Going to China

...But it gradually seemed to me that I'd made myself believe something that wasn't true. I'd made myself believe that I was fine and happy and fulfilled on my own without the love of anyone else. Being in love was like China: you knew it was there, and no doubt it was very interesting, and some people went there, but I never would. I'd spend all my life without ever going to China, but it wouldn't matter, because there was all the rest of the world to visit... And I thought: am I really going to spend the rest of my life without feeling that again? I thought: Iwant to go to China. It's full of treasures and strangeness and mysteries and joy.

~Philip Pullman, The Amber Spyglass

If People Were Rain

I wanted so badly to lie down next to her on the couch, to wrap my arms around her and sleep... Just sleep together, in the most innocent sense of the phrase. But I lacked the courage and she had a boyfriend and I was gawky and she was gorgeous and I was boring and she was endlessly fascinating. So I walked back to my room and collapsed on the bottom bunk, thinking that if people were rain, I was drizzle and she was a hurricane.

~John Green, Looking for Alaska


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The Heart of a Star

"So what I want to know is why it is that I can no longer find you, in my mind. You are still there, just, but you are there like a ghost, a will o' the wisp. Not long ago you burned--your heart burned--in my mind like silver fire. But after that night in the inn it became patchy and dim, and now it is not there at all."

Yvaine realized that she felt nothing but pity for the creature who had wanted her dead, so she said, "Could it be that the heart you seek is no longer my own?"

The old woman coughed.

The star waited for her to be done, and then she said, "I have given my heart to another."

"The boy? The one in the inn? With the unicorn?"

"Yes."

"You should have let me take it back then, for my sisters and me. We could have been young again, well into the next age of the world. Your boy will break it, or waste it, or lose it. They all do."

"Nonetheless," said the star, "he has my heart."

~Neil Gaiman, Stardust


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i carry your heart with me

i carry your heart with me (i carry it in
my heart) i am never without it (anywhere
i go you go, my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing, my darling)
i fear
no fate (for you are my fate, my sweet) i want
no world (for beautiful you are my world, my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart (i carry it in my heart)

~e.e. cummings


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But I love you, sir;
And when a woman says she loves a man,
The man must hear her, though he love her not.

~Elizabeth Barrett Browning

J.W. Waterhouse, The Lady of Shalott

Princess

"Once there was a princess who was very beautiful. She shone as bright as the stars on a moonless night. But what difference did it make that she was beautiful? None. No difference."

"Why did it make no difference?" asked Abilene.

"Because," said Pellegrina, "she was a princess who loved no one and cared nothing for love, even though there were many who loved her."

At this point in her story, Pellegrina stopped and looked right at Edward. She stared deep into his painted-on eyes, and again, Edward felt a shiver go through him. 

"And so," said Pellegrina, still staring at Edward.

"What happened to the princess?" asked Abilene.

"And so," said Pellegrina, turning back to Abilene, "the king, her father, said that the princess must marry; and soon after this, a prince came from a neighboring kingdom and he saw the princess and, immediately, he loved her. He gave her a ring of pure gold. He placed it on her finger. He said these words to her: 'I love you.' But do you know what the princess did?"

Abilene shook her head. 

"She swallowed the ring. She took it from her finger and swallowed it. She said, 'That is what I think of love.' And she ran from the prince. She left the castle and went deep into the woods. And so."

"And so what?" said Abilene. "What happened then?"

"And so, the princess became lost in the woods. She wandered for many day. Finally, she came to a little hut, and she knocked on the door. She said, 'Let me in; I am cold.'

"There was no answer.

She knocked again, 'Let me in; I am hungry,'

"A terrible voice answered her. The voice said, 'Enter if you must.'

"The beautiful princess entered, and she saw a witch sitting at the table counting pieces of gold.

"'Three thousand six hundred and twenty-two.' said the witch.

"'I am lost.' said the beautiful princess.

"'What of it?' said the witch. 'Three thousand six hundred and twenty-three.'

"'I am hungry,' said the princess.

"' Not my concern,' said the witch. 'Three thousand six hundred and twenty-four.'

"'But I am a beautiful princess.' said the princess.

"'Three thousand six hundred and twenty-five,' replied the witch. 

"'My father,' said the princess, 'is a powerful king. You must help me or there will be consequences.'

