Abby

“He carried a pencil always behind his ear, a pencil so broad and of so soft a lead that it could serve for nothing except making a mark across a plank of wood, but which Lady Slane never saw used for any other purpose than scratching his head.”
― Vita Sackville-West, All Passion Spent

“But, perversely, the flittering of the butterflies had always remained more important.”
― Vita Sackville-West, All Passion Spent

“That was old age, when people knew everything so well that they could no longer afford to express it save in symbols.”
― Vita Sackville-West, All Passion Spent

“If one wanted beauty, one had only to rest one's eyes on her, so fine and old and lovely, like an ivory carving; flowing down like water into her chair, so slight and supple were her limbs, the firelight casting a flush of rose over her features and snowy hair. Youth had no beauty like the beauty of an old face; the face of youth was an unwritten page. Youth could never sit as still as that, in absolute repose, as though all haste, all movement, were over and done with, and nothing left but waiting and acquiescence.”
― Vita Sackville-West, All Passion Spent