D.H. Lawrence

British novelist, poet and essayist, 1885-1930

In every living thing there is the desire for love.

Love is the flower of life, and blossoms unexpectedly and without law, and must be plucked where it is found, and enjoyed for the brief hour of its duration.

One must learn to love, and go through a good deal of suffering to get to it... and the journey is always towards the other soul.

In the ancient recipe, the three antidotes for dullness or boredom are sleep, drink, and travel. It is rather feeble. From sleep you wake up, from drink you become sober, and from travel you come home again. And then where are you? No, the two sovereign remedies for dullness are love or a crusade.

I cannot cure myself of that most woeful of youth's follies--thinking that those who care about us will care for the things that mean much to us.

I can't bear art that you can walk round and admire. A book should be either a bandit or a rebel or a man in the crowd.

I feel I cannot touch humanity, even in thought, it is abhorrent to me. But a work of art is an act of faith, as Michael Angelo says, and one goes on writing, to the unseen witnesses.

I know the greatness of Christianity; it is a past greatness.... I live in 1924, and the Christian venture is done.

I never saw a wild thing sorry for itself. A small bird will drop frozen dead from a bough without ever having felt sorry for itself.

I shall always be a priest of love.

I looked that up for my Johnny, his email arriving just as I was thinking of calling him to warn him of our imminent, and unfortunately brief, stint in Montreal next weekend.

I looked that up for Johnny because once upon a time, not all that long ago, he and I drove ourselves harder than a January snowstorm with that fateful line

"I never saw a wild thing feel sorry for itself."

Today, re-reading the essay for the first time since I snuck poetry books in the inside pocket of my badass motorcycle jacket going on last decade, I realized

there's an even more powerful sentence in it.

"I cannot cure myself of that most woeful of youth's follies--thinking that those who care about us will care for the things that mean much to us. "

And I can't help sitting here thinking how many people I have to thank for teaching me the significance of that.

They/you know who you are. You should. If I've ever hugged you with just that glee, it is because this is what you were teaching me.

Remember that conversation? I must have had it with you.

The one about trying to learn to care.

I think I'm about ready to pass the mid-term.

And as I stare at the extra room and all the organizing left to do, and think of the wine and cheese that I am so looking forward to this afternoon, and I think of the glass of bitter Merlot that I drank nearing on two this morning with a beautiful young girl in a caf� last night and I realize that I've really missed wine since I got here and all these tiny little not all that important things

really I just want to thank you.

Not just you if you're reading, but the global, all-encompassing You.

I guess this is my own version of thanksgiving. The spoiled girl isn't just happy for the harvest, but ever wanting more, I am happy for the warmth of souls as well.

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