Andrew Krivak > Quotes

“But I miss whom I once could touch, as all must do when we make our way through whatever forest or wood it is in which we travel or are raised. This does not mean the man is lost or has disappeared forever. For although he no longer walks beside you, he still remains in the time and place of memory and this is where he will appear again and again, as often as you will seek him. Not only in those places where he has always been but where he could not be then yet will be now.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Bear

“But we don't get to choose when we leave here to sleep on the mountain. We all have to sleep on the mountain one day. Even the bear. Even when we struggle with all our will not to.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Bear

“Her father told her once that all animals were creatures of habit and so, too, were they. The difference was she could choose to change her habits. Animals changed when they were afraid. Change before feat has had a chance to overcome you, he said, or after you have overcome it and like a storm it has moved on.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Bear

“The Northwestern Carpathians, in which I was raised, were a hard place, as unforgiving as the people who lived there, but the Alpine landscape into which Zlee and I were sent that early winter seemed a glimpse of what the surface of the earth looked and felt and acted like when there were no maps or borders, no rifles or artillery, no men or wars to claim possession of land, and snow and rock alone parried in a match of millennial slowness so that time meant nothing, and death meant nothing, for what life there was gave in to the forces of nature surrounding and accepted its fate to play what role was handed down in the sidereal march of seasons capable of crushing in an instant what armies might--millennia later--be foolish enough to assemble on it heights.

And yet there we were, ordered to march ourselves, for God, not nature, was with us now, and God would deliver us, in this world and next, when the time came for that.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Sojourn

“Each believed that God was on his side, for no one raises a hand without convincing himself first that he is right.”
― Andrew Krivak

“For although he no longer walks beside you, he still remains in the time and place a memory and this is where he will appear again and again, as often as you will seek him. Not only in those places where he has always been but where he could not be then yet will be now.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Bear

“Like a couple that communicates by intention nearly as much as by word, so in tune are they to each other and their surroundings.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Sojourn

“I prayed for death so as not to live in madness.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Sojourn

“Some animals of old have said it was the trees themselves that taught them to speak, for they never make an unnecessary sound. Each word, like a breath, carries with it some good, some purpose. For this reason, trees are the wisest and most compassionate creatures in the woods. They will do all in their power to take care of everyone and everything beneath them, when they have the power to do it.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Bear

“What is left to be afraid of?' And he said, 'The possibility that a life itself may prove to be the most worthy struggle.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Sojourn

“Sleep is the only balm I know.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Bear

“AND YET NO MATTER HOW LONG WINTER LASTED, spring followed, its arrival soft and somehow surprising, like the notes of birdsong upon waking, or the tap of water slipping in a droplet from a branch to the ground.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Bear

“THE NORTHWESTERN CARPATHIANS, IN WHICH I WAS RAISED, were a hard place, as unforgiving as the people who lived there, but the Alpine landscape into which Zlee and I were sent that early winter seemed a glimpse of what the surface of the earth looked and felt and acted like when there were no maps or borders, no rifles or artillery, no men or wars to claim possession of land, and snow and rock alone parried in a match of millennial slowness so that time meant nothing, and death meant nothing, for what life there was gave in to the forces of nature surrounding and accepted its fate to play what role was handed down in the sidereal march of seasons capable of crushing in an instant what armies might—millennia later—be foolish enough to assemble on it heights.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Sojourn

“I’ll miss you, he whispered.
She understood now and held his hand tighter.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Bear

“The only difference between life here and on the battlefield was there we believed that the outcome of the war would be different, and so fought to that end. Here we were reminded of our defeat, for although they died among comrades, death came quietly to those who couldn't hold out any longer, and into that silence, too, went all hope that we might have fought for some purpose.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Sojourn

“Banquo asked me how it felt to be alive when I saw so many of my comrades dead or dying, and I said that I had ceased to think of life or death because it seemed that I was destined to serve out the sentence of one for having delivered so well of the other, and that I saw the dead every night before I went to sleep as though they were still alive and standing before me.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Sojourn

“The ship slipped her lines and a tug nudged her into mid-river, where she stalled briefly, waiting to see that everything that lay before her on the course below was clear. Then Hamburg, and Europe, and all her empires, all I had ever known--the only ground that up until then had fed me, the only well from which I had drunk--receded in slow swaths of wash and sky as we surrendered to the outgoing tide on the Elbe.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Sojourn

“Imagine it from here everything you say in front of you — lake, trees, the mountains to the edge of the horizon — was water. Endless blue water of waves in constant motion. That’s what the ocean looks like.
The girl frowned.
I can’t imagine it, she said.
No, said the man. You can’t. Not until you see it. And hear it. And smell it.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Bear

“Like the body, courage, too, is a thing weakened, especially when we are young and invincible. We can't give one the rest it needs and expect the other to protect us. Don't anger Nature with talk of wishing she had chosen differently. See to your own nature.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Sojourn

“I longed only to turn back and climb and begin life all over again in a place where I might find the peace I'd once known in mountains of another time and another place, and I wondered-if I could slip out of camp unobserved-whether I just might be able to stay hidden and uncaptured until this war came to an end.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Sojourn

“Why did you wait that long before you woke me? she asked. Because sleep is the only balm I know, said the bear.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Bear

“Imagine it from here everything you saw in front of you — lake, trees, the mountains to the edge of the horizon — was water. Endless blue water of waves in constant motion. That’s what the ocean looks like.
The girl frowned.
I can’t imagine it, she said.
No, said the man. You can’t. Not until you see it. And hear it. And smell it.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Bear

“Was my mother a bear? she asked out loud when the animal with bluish-black fur and a blaze of white on its chest had disappeared into the trees. The man laughed and asked, What makes you say that? She didn’t want to stay with us, said the girl. She went away. Up the mountain. Just like that bear. The man understood then what the girl had been thinking.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Bear

“I fought for the marine next to me, each time, each tour.”
― Andrew Krivak, Like the Appearance of Horses

“Her father told her once that all animals were creatures of habit and so, too, were they. The difference was she could choose to change her habits. Animals changed when they were afraid. Change before fear has had a chance to overcome you, he said, or after you have overcome it and like a storm it has moved on.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Bear

“That every thing has its end. And we have a part to play, right up to that end.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Bear

“She wanted nothing more than to be here with you. But we don’t get to choose when we leave here to sleep on the mountain. We all have to sleep on the mountain one day. Even the bear. Even when we struggle with all our will not to.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Bear

“Not all animals had the range of voice that could be heard, he said, but all living things spoke, and perhaps the real question was how she could understand him.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Bear

“For this reason, trees are the wisest and most compassionate creatures in the woods. They will do all in their power to take care of everyone and everything beneath them, when they have the power to do it.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Bear

“I had never seen anyone fight and I had never been taught to defend myself. But I knew hurt and never wondered that day what it was I had to do if I didn't want to be hurt again.”
― Andrew Krivak, The Sojourn