the doorway between two worlds, and we were all afraid. Annie Dillard pain sorry running What I call innocence is the spirit's unself-conscious state at any moment of pure devotion to any object. It is at once a receptiveness and total concentration. Annie Dillard innocence moments spirit Landscape consists in the multiple, overlapping intricacies and forms that exist in a given space at a moment in time. Annie Dillard landscape space moments Novels written with film contracts in mind have a faint but unmistakable, and ruinous, odor. Annie Dillard odor film mind The novel is a game or joke shared between author and reader. Annie Dillard novel reader games It has always been a happy thought to me that the creek runs on all night, new every minute, whether I wish it or know it or care, as a closed book on a shelf continues to whisper to itself its own inexhaustible tale. Annie Dillard running night book Could two live that way? Could two live under the wild rose, and explore by the pond, so that the smooth mind of each is as everywhere present to the other, and as received and as unchallenged, as falling snow? Annie Dillard wild-roses two fall There are no events but thoughts and the heart's hard turning, the heart's slow learning where to love and whom. The rest is merely gossip, and tales for other times. Annie Dillard gossip events heart It should surprise no one that the life of the writer - such as it is - is colorless to the point of sensory deprivation. Many writers do little else but sit in small rooms recalling the real world. Annie Dillard small-rooms real world Painters work from the ground up. The latest version of a painting overlays earlier versions, and obliterates them. Writers, on the other hand, work from left to right. The discardable chapters are on the left. Annie Dillard chapters painting hands Whenever an encounter between a writer of good will and a regular person of good will happens to touch on the subject of writing, each person discovers, dismayed, that good will is of no earthly use. The conversation cannot proceed. Annie Dillard encounters use writing
