Sunflower Quotes - Page 3

• Pick up a sunflower and count the florets running into its centre, or count the spiral scales of a pine cone or a pineapple, running from its bottom up its sides to the top, and you will find an extraordinary truth: recurring numbers, ratios and proportions.

  Charles Jencks

  Running, Numbers, Ratios

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• From the animist point of view, humans belong in a sacred place because they themselves are sacred. Not sacred in a special way, not more sacred than anything else, but merely as sacred as anything else -- as sacred as bison or salmon or crows or crickets or bears or sunflowers.

  Daniel Quinn

  Views, Crow, Special

  80 Copy quote

• My will broke at the sound of his voice, and my head turned with as much inevitability as a sunflower turning its face to the sun.

  Patricia Briggs

  Voice, Sound, Faces

  Patricia Briggs (2010). “Silver Borne”, p.59, Penguin

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• I am working with the enthusiasm of a man from Marseilles eating bouillabaisse, which shouldn't come as a surprise to you because I am busy painting huge sunflowers.

  Vincent Van Gogh

  Men, Enthusiasm, Painting

  78 Copy quote

• My work is the world. Here the sunflowers, there the hummingbird - equal seekers of sweetness. Here the quickening yeast; there the blue plums.

  Mary Oliver

  Blue, Plums, World

  Mary Oliver (2006). “Thirst: Poems”, p.8, Beacon Press

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• As for marigolds, poppies, hollyhocks, and valorous sunflowers, we shall never have a garden without them, both for their own sake, and for the sake of old-fashioned folks, who used to love them.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  Flower, Garden, Sake

  Henry Ward Beecher (2009). “Star Papers”, p.98, Applewood Books

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• It is not while beauty And youth are thine own And thy cheeks Unprofaned by a tear That the ferver and faith Of a soul can be known To which time will but Make thee more dear No the heart that has truly loved Never forgets But as truly loves On to the close As the sunflower turns On her god when he sets The same look which She'd turned when he rose.

  Thomas Moore

  Heart, Rose, Soul

  Thomas Moore (1861). “Poetical works”, p.235

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• The splendor of a human heart that trusts it is loved unconditionally gives God more pleasure than Westminster Cathedral, the Sistine Chapel, Beethoven’s “Ninth Symphony”, Van Gogh’s “Sunflowers”, the sight of 10,000 butterflies in flight, or the scent of a million orchids in bloom. Trust is our gift back to God, and he finds it so enchanting that Jesus died for love of it.

  Brennan Manning

  Jesus, Heart, Butterfly

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• Bibliotropic," Hugh said. "Like sunflowers are heliotropic, they naturally turn towards the sun. We naturally turn towards the bookshop.

  Jo Walton

  Said, Turns, Bookshops

  Jo Walton (2011). “Among Others”, p.154, Macmillan

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• Unholy battered old thing you were, my sunflower O my soul, I loved you then!

  Allen Ginsberg

  Old Things, Soul, I Loved You

  Allen Ginsberg, Lewis Hyde (1984). “On the Poetry of Allen Ginsberg”, p.395, University of Michigan Press

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• I want to die at a hundred years old with an American flag on my back and the star of Texas on my helmet, after screaming down an Alpine descent on a bicycle at 75 miles per hour. I want to cross one last finish line as my wife and my ten children applaud, and then I want to lie down in a field of those famous French sunflowers and gracefully expire, the perfect contradiction to my once anticipated poignant early demise.

  Lance Armstrong

  Stars, Children, Lying

  "It's Not About the Bike: My Journey Back to Life". Book by Lance Armstrong, 2001.

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• There is no friend like the old friend, who has shared our morning days,
  No greeting like his welcome, no homage like his praise:
  Fame is the scentless sunflower, with gaudy crown of gold;
  But friendship is the breathing rose, with sweets in every fold.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  Sweet, Morning, Real

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• In your hands The dog, the donkey, surely they know They are alive. Who would argue otherwise? But now, after years of consideration, I am getting beyond that. What about the sunflowers? What about The tulips, and the pines? Listen, all you have to do is start and There’ll be no stopping. What about mountains? What about water Slipping over rocks? And speaking of stones, what about The little ones you can Hold in your hands, their heartbeats So secret, so hidden it may take years Before, finally, you hear them?

  Mary Oliver

  Dog, Rocks, Hands

  33 Copy quote

• We've left the moment. It's gone. We're somewhere else now, and that's okay. We've still got that moment with us somewhere, deep in our memory, seeping into our DNA. And when our cells get scattered , whenever that happens, this moment will still exist in them. Those cells might be the biulding block of something new. A planet or star or a sunflower, a baby. Maybe even a cockroach. Who knows? Whatever it is, it'll be a part of us, this thing right here and now, and we'll be a part of it.

