Hanuta Wildner

“Once, very long ago, Time fell in love with Fate. This, as you might imagine, proved problematic. Their romance disrupted the flow of time. It tangled the strings of fortune into knots.  The stars watched from the heavens nervously, worrying what might occur. What might happen to the days and nights were time to suffer a broken heart? What catastrophes might result if the same fate awaited Fate itself? The stars conspired and separated the two. For a while they breathed easier in the heavens. Time continued to flow as it always had, or perhaps imperceptibly slower. Fate weaved together the paths that were meant to intertwine, though perhaps a string was missed here and there. But eventually, Fate and Time found each other again.  In the heavens, the stars sighed, twinkling and fretting. They asked the Moon her advice. The Moon in turn called upon the parliament of owls to decide how best to proceed. The parliament of owls convened to discuss the matter amongst themselves night after night. They argued and debated while the world slept around them, and the world continued to turn, unaware that such important matters were under discussion while it slumbered.  The parliament of owls came to the logical conclusion that if the problem was in the combination, one of the elements should be removed. They chose to keep the one they felt more important. The parliament of owls told their decision to the stars and the stars agreed. The Moon did not, but on this night she was dark and could not offer her opinion.  So it was decided, and Fate was pulled apart. Ripped into pieces by beaks and claws. Fate’s screams echoed through the deepest corners and the highest heavens but no one dared to intervene save for a small brave mouse who snuck into the fray, creeping unnoticed through the blood and bone and feathers, and took Fate’s heart and kept it safe. When the furor died down there was nothing else left of Fate.  The owl who consumed Fate’s eyes gained great site, greater site then any that had been granted to a mortal creature before. The Parliament crowned him the Owl King. In the heavens the stars sparkled with relief but the moon was full of sorrow. And so time goes as it should and events that were once fated to happen are left instead to chance, and Chance never falls in love with anything for long. But the world is strange and endings are not truly endings no matter how the stars might wish it so.  Occasionally Fate can pull itself together again.  And Time is always waiting.”
― Erin Morgenstern, The Starless Sea

“Because you, you are precious cargo, Marwan, the most precious there ever was. I pray the sea knows this. Inshallah.”
― Khaled Hosseini, Sea Prayer

“Doch jenseits Phantásiens gibt es ein Reich,
das heißt die Äußere Welt,
und die dort wohnen - ja, sie sind reich,
um sie ist es anders bestellt!
Die Adamssöhne, so nennt man mit Recht
die Bewohner des irdischen Ortes,
die Evastöchter, das Menschengeschlecht,
Blutsbrüder des Wirklichen Wortes.
Sie alle haben seit Anbeginn
die Gabe, Namen zu geben.
Sie brachten der Kindlichen Kaiserin
zu allen Zeiten das Leben.
Sie schenkten ihr neue und herrliche Namen,
doch ist es schon lange her,
daß Menschen zu uns nach Phantasien kamen.
Sie wissen den Weg nicht mehr.
Sie haben vergessen, wie wirklich wir sind,
und sie glauben nicht mehr daran.
Ach, käme ein einziges Menschenkind,
dann wäre schon alles getan!
Ach, wäre nur eines zu glauben bereit
und hätte den Ruf nur vernommen!
Für sie ist es nah, doch für uns ist es weit,
zu weit, um zu ihnen zu kommen.”
― MichaelEnde, The Neverending Story

“Spiritual but not religious,” Zachary clarifies. He doesn’t say what he is thinking, which is that his church is held-breath story listening and late-night-concert ear-ringing rapture and perfect-boss fight-button pressing. That his religion is buried in the silence of freshly fallen snow, in a carefully crafted cocktail, in between the pages of a book somewhere after the beginning but before the ending.”
― Erin Morgenstern, The Starless Sea