Susan Fletcher > Quotes

“Love is blind, they say--but isn't it more that love makes us see too much? Isn't it more that love floods our brain with sights and sounds, so that everything looks bigger, brighter, more lovely than ever before?”
― Susan Fletcher, Eve Green

“Kisses open doors, I've noticed. That one gesture can unlock secrets, ease open feelings. It can't be prevented--these kisses just are. It's how they work. They break into basements you never knew you had.”
― Susan Fletcher, Eve Green

“Love is as varied and unpredictable as the rain is: it comes in constant summer drizzles, or sudden, unforseen storms that make rivers burst their banks and Cornish fishing boats rock and spill and lose their crew in the Atlantic.”
― Susan Fletcher, Eve Green

“I've heard fate talked of. It's not a word I use. I think we make our own choices. I think how we live our lives is our own doing, and we cannot fully hope on dreams and stars. But dreams and stars can guide us, perhaps. And the heart's voice is a strong one. Always is.

Your heart's voice is your true voice. It is easy to ignore it, for sometimes it says what we'd rather it did not - and it is so hard to risk the things we have. But what life are we living, if we don't live by our hearts? Not a true one. And the person living it is not the true you.”
― Susan Fletcher, Corrag

“Sometimes we have so much to say, we cannot say it. Sometimes it's best we do not say goodbyes.”
― Susan Fletcher, Corrag

“Your heart's voice is your true voice. It is easy to ignore it, for sometimes it says what we'd rather it did not - and it is so hard to risk the things we have. But what life are we living, if we don't live by our hearts? Not a true one. And the person living it is not the true you.”
― Susan Fletcher, The Highland Witch

“What if...? A question we ask to hurt ourselves.”
― Susan Fletcher, Eve Green

“Which people take the time to care for their souls, these days? I reckon not many. But...hear this: I think that maybe in our lives -- in our scrabbling for food, in the washing of our bodies and warming of them, in our small daily battles -- we can forget our souls. We do not tend to them, as if they matter less. But I don't think they matter less.”
― Susan Fletcher, Corrag

“It is evening. The moon is small, and new. There are stars, and a stream's sound, and I can hear the wings of insects, in the dark. I think what gifts we are given, such gifts--every day.”
― Susan Fletcher, Corrag

“But maybe the best thing I learnt was this: that we cannot know a person's soul and nature until we've sat beside them, and talked.”
― Susan Fletcher, The Highland Witch

“No war. Fight with your pen. Give your battle-cry in ink, and mark your dreams down on a page”
― Susan Fletcher, Corrag

“I've heard fate talked of. It's not a word I use. I think we make our own choices. I think how we live our lives is our own doing, and we cannot fully hope on dreams and stars. But dreams and stars can guide us, perhaps. And the heart's voice is a strong one. Always is.”
― Susan Fletcher, Corrag

“I've done so many bad things in my life but the stars always forgave me.”
― Susan Fletcher, A Little in Love

“Mostly, she sees the good in the world, the light where there is dark... She sees beauty where we mostly pass it by. But tonight, she was heavy-hearted. I think sometimes she unfolds all her losses and stares at them, in the dark.”
― Susan Fletcher, Corrag

“The Highland way says it's who you say you love and who you serve, which is of worth. Not some title that is passed down upon you by tradition. That's the English way, and the Lowland way--but who can be born a nobleman? Nobility is earned... 'Tis our choices that make us.”
― Susan Fletcher, Corrag

“What creatures we are. What powers are in us--in all of us. What we already know, if we choose to spend time with ourselves. What a deep love we can feel.”
― Susan Fletcher, Corrag

“Grief is such a lonely thing. There is no-one in it with you - others may grieve for the same soul, but they do not grieve exactly for what you also grieve. No-one has lost precisely what you have lost. Not exactly, never exactly. We are in it alone.”
― Susan Fletcher, The Silver Dark Sea

“The only evil in the world is the one that lies in people—in their pride, and greed, and duty. Remember that.”
― Susan Fletcher, The Highland Witch

“We carry them with us... We breathe for them, sing for them soak up stories that they cannot hear. We think they would have loved this...

And we smile for them, on their behalf.”
― Susan Fletcher, The Silver Dark Sea

“Isn't it the rarest thing? Never mind the whale migrations, or total eclipses of suns and moons: love that lasts, and is returned in equal measure, is the rarest thing she knows of.”
― Susan Fletcher, The Silver Dark Sea

“I know this: there is no sense to grief. There is no pattern or shape or texture, and there are no books or stories which can lessen the pain at losing a person you have loved, and will always love. There are no rules, with loss.”
― Susan Fletcher, The Silver Dark Sea

“So I say this. Speak of them. Speak of those that died. Speak of all those who ever died--in all the world's history, in its wars, and long-lost days. Speak of those who met their deaths in Glencoe, in snow--not of their deaths, but of their lives before them. Not of how they died, but of how they bent to pat a dog's head, or what ballads they could sing, or what their skin was like by their eyes when they smiled, or which weather was their weather--for it keeps them living. It stops them being dead.

To do this--to speak or write of them--puts breath back in their mouths. It lifts them up from their earthy beds... brings them forth, and they stand by the side of the one who speaks of them; they walk out of the pages of those who write them down. From the realm, they smile upon us. All the dead people--only, they are not dead.”
― Susan Fletcher, Corrag

“We are the Magick--we are. The truest magick in this world is in us... It is in our movements and in what we say and feel.”
― Susan Fletcher, Corrag

“...grieving needs space, and it needs so much time. And it needs to be done; it cannot be trodden round or not looked in the eye.”
― Susan Fletcher, The Silver Dark Sea

“God works as he chooses - we have our tests and He has His revelations”
― Susan Fletcher, Corrag

“A man can be beautiful, I see that now. It's not just a woman's term, not a word reserved for romantic, virtuous, elegant things. I don't think beauty is neat any more. It's unordered. It's unbrushed hair and a torn back pocket. It's bright and strange and lovely, and if I were to paint him, I'd use all the warm colours - ochre, gold, plum, terracotta, scarlet, burnt orange.”
― Susan Fletcher, Eve Green

“Is that why we give flowers? To express admiration? Sometimes. But there are other reasons. A symbol of love or of commiseration. A way of saying thank you. A mark of respect. Proof we like someone and want them to smile. And we put flowers on graves to say “Look, we still think of you. You've left a space behind.”
― Susan Fletcher, Eve Green

“It is an extraordinary world - full of love, grief, coincidence - and we shall never understand it. We should never try to. We should only be grateful for it. I reckon we should love, breathe, and say all will be well and believe it. And we should share our best stories, as often as we can.”
― Susan Fletcher, The Silver Dark Sea

“Some things are hard, even if they are right. Even if you know they are the proper, decent way. I was glad to have left herbs for those men whose lungs and minds had not known Highland winters before. It was kindness. And kindness is worth showing.”
― Susan Fletcher, The Highland Witch

“This is the place. I was certain. For the heart knows its home when it finds it, and on finding it, stays there.”
― Susan Fletcher, Corrag