em

“If I were to kiss you then go to hell, I would. So then I can brag with the devils I saw heaven without ever entering it.”
― William Shakespeare

“Union"

I don’t know how to become one with you.
If you’re heaven, then tell me.
I will kneel to every god.
If you’re hell, then tell me.
I will fill the earth with sin.

I don’t know how to become one with you.
If you’re an invaded soil, then tell me.
I will make my skin your flag.
If you are, as I am, a gypsy,
draw a border around me:
make me your country.

— Abdulla Pashew, “Union.” Translated by

Words without Borders: Kurdish Literature. January 2014.”
― Abdulla Pashew

“We don't read and write poetry because it's cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. And medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for. To quote from Whitman, "O me! O life!... of the questions of these recurring; of the endless trains of the faithless... of cities filled with the foolish; what good amid these, O me, O life?" Answer. That you are here - that life exists, and identity; that the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse. That the powerful play *goes on* and you may contribute a verse. What will your verse be?”
― N.H. Kleinbaum, Dead Poets Society

“I wanted to fathom her secrets; I wanted her to come to me and say: "I love you," and if not that, if that was senseless insanity, then...well, what was there to care about? Did I know what I wanted? I was like one demented: all I wanted was to be near her, in the halo of her glory, in her radiance, always, for ever, all my life. I knew nothing more!”
― Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Gambler