A shade flickered to my left, an eerie shadow balanced even more precariously on the railing than I. Her plimsolls struggled to grip the same rail my fingers now held. I knew her face, just...

We are biology. We are reminded of this at the beginning and the end, at birth and at death. In between we do what we can to forget.

The sound is gone. There’s nothing left but the insomniac throbbing of crickets. Crickets in the garden, the courtyard, the back courtyard. Close, domestic, identifiable. And those out in the country. Between all of them...

The bulletproof vest–‘bullet resistant,’ technically–is made of two double panels of a synthetic material called Kevlar, inside a cloth carrier that holds it around your torso like a lead X-ray smock. One cop wrote phrases...

You are not ready to live if you are not yet ready to die!

In a typical desperation for quick answers, easily understood, people had turned to primitive worship as the solution. With less than success. Not only had they died as quickly as the rest of the people,...

Isn’t it sad that so often it takes facing death to appreciate life and each other fully?

Taylor, listen to me. I could tell you that it’s okay. That she wasn’t a wonderful person, or I didn’t love her. I could tell you that she’s happier now, and her life would’ve been...

That’s the source of the meditation on death I’ve carried in my heart all my life.

Would you like me to [kill you] now?” asked Snape, his voice heavy with irony. “Or would you like a few moments to compose an epitaph?

Oh threats of Hell and Hopes of Paradise!One thing at least is certain – This Life flies;One thing is certain and the rest is Lies -The Flower that once has blown forever dies.

I am not afraid of death, which after all can’t be far away. What does frighten me, though, is the halfway stage.

That is not dead which can eternal lie,And with strange aeons even death may die.

Kun olen kuollut, kun olen kuollut.Kesä jatkuu. Kesä.

Cordelia! stay a little. Ha! What is’t thou say’st? Her voice was ever soft.

Muhammad adhered meticulously to the charter he forged for Medina, which – grounded as it was in the Quranic injunction, “Let there be no compulsion in religion” (2:256) – is arguably the first mandate for...

O I will accompany the windUntil the chainOf my white bonesDrifts like fine sandAnd I become compassing.I become the wind.- Song of the Wind

Do you believe that you will die? Yes, man is mortal, I am a man, ergo… No, that isn’t what I mean. I know that you know that. What I’m asking is: Have you ever...

To be heroic is to be courageous enough to die for something; to be inspirational is to be crazy enough to live a little.

I’m not blessed, or merciful. I’m just me. I’ve got a job to do, and I do it. Listen: even as we’re talking, I’m there for old and young, innocent and guilty, those who die...

When we understand that Peace is a state of mind we understand true Peace.

Every cataclysm is welcomed by somebody; there is always someone to rejoice at disaster and see in it the prospect of a new beginning and a better world.

a man was on his way to the gallows when he met another, who asked him: where are you going, my friend? and the condemned man replied: i’m not going anywhere. they’re taking me by...

Fear manifested itself as a physical presence that seemed to dominate the public sphere. Time almost stopped. Even without confirmation I could sense that something had gone terribly wrong.

Nightmares are seldom a foreshadowing of real events, but always a showing of real fears.

I knew then that death could stopa lot of things, but it could never cut the bond of friendship.

By the time men get to be of our age, Mr. Vaiden, about all any new acquaintance can do is to remind them of somebody else. You know at times I have thought that is...

Do you know why hurricanes have names instead of numbers? To keep the killing personal. No one cares about a bunch of people killed by a number. ‘200 Dead as Number Three Slams Ashore’ is...

Sleep: the stepchild of Death.

Many a good hanging prevents a bad marriage.

I will take a new approach to death, because what is important about death is not the dead. It’s the living. Those of us left behind.

Shut up. Don’t make me tell you again.”We shut up, which I find hysterically funny.

Death is ordinary. Behold it, subtract its patterns and lessons from those of the death that weapons bring, and maybe the residue will show what violence is.

And thus we all are nighingThe truth we fear to know:Death will end our cryingFor friends that come and go.

Staring out to sea, I finally forced myself to stop thinking of her as someone still somewhere, if only in memory, still obscurely alive, breathing, doing, moving, but as a shovelful of ashes already scattered;...

It happened. It was awful. You aren’t perfect. That’s all there is. Don’t confuse your grief with guilt.”We stay in the silence and the loneliness of the otherwise empty dormitory for a few more minutes,...

Hef ég drepið mann eða hef ég ekki drepið mann? Hver hefur drepið mann og hver hefur ekki drepið mann? Hvenær drepur maður mann og hvenær drepur maður ekki mann? Fari í helvíti sem ég...

When a country is defeated, there remain only mountains and rivers, and on a ruined castle in spring only grasses thrive. I sat down on my hat and wept bitterly till I almost forgot time.A...

OH, THERE HAS TO BE SOMETHING IN THE STOCKING THAT MAKES A NOISE, said Death. OTHERWISE, WHAT IS 4:30 A.M. FOR?

He made me feel unhinged . . . like he could take me apart and put me back together again and again.

A halo surrounded the grim reaper nun, Sister Maria. (By the way-I like this human idea of the grim reaper. I like the scythe. It amuses me.)

When I arrived at the house in the suburbs that night I seriously contemplated suicide for the first time in my life. But as I thought about it, the idea became exceedingly tiresome, and I...

Everybody know death is inevitably coming, but it never fails to catch everybody by surprise everytime one is going

For two days I went about my business. I travelled the globe as always, handing souls to the conveyor belt of eternity.

Apparently even the most awful tragedies, and the people they’d ruined, got a little stale after a while.

Now we gotta be all politically correct. It’s like the Cold Wars never happened.

He’d grown eager to hand off his things, as if the weight of his possessions kept him tethered to this earth, and by giving them away, he could snip those strings.

But man by his nature is an unnatural animal. If any creature stands a chance of defeating death, it is man.

Sam studied his brother. At one time he thought Frankie had a good head on his shoulders. Sure, he had a temper. And he was conceited. But he always used common sense. But now he...

It’s lucky I was there. Then again, who am I kidding? I’m in most places at least once, and in 1943, I was just about everywhere.