Love is like quicksilver in the hand. Leave the fingers open and it stays. Clutch it, and it darts away.

About Dorothy Parker

Dorothy Parker (née Rothschild; August 22, 1893 – June 7, 1967) was an American poet, literary critic and writer of fiction. Based in New York, she was known for her caustic wisecracks, and eye for 20th-century urban foibles.

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They sicken of the calm, who knew the storm.

—Dorothy Parker

That would be a good thing for them to cut on my tombstone: Wherever she went, including here, it was against her better judgment.

—Dorothy Parker

I'm never going to be famous. My name will never be writ large on the roster of Those Who Do Things. I don't do any thing. Not one single thing. I used to bite my nails, but I don't even do that any more.

—Dorothy Parker

She runs the gamut of emotions from A to B.

—Dorothy Parker

emotions

If all the girls who attended the Yale prom were laid end to end, I wouldn't be a bit surprised.

—Dorothy Parker

girls

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The appalling thing is the degree of charity women are capable of. You see it all the time… love lavished on absolute fools. Love's a charity ward, you know.

—Lawrence Durrell

love women fools charity

Try not to be a man or woman of success, but rather a man or woman of inspiration. If you're successful, they will flock to you for money or fame, but if you're inspirational, they will flock to you because they love your soul and how you change theirs.

—Shannon L. Alder

love inspiration success fame soul change money

Love is the great miracle cure. Loving ourselves works miracles in our lives.

—Louise L. Hay

love self-love miracles

Then the cook enters and approaches our table. He bows low before me. He is grateful to me, he explains, because since his years as a cook in a Buddhist monastery, he has had little opportunity to cook vegetarian food for anyone who appreciates it. The wild mushrooms, he tells me, were picked in a nearby forest. The greens are from gardens known for the quality of their vegetables.… He bows slowly, and thanks me once again. I stumble over my own words of gratitude as he quietly disappears into the kitchen. I never see him again. I didn't sleep that night. The cook's reverence and humility sliced through years of protective hardness and caught me without warning. His food was saturated with love, and its nurturance was almost too much to bear.

—Anne Scott

love gratitude humility food Buddhism

Spiritual awakening is frequently described as a journey to the top of a mountain. We leave our attachments and our worldliness behind and slowly make our way to the top. At the peak we have transcended all pain. The only problem with this metaphor is that we leave all the others behind.… In the process of discovering our true nature, the journey goes down, not up.… Instead of transcending the suffering of all creatures, we move toward the turbulence and doubt.… We explore the reality and unpredictability of insecurity and pain, and we try not to push it away. If it takes years, if it takes lifetimes, we will let it be as it is. At our own pace, without speed or aggression, we move down and down and down. With us move millions of others, our companions in awakening from fear. At the bottom we discover water, the healing water of compassion. Right down there in the thick of things, we discover the love that will not die.

—Pema Chödrön

Love is like quicksilver in the hand. Leave the fingers open and it stays. Clutch it, and it darts away.

About Dorothy Parker

More quotations from Dorothy Parker

More quotations tagged with “love”

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