  Libba Bray

  Baby, Stars, Memories

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• Ranger picked up and there was a moment of silence as if he was sensing me at the other end, taking my body temperature and heart rate long distance. “Babe,” he finally said. “Do you know the slum apartment building Bobby Sunflower owns on Stark?” “Yes. It’s on the same block as his funeral home.” “That’s the one. I’m going in to look for someone. If you don’t hear from me in a half hour maybe you could send someone to check.” “Is this a smart thing to do?” “Probably not.” “As long as you know,” Ranger said. And he disconnected.

  Janet Evanovich

  Block, Smart, Distance

  Janet Evanovich (2010). “Sizzling Sixteen”, p.20, Macmillan

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• For time and eternity there have been fathers like Nathan who simply can see no way to have a daughter but to own her like a plot of land. To work her, plow her under, rain down a dreadful poison upon her. Miraculously, it causes these girls to grow. They elongate on the pale slender stalks of their longing, like sunflowers with heavy heads. You can shield them with your body and soul, trying to absorb that awful rain, but they'll still move toward him. Without cease they'll bend to his light.

  Barbara Kingsolver

  Girl, Daughter, Father

  Barbara Kingsolver (2008). “The Poisonwood Bible”, p.162, Faber & Faber

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• The American Indian is of the soil, whether it be the region of forests, plains, pueblos, or mesas. He fits into the landscape, for the hand that fashioned the continent also fashioned the man for his surroundings. He once grew as naturally as the wild sunflowers, he belongs just as the buffalo belonged.

  Luther Standing Bear

  Nature, Native American, Men

  Luther Standing Bear (2006). “Land of the Spotted Eagle”, p.247, U of Nebraska Press

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• Eagle of flowers! I see thee stand, And on the sun's noon-glory gaze; With eye like his, thy lids expand, And fringe their disk with golden rays: Though fix'd on earth, in darkness rooted there, Light is thy element, thy dwelling air, Thy prospect heaven.

  James Montgomery

  Flower, Eye, Light

  James Montgomery, Robert Carruthers (1858). “The Poetical Works of James Montgomery: With a Memoir”, p.162

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• I would much rather end up a fertiliser under a sunflower which is eventually made into sunflower seed oil so that instead of nibbling me in her prawn cocktail, the pretty girl will rub me on her bristols as she suns herself on a beach in the Caribbean.

  Oliver Reed

  Girl, Beach, Oil

  Oliver Reed (1979). “Reed all about me: the autobiography of Oliver Reed”, W.H. Allen

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• Man would not be man if his dreams did not exceed his grasp... If I remember the sunflower forest it is because from its hidden reaches man arose. The green world is his sacred center. In moments of sanity he must still seek refuge there.

  Loren Eiseley

  Dream, Men, Green World

  Loren Eiseley (2016). “The Invisible Pyramid: A Library of America eBook Classic”, p.8, Library of America

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• There was the gaudy patch of sunflowers beside the west gate of the palace of the Prince of Ombria, that did nothing all day long but turn their golden-haired, thousand-eyed faces to follow the sun.

  Patricia A. McKillip

  Long, Golden, West

  Patricia A. McKillip (2002). “Ombria in Shadow”, p.14, Penguin

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• Hello, Harry!” she said. “Er — my name’s Barny,” said Harry, flummoxed. “Oh, have you changed that too?” she asked brightly. “How did you know — ?” “Oh, just your expression,” she said. Like her father, Luna was wearing bright yellow robes, which she had accessorized with a large sunflower in her hair. Once you got over the brightness of it all, the general effect was quite pleasant. At least there were no radishes dangling from her ears.

  J. K. Rowling

  Father, Hair, Expression

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• I'm now painting with all the elan of a Marseillais eating soup, which won't surprise you when I tell you I'm painting large sunflowers. The idea? To decorate the studio, now there's hope of Gauguin living here. I aim at a dozen panels of sunflowers in the room I've set aside for Gauguin.

  Vincent Van Gogh

  Ideas, Dozen, Soup

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• The author O. Henry taught me about the value of the unexpected. He once wrote about the noise of flowers and the smell of birds—the birds were chickens and the flowers dried sunflowers rattling against a wall.

  Chuck Jones

  Wall, Flower, Smell

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• We're not our skin of grime, we're not our dread bleak dusty imageless locomotive, we're all beautiful golden sunflowers inside, we're blessed by our own seed & hairy naked accomplishment-bodies growing into mad black formal sunflowers in the sunset, spied on by our eyes under the shadow of the mad locomotive riverbank sunset Frisco hilly tincan evening sitdown vision.

  Allen Ginsberg

  Beautiful, Blessed, Sunset

  Allen Ginsberg, “Sunflower Sutra”

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