Ophir

“He knew that on the day of his death he would see her face and he could hope to carry that beauty into the darkness with him, the last pagan on earth, singing softly upon his pallet in an unknown tongue.”
― Cormac McCarthy, The Passenger

“Why did white folks think you could live on nothing but art? Strange! Too strange! Too strange!”
― Langston Hughes, The Ways of White Folks: Stories

“In the spring of the year birds began to arrive on the beach from across the gulf. Weary passerines. Vireos. Kingbirds and grosbeaks. Too exhausted to move. You could pick them up out of the sand and hold them trembling in your palm. Their small hearts beating and their eyes shuttering. He walked the beach with his flashlight the whole of the night to fend away predators and toward the dawn he slept with them in the sand. That none disturb these passengers.”
― Cormac McCarthy, The Passenger

“What’s all this, Mr. Stibbons?” “I really should talk to him, sir. He’s had a near-death experience!” “We all have. It’s called ‘living,’” said the Archchancellor shortly.”
― Terry Pratchett, Hogfather