Left ear, I wear four earrings. The four is symbolic of the four seasons, spring, winter, summer and fall, the four directions, north, east, south and west, the four gospel writers, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.

Every summer’s mine.

Long stormy spring-time, wet contentious April, winter chilling the lap of very May; but at length the season of summer does come.

It was one of those March days when the sun shines hot and the wind blows cold: when it is summer in the light, and winter in the shade.

I have been influenced in my thinking by both west and east.

In the spring, at the end of the day, you should smell like dirt.

In most cases, my visits to the West are for promotion of human values and religious harmony.

Because I could not stop for death, He kindly stopped for me; The carriage held but just ourselves and immortality.

It is only the farmer who faithfully plants seeds in the Spring, who reaps a harvest in the Autumn.

A cat is only itself, representative of the strong forces of life that won’t let go.

Italy, and the spring and first love all together should suffice to make the gloomiest person happy.

Tears of joy are like the summer rain drops pierced by sunbeams.

I am proud to have been born in Iowa. Through the eyes of a ten-year-old boy, it was a place of adventure and daily discoveries – the wonder of the growing crops, the excitements of the harvest, the journeys to the woods for nuts and hunting, the joys of snowy winters, the comfort of the family fireside, of good food and tender care.

The desire of excessive power caused the angels to fall; the desire of knowledge caused men to fall.

There is much to support the view that it is clothes that wear us, and not we, them; we may make them take the mould of arm or breast, but they mould our hearts, our brains, our tongues to their liking.

Mysticism is the mistake of an accidental and individual symbol for an universal one.

I always knew from that moment, from the time I found myself at home in that little segregated library in the South, all the way up until I walked up the steps of the New York City library, I always felt, in any town, if I can get to a library, I’ll be OK. It really helped me as a child, and that never left me.

Every natural fact is a symbol of some spiritual fact.

I didn’t go to school for a full year until I was 12. In the summer I was a wild child in the woods, with no shoes, and in the fall it was back to the city, shoe shops and school.

When my ancestors came from Africa, they were shackled by our neck, our wrists, and our ankles in steel chains. I’ve turned those steel chains into gold to symbolize the fact that I’m still a slave, only my price tag is higher.

Cynicism is something which has become symbolic of imperial policy.

Men shut their doors against a setting sun.

You can’t get too much winter in the winter.

Words are but symbols for the relations of things to one another and to us; nowhere do they touch upon absolute truth.

In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage.

The bluebird carries the sky on his back.

One of the triumphs of the Civil Rights Movement is that when you travel through the South today, you do not feel overwhelmed by a residue of grievance and hate.

Now is the winter of our discontent.

The practice of politics in the East may be defined by one word: dissimulation.

I would never want to be a member of a group whose symbol was a guy nailed to two pieces of wood.

I love tattoos. And mine symbolise who I really am. I have a Samurai on my left arm. At a subconscious level, I connect to this warrior and model myself on his discipline, skills and honour. There is also a tribal tattoo and a Chinese symbol of faith. I have seen a lot of people getting tattoos just because it’s a trend.

So comes snow after fire, and even dragons have their ending!

A black cat crossing your path signifies that the animal is going somewhere.

In the depth of winter I finally learned that there was in me an invincible summer.

The tradition of the South is not urban… I think we are a region of storytellers, naturally, just from our tribal instincts. We did not have the pleasures of the theater or the dance, motion pictures when they came along. We simply entertain each other by talking.

That summer after the draft was probably the most fun I’ve ever had, because all I had to do every day was wake up and go work out for four or five hours. I got to play some golf, which I love to do, too, and then got to hang out with my family.

When you say, ‚I spent my summers at the Jersey Shore,‘ people always say, ‚Oh, really?‘ They think of the TV show. So I just say, ‚A cute little harbor town in New Jersey.‘

Falsehood is a perennial spring.

One strength of the communist system of the East is that it has some of the character of a religion and inspires the emotions of a religion.

Either the opponents of slavery will arrest the further spread of it and place it where the public mind shall rest in the belief that it is in course of ultimate extinction, or its advocates will push it forward, till it shall become alike lawful in all the States – old as well as new – North as well as South.

Black people comprehend the South. We understand its weight. It has rested on our backs… I knew that my heart would break if ever I put my foot down on that soil, moist, still, with old hurts. I had to face the fear/loathing at its source or it would consume me whole.

Poland is not East or West. Poland is at the center of European civilization. It has contributed mightily to that civilization. It is doing so today by being magnificently unreconciled to oppression.

It seems that it had been destined before that I should occupy myself so thoroughly with the vulture, for it comes to my mind as a very early memory, when I was still in the cradle, a vulture came down to me, he opened my mouth with his tail and struck me a few times with his tail against my lips.

I love the scents of winter! For me, it’s all about the feeling you get when you smell pumpkin spice, cinnamon, nutmeg, gingerbread and spruce.

Putin goes to bed at night knowing he can break all the rules, and the West will follow all the rules.

In many ways, September feels like the busiest time of the year: The kids go back to school, work piles up after the summer’s dog days, and Thanksgiving is suddenly upon us.

Some rise by sin, and some by virtue fall.

The attitude of the West and of Russia towards a crisis like Ukraine is diametrically different. The West is trying to establish the legality of any established border. For Russia, Ukraine is part of the Russian patrimony.

All art is at once surface and symbol. Those who go beneath the surface do so at their peril. Those who read the symbol do so at their peril. It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors. Diversity of opinion about a work of art shows that the work is new, complex and vital.

Romania, which had the worst dictator in Eastern Europe, Ceausescu, he was a darling of the West. The United States and Britain loved him. He was supported until the last minute.

In too much of the West, everyone wants the guarantee of safety, and never having to make any decisions.

Some of the most moving experiences I’ve had are just in black churches in the South, during the Civil Rights Movement, where people were getting beaten, killed, really struggling for the most elementary rights.

If you saw a heat wave, would you wave back?

The symbolism of the climate strike is that if you adults don’t give a damn about my future, I won’t either.

When my dad founded our church, he used either a globe or a map of the world behind him. It was symbolic of what Christ said: to go forth and preach hope to the world. We believe in the cross, but we just continued with the globe.

The only thing that could spoil a day was people. People were always the limiters of happiness except for the very few that were as good as spring itself.

Ritual will always mean throwing away something: destroying our corn or wine upon the altar of our gods.

I noticed words crudely spray-painted upon the wall, perhaps by a young Berliner: ‚This wall will fall. Beliefs become reality.‘ Yes, across Europe, this wall will fall. For it cannot withstand faith; it cannot withstand truth. The wall cannot withstand freedom.

There is hopeful symbolism in the fact that flags do not wave in a vacuum.

I don’t like allegories.

I think, in many people’s minds, the Confederate battle flag is not only a memorial to our ancestors, which is perfectly OK, but also a symbol of white superiority and an inclination for people to believe that even slavery would’ve been OK.