DEATH QUOTES XVII

quotations about death

Leap through the Mystery of death as the circus-rider leaps through the papered hoop ... find Life ambling along beneath us on the Other Side?

SIDNEY LANIER

Songs Against Death


The only religious way to think of death is as part and parcel of life; to regard it, with the understanding and the emotions, as the the inviolable condition of life.

THOMAS MANN

The Magic Mountain


Death is a great revealer of what is in a man, and in its solemn shadow appear the naked lineaments of the soul.

E. H. CHAPIN

Living Words


Far happier he, who, young and full of pride
And radiant with the glory of the sun,
Leaves earth before his singing time is done.
All wounds of Time the graveyard flowers hide,
His beauty lives, as fresh as when he died.

JOYCE KILMER

"The Clouded Sun"


How terrible is Death to one man, yet to another it appears the greatest providence in nature; even to all ages and conditions it is the wish of some, relief of many, and the end of all. It puts us all upon a level; the prince and peasant are doomed to the same fate.

WELLINS CALCOTT

Thoughts Moral and Divine


As death, when we come to consider it closely, is the true goal of our existence, I have formed during the last few years such close relationships with this best and truest friend of mankind that death's image is not only no longer terrifying to me, but is indeed very soothing and consoling, and I thank my God for graciously granting me the opportunity...of learning that death is the key which unlocks the door to our true happiness. I never lie down at night without reflecting that --- young as I am -- I may not live to see another day. Yet no one of all my acquaintances could say that in company I am morose or disgruntled.

WOLFGANG AMADEUS MOZART

letter to Leopold Mozart, Apr. 4, 1787


Scientists have proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that there is life after death -- though they say it's virtually impossible to get decent Chinese food.

DAVID LETTERMAN

Late Show with David Letterman, October 13, 2014


In statistics, what disappears behind rows of numbers is death.

GUNTER GRASS

Crabwalk


Perhaps the whole root of our trouble, the human trouble, is that we will sacrifice all the beauty of our lives, will imprison ourselves in totems, taboos, crosses, blood sacrifices, steeples, mosques, races, armies, flags, nations, in order to deny the fact of death, which is the only fact we have.

JAMES BALDWIN

"Letter from a Region of My Mind", The New Yorker, November 17, 1962


Death makes angels of us all
& gives us wings
where we had shoulders
smooth as raven's
claws

JIM MORRISON

An American Prayer


Obituaries would be a lot more interesting if they told you how the person died.

MACKEY MILLER

Mouse Attack 5!!!


Sweet lovely death
I am waiting for your breath
Come sweet death, one last caress

METALLICA

"Last Caress"


When you look at a corpse you can always sense your own breath better.

ZONA GALE

"Miggy"


Oh! that "eternal shore,"
When Death shall be no more!
How widely differing from this mortal state,
Where we but draw our earliest breath
To yield it up again in death,
Obedient to the unchanging laws of fate!

ANNE S. BUSHBY

"Easter Morning"


When a great life sets it leaves an afterglow on the sky far into the night.

AUSTIN O'MALLEY

Keystones of Thought


Men believe death's elections to be a thing inscrutable yet every act invites the act which follows and to the extent that men put one foot before the other they are accomplices in their own deaths as in all such facts of destiny.

CORMAC MCCARTHY

The Crossing


Death is simply the soul's change of residence.

ELIZA COOK

Diamond Dust


Death is a Dialogue between
The Spirit and the Dust.

EMILY DICKINSON

"Death is a Dialogue"


Alone in a room
needless I sit
I close my eyes
and try to forget
Death is calling
get in line

JAY REATARD

"Death Is Forming", Blood Visions


We give our dead
To the orchards
And the groves.
We give our dead
To life.

OCTAVIA E. BUTLER

Parable of the Talents