The collection / 167 fragments

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Passages, proverbs, and questions carried across the ages.

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167 results · Page 3 of 7Play this collection ▷

01Undated

From all that I saw, and everywhere I wandered, I learned that time cannot be spent. It can only be squandered.

Roman Payne / quote

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02Undated

I care not that this moment’s lot was thin and sparsely dealt all pleasures sweet can be forgot the instant they are felt.

Roman Payne / quote

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03Undated

The youthful body untouched decays the fastest, for no living hands record its splendor; and here youth and time are wasted.

Roman Payne / quote

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04Undated

I just wish moments weren’t so fleeting!' Isaac called to the man on the roof, 'They pass so quickly!' 'Fleeting?!' responded the tilling man, 'Moments? They pass quickly?! . . . Why, once a man is finished growing, he still has twenty years of youth. After that, he has twenty years of middle age. Then, unless misfortune strikes, nature gives him twenty thoughtful years of old age. Why do you call that quickly?' And with that, the tilling man wiped his sweaty brow and continued tilling; and the dejected Isaac continued wandering. 'Stupid fool!' Isaac muttered quietly to himself as soon as he was far enough away not to be heard.

Roman Payne / quote

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05Undated

The lot of the brideto be wed before beddesired until rotten.The lot of the authorto be read before bedadmired then forgotten.

Roman Payne / quote

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06Undated

May a man live well-, and long-enough, to leave many joyful widows behind him.

Roman Payne / quote

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07Undated

I regained my soul through literature after those times I'd lost it to wild-eyed gypsy girls on the European streets.

Roman Payne / quote

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08Undated

Ô, the wine of a womanfrom heaven is sent, more perfect than allthat a man can invent.When she came to my bed and begged me with sighsnot to tempt her towards passion nor actions unwise, I told her I’d spare her and kissed her closed eyes, then unbraided her body of its clothing disguise.While our bodies were nude bathed in candlelight fineI devoured her mouth, tender lips divine;and I drank through her thighs her feminine wine.Ô, the wine of a woman from heaven is sent,more perfect than all that a man can invent.

Roman Payne / quote

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09Undated

Ô, the wine of a woman from heaven is sent,more perfect than all that a man can invent.

Roman Payne / quote

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10Undated

Never did the world make a queen of a girl who hides in houses and dreams without traveling.

Roman Payne / quote

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11Undated

Alexander the Great slept with 'The Iliad' beneath his pillow. During the waning moon, I cradle Homer’s 'Odyssey' as if it were the sweet body of a woman.

Roman Payne / quote

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12Undated

They say Alexander the Great slept with 'The Iliad' beneath his pillow. Though I have never led an army, I am a wanderer. During the waning moon, I cradle Homer’s 'Odyssey' as if it were the sweet body of a woman.

Roman Payne / quote

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13Undated

I was glad to be made awarethat “Veimke” (jeune fille au pair),is subject to natural law,and can be made fat,by such things as poor diet,and alcohol.

Roman Payne / quote

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14Undated

She was a free bird one minute: queen of the world and laughing. The next minute she would be in tears like a porcelain angel, about to teeter, fall and break. She never cried because she was afraid that something 'would' happen; she would cry because she feared something that could render the world more beautiful, 'would not' happen.

Roman Payne / quote

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15Undated

Alexander the Great slept with 'The Iliad' beneath his pillow. Though I’ve never led an army, I am a wanderer. I cradle 'The Odyssey' nights while the moon is waning, as if it were the sweet body of a woman.

Roman Payne / quote

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16Undated

I cursed myself. For once, heaven had sent me "Beauty" in its most perfected form and I abandoned it. She might not have been a girl after all but an angel: a force to guide me on this hazardous path of life I hurry down... How can life be hazardous if it can only end in death?

Roman Payne / quote

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17Undated

I’ve seen knives pierce the chest,Children dying in the roadCrawling things hooked and baited,Rapists bound and then castrated,Villains singed in public square.Yet none these sights did make me cringeLike when my Love cut all her hair.

Roman Payne / quote

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18Undated

Fortune's fool! How we humans lie upon beauty like lizards upon a sun-baked rock.

Roman Payne / quote

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19Undated

This was how it was with travel: one city gives you gifts, another robs you. One gives you the heart’s affections, the other destroys your soul. Cities and countries are as alive, as feeling, as fickle and uncertain as people. Their degrees of love and devotion are as varying as with any human relation. Just as one is good, another is bad.

Roman Payne / quote

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20Undated

This was how it was with travel: one city gives you gifts, another robs you. One gives you the heart’s affections, the other destroys your soul. Cities and countries are as alive and feeling, as fickle and uncertain as people. Their degrees of love and devotion are as varying as with any human relation. Just as one is good, another is bad.

Roman Payne / quote

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21Undated

The green-eyed angel came in less than a half hour and fell docile as a lamb into my arms. We kissed and caressed, I met no resistance when I unlaced the strings to free her dress and fill myself in the moist and hot bed nature made between her thighs. We made love outdoors—without a roof, I like most, without stove, my favorite place, assuming the weather be fair and balmy, and the earth beneath be clean. Our souls intertwined and dripping with dew, and our love for each other was seen. Our love for the world was new.

Roman Payne / quote

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22Undated

All forms of madness, bizarre habits, awkwardness in society, general clumsiness, are justified in the person who creates good art.

Roman Payne / quote

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23Undated

I’ve decided the act that cannot wait / is the important will to create / But, ah, if my belly is ignored / the pantry door I shall implore / But I’ve been known to reach the bed / ideas still famished in my head.

Roman Payne / quote

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24Undated

I will always know the glory of the beautiful and rare, as they will know security from labour and prayer. As they will hear the laughter of the children they gave life, I will know the torments of the song born under knife.

Roman Payne / quote

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