Run fast, stand still. This, the lesson from lizards. For all writers. Observe almost any survival creature, you see the same. Jum...p, run, freeze. In the ability to flick like an eyelash, crack like a whip, vanish like steam, here this instant, gone the next--life teems the earth. And when that life is not rushing to escape, it is playing statues to do the same. See the hummingbird, there, not there. As thought arises and blinks off, so this thing of summer vapor; the clearing of a cosmic throat, the fall of a leaf. And where it was--a whisper. What can we writers learn from lizards, lift from birds? In quickness is truth. The faster you blurt, the more swiftly you write, the more honest you are. In hesitation is thought. In delay comes the effort for a style, instead of leaping upon truth which is the only style worth deadfalling or tiger-trapping. In between the scurries and flights, what? Be a chameleon, ink- blend, chromosome change with the landscape. Be a pet rock, lie with the dust, rest in the rainwater in the filled barrel by the drainspout outside your grandparents' window long ago.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
If, as they say, some dust thrown in my eyes Will keep my talk from getting overwise,... I'm not the one for putting off the proof.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Research is formalized curiosity. It is poking and prying with a purpose. It is a seeking that he who wishes may know the cosmic s...ecrets of the world and that they dwell therein.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Yet to me what is this quintessence of dust? Man delights not me--nor woman neither, though by your smiling you seem to say so.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
It is the sinner's dust-tongued bell claps me to churches When, with his torch and hourglass, like a sulphur priest,... His beast heel cleft in a sandal....LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Therefore I have uttered what I did not understand, things too wonderful for me, which I did not know. ... I had heard of you by t...he hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees you; therefore I despise myself, and repent in dust and ashes."LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »