"What a pity that Bilbo did not stab that vile creature, when he had a chance!

'Pity? It was pity that stayed his hand. Pity, and Mercy: not to strike without need. And he has been well rewarded, Frodo. Be sure that he took so little hurt from the evil, and escaped in the end, because he began his ownership of the Ring so. With Pity.

'I am sorry,' said Frodo. 'But I am frightened; and I do not feel any pity for Gollum.

'You have not seen him,' Gandalf broke in.

'No, and I don't want to,' said Frodo. 'I can't understand you. Do you mean to say that you, and the Elves, have let him live on after all these horrible deeds? Now at any rate he is as bad as an Orc, and just an enemy. He deserves death.'

'Deserves it! I daresay he does. Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgment. For even the very wise cannot see all ends.

*

My heart tells me that he has some part to play yet, for good or ill, before the end; and when that comes, the Pity of Bilbo may rule the fate of many - yours not least."

- The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, J. R. R Tolkien

Dear Leonard. To look life in the face. Always to look life in the face and to know it for what it is. At last to know it. To love it for what it is, and then, to put it away. Leonard. Always the years between us. Always the years. Always the love. Always the hours.

Angelica: What happens when we die?

Virginia: What happens? [pause] We return to the place that we came from.

Angelica: I don't remember where I came from.

Virginia: Nor do I.

Angelica:...She looks smaller

Virginia: Yes, that's one of the things that happens. You look smaller.

Angelica:But so peaceful...

- The Hours

"Why do I always have to sit next to the exes? Is this some kind of a hint, sweetheart? Anyway, shouldn't the exes have a table of their own, where they can all ex together in ex-quisite agony?"

- Sally Lester in The Hours

{ Would you be angry if I died? }

*

If you died?

*

{ Who is this party for? }

*

What do you mean who is it for? Why are you asking? What are you trying 

to say?

*

{ I am not trying to say anything.  I'm saying I think I'm only staying alive 

to satisfy you. }

*

So that is it we do. That is what people do - they stay alive for each other.

- The Hours

"I wanted to be a writer, that's all. I wanted to write about it all. Everything that happens in a moment. The way the flowers looked when you carried them in your arms. This towel, how it smells, how it feels, this thread. All our feelings, yours and mine. The history of it, who we once were. Everything in the world. Everything is all mixed up, like it's all mixed up now."

- The Hours

i just keep coming back to The Hours, over and over and over and over and over and over again.

"And when I saw those places, walked by them and reached out to touch where my fingers had once touched before, I felt parts of me were still in those places. I felt that I somehow had left a piece of myself there, maybe like we all do, and I continue to leave pieces everywhere I go. It’s strange to think about yourself haunting places you’ve once spent moments or minutes or hours of your life at but I think it’s true. Somehow parts of ourselves stay there in the soil or in the stone. They say it’s so easy to miss someone once they’re gone well maybe it’s just as easy to miss yourself."

- kelsey from pigmenting

tonight, Lykke Li

keep us safe until the night; what happens next then? what happens when night falls? wouldn't it be better to keep us safe day and night? but no one can do that, can they? 

yesterday, the night before tomorrow. 

so hard to cast away the night when so much of me has moved forward, yet so much of me dwells there still. it is like a tiny, tiny pond, a subterranean, miniscule pond of unknowable depth, submerged within a clear, wavering stream that's struggling to trickle forth. 

"All I knew about the well was its frightening depth. It was deep beyond measuring, and crammed full of darkness, as if all the world's darknesses had been boiled down to their ultimate density."

- Norwegian Wood, Haruki Murakami