“A small clear fountain, with green willow trees;
Girdling it round, there is one single spot
Where you may sit and rest, its only bank;”

“All a green willow, willow,
All a green willow is my garland.”

“To put a girdle round about the world.”

“Beyond are greens where pink chestnuts, may trees and copper beeches flaunt themselves gaily.”

“I sit, I read, I listen to music, I go or a walk, I ride to Prospect Park and sit under the Willow Tree, I remember, I forget, I look at pictures, I do, I do, I do… or I don't, but its peaceful… only me… no worries.”

“On a tree by a river a little tomtit
Sang "Willow, titwillow, titwillow"
And I said to him, "Dicky-bird, why do you sit
Singing ‘Willow, titwillow, titwillow?'.
"Is it weakness of intellect, birdie?" I cried,
"Or a rather tough worm in your little inside?"”

“We like rather to dream of a body of young men as a live thing, as a tree where all the branches are nourished by a single sap, and where each part is meaningless and incomplete except in connection with its fellows. You may lop away the dead branches, you may bend the trunk, you may dig about it and water it; but leave it to assume its own form, do not constrain the peculiar roots, or you will have a crippled, gnarled monster, and no tree.”

“There is an art in taking the whiplash of suffering full in the face, an art you must learn. Let each single attack exhaust itself; pain always makes single attacks, so that its bite may be more intense, more concentrated. And you, while its fangs are implanted and injecting their venom at one spot, do not forget to offer it another place where it can bite you, and so relieve the pain of the first.”

“I find it hard to sit still in one spot, and impossible to sit still in two spots.”

“On a tree by a river a little tomtit
Sang "Willow, titwillow, titwillow"
And I said to him, "Dicky-bird, why do you sit
Singing ‘Willow, titwillow, titwillow?'.
"Is it weakness of intellect, birdie?" I cried,
"Or a rather tough worm in your little inside?"
With a shake of his poor little head he replied,
"Oh, Willow, titwillow, titwillow!"”