“At the temple there is a poem called "Loss" carved into the stone. It has three words, but the poet has scratched them out. You cannot read loss, only feel it.”

“If you cannot be a poet, be the poem.”

“I think that the loss of the house call has been the biggest blow to the art of medicine in this century. Not only has the patient lost this precious attention, but the physician has not found a replacement for the lost intimacy.”

“Everyone has wins and losses within the realm of love. However, sometimes a win becomes a loss, and most of the time, a loss becomes a win. But neither are ever absolute.”

“If your house has Cold Mountain poems
They are better for you than sutras
Hang them up where you can see them
Read them and read them again”

“Every sickness has an alien quality, a feeling of invasion and loss of control that is evident in the language we use about it.”

“Every generation of Americans since has had to reenact the loss of our innocence. Smog over L. A. was the loss of our innocence. Vietnam was the loss of our innocence. Gettysburg was the loss of our innocence. Ingrid Bergman’s baby was the loss of our innocence. Oklahoma City was the loss of our innocence. The World Trade Center was the loss of our innocence. Other nations are cynical. America has preferred the child’s game of “discovering” evil—Europe’s or Asia’s, her grandfather’s, even her own.”

“Every time you don't follow your inner guidance, you feel a loss of energy, loss of power, a sense of spiritual sadness.”

“Nothing on earth can make up for the loss of one who has loved you.”

“Yet the stones remain less real to those who cannot
name them, or read the mute syllables graven in silica.
To see a red stone is less than seeing it as jasper —
metamorphic quartz, cousin to the flint the Kiowa
carved as arrowheads. To name is to know and remember.”