Oliver Wendell Holmes

Famous quotes containing the words oliver wendell holmes, wendell holmes, oliver wendell, oliver and/or wendell:

    And if I should live to be
    The last leaf upon the tree
    In the spring,
    Let them smile, as I do now,
    At the old forsaken bough
    Where I cling.
    Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809–1894)

    Alas for those two loving ones! she waked not from her swound,
    And he was taken with the cramp, and in the waves was drowned;
    But Fate has metamorphosed them, in pity of their woe,
    And now they keep an oyster-shop for mermaids down below.
    —Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809–1894)

    People that make puns are like wanton boys that put coppers on the railroad tracks. They amuse themselves and other children but their little trick may upset a freight train of conversation for the sake of a battered witticism.
    Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809–1894)

    the hatchlings wake in the swaying branches,
    in the silver baskets,
    and love the world.
    Is it necessary to say any more?
    Have you heard them singing in the wind, above the final fields?
    Have you ever been so happy in your life?
    —Mary Oliver (b. 1935)

    What a comfort a dull but kindly person is, to be sure, at times! A ground-glass shade over a gas-lamp does not bring more solace to our dazzled eyes than such a one to our minds.
    —Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809–1894)