"'Consequences?' said the witch. She looked up from her gold. She stared at the princess. 'You dare to talk to me of consequences? Very well, then, we will speak of consequences: tell me the name of the one you love.'

"'Love!' said the princess. She stamped her foot. 'Why must everyone speak of love?'

"'Whom do you love?' said the witch. 'You must tell me the name.'

"'I love no one,' said the princess proudly.

"'You disappoint me,' said the witch. She raised her hand and said one word: 'Farthfigery.'

"And the beautiful princess was changed into a warthog.

"'What have you done to me?' squealed the princess.

"'Talk to me of consequences now, will you?' said the witch, and she went back to counting her pieces of gold. 'Three thousand six hundred and twenty-six,' said the witch as the warthog princess ran from the hut and out again into the forest.

"The kings' men were in the forest, too. And what were they looking for? A beautiful princess. And so when they came upon an ugly warthog, they shot it immediately. Pow!"

"No," said Abilene.

"Yes," said Pellegrina. "The men took the warthog back to the castle and the cook slit open its belly and inside it she found a ring of pure gold. There were many hungry people in the castle that night and all of them were waiting to be fed. So the cook put the ring on her finger and finished butchering the warthog. And the ring that the beautiful princess had swallowed shone on the cook's hand as she did her work. The end."

-Kate DiCamillo

Chapter IV, The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

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Pointless.

The old doll said, "I wonder who will come for me this time. Someone will come. Someone always comes. Who will it be?"

"I don't care if anyone comes for me," said Edward.

"But that's dreadful," said the old doll. "There's no point in going on if you feel that way. No point at all. You must be filled with expectancy. You must be awash in hope. You must wonder who will love you, whom you will love next."

"I am done with being loved," Edward told her. "I'm done with loving. It's too painful."

"Pish," said the old doll. "Where is your courage?"

"Somewhere else, I guess," said Edward.

"You disappoint me," she said. "You disappoint me greatly. If you have no intention of loving or being loved, then the whole journey is pointless. You might as well leap from this shelf right now and let yourself shatter into a million pieces. Get it over with. Get it all over with now."

-Kate DiCamillo

Chapter XXVI, The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

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Owned.

"I have no interest in being purchased," said Edward. 

The doll gasped. "You don't want somebody to buy you?" she said. "You don't want to be owned by a little girl who loves you?"

Sarah Ruth! Abilene! Their names went through Edward's head like the notes of a sad, sweet song. 

"I have already been loved," said Edward. "I have been loved by a girl named Abilene. I have been loved by a fisherman and his wife and a hobo and his dog. I have been loved by a boy who played the harmonica and by a girl who died. Don't talk to me about love," he said. 

"I have known love."

-Kate DiCamillo

Chapter XXVI, The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

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Broken.

Look at me, he said to her. His arms and legs jerked. Look at me. You got your wish. I have learned how to love. And it's a terrible thing. I'm broken. My heart is broken. Help me. 

-Kate DiCamillo

Chapter XX, The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

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Baby.

Never in his life had Edward been cradled like a baby. Abilene had not done it. Nor had Nellie. And most certainly Bull had not. It was a singular sensation to be held so gently and yet so fiercely, to be stared down at with so much love. Edward felt the whole of his china body flood with warmth.

-Kate DiCamillo

Chapter XVII, The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

Stars.

Finally, the sun set and the birds flew away. Edward hung by his ears and looked up at the night sky. He saw the stars. But for the first time in his life, he looked at them and felt no comfort. Instead, he felt mocked.

You are down there alone, the stars seemed to say to him. And we are up here, in our constellations, together.

I have been loved, Edward told the stars. 

So? said the stars. What difference does that make when you are all alone now?

Edward could think of no answer to that question.

-Kate DiCamillo

Chapter XV, The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

Hwin.

Then Hwin, though shaking all over, gave a strange little neigh and trotted across to the Lion.

"Please," she said, "you're so beautiful. You may eat me if you like. I'd sooner be eaten by you, than fed by anyone else."

"Dearest daughter," said Aslan, planting a lion's kiss on her twitching, velvet nose, "I knew you would not be long in coming to me. Joy shall be yours."

-C. S. Lewis

Chapter XIV, The Horse and His Boy

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Gone

I woke up and knew he was gone. Straightaway I knew he was gone. When you love somebody you know these things.

~David Almond, Skellig