Quotes about trees

„I want to do with you what spring does with cherry trees.“

—  Pablo Neruda, book Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair

Quiero hacer contigo lo que la primavera hace con los cerezos.
"Every Day You Play" (Juegas Todos las Días), XIV, p. 35.
Variant: I want
To do with you what spring does with the cherry trees.
Source: Veinte Poemas de Amor y una Canción Desesperada (Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair) (1924)

„And before the stars were born.
The greatest gift you can offer anyone is their complete freedom.
Freedom to love, to laugh, to cry, to feel scared, angry, insecure, full of doubt or full of joy.
To hold them in that safe and sacred space.
You don't exist to make anyone else happy.
But you can be present.
Present to their unhappiness, their excitement.
Present to the life that moves in them.
And you can invite them to a deeper Happiness.
The Happiness of Being itself.
The Happiness that holds them exactly as they are.
The way you hold them now.
The way the ground holds the flowers, the trees, the great mountain ranges.
The way you were held as a little one.
And before the stars were born.“

—  Джефф Фостер American basketball player 1977

„The importance of oaks both in the economy and in the forest ecosystem is big, but the exceptional part is that this tree plays in the old beliefs and legends.“

—  Marek Żukow-Karczewski Polish historian, journalist and opinion journalist 1961

Oak - the king of the Polish trees, "Aura" 9, 1988-09, p. 20-21. http://yadda.icm.edu.pl/yadda/element/bwmeta1.element.agro-72dccf88-5430-4d92-8617-9f550865d9b9?q=1dac2329-67be-4b51-b5b3-4554b1ebe953$15&qt=IN_PAGE

„If melodiously piping flutes sprang from the olive, would you doubt that a knowledge of flute-playing resided in the olive? And what if plane trees bore harps which gave forth rhythmical sounds? Clearly you would think in the same way that the art of music was possessed by plane trees. Why, then, seeing that the universe gives birth to beings that are animate and wise, should it not be considered animate and wise itself?“

—  Zeno of Citium ancient Greek philosopher -334 - -263 BC

As quoted in De Natura Deorum by Cicero, ii. 8.

„Trees that are slow to grow bear the best fruit.“

—  Molière French playwright and actor 1622 - 1673

„There is something about spending Christmas alone, naked, sitting by the Christmas tree gripping a shotgun, that lets you know your life is spinning dangerously outta control.“

—  Nikki Sixx American musician 1958

Source: The Heroin Diaries: A Year In The Life Of A Shattered Rock Star

„Everything we look at disperses and vanishes. doesn't it? Nature is always the same, and yet its appearance is always changing... Painting must give us the flavour of nature’s eternity. Everything, you understand. So I join together nature's straying hands.... From all sides, here there and everywhere, I select colours, tones and shades; I set them down, I bring them together.... They make lines, they become objects – rocks, trees – without my thinking about them.... But if there is the slightest distraction, the slightest hitch, above all if I interpret too much one day, if I'm carried away today by a theory which contradicts yesterday's, if I think while I'm painting, if I meddle, then woosh!, everything goes to pieces.“

—  Paul Cézanne French painter 1839 - 1906

Source: Quotes of Paul Cezanne, after 1900, p. 148, in: 'What he told me – I. The motif'

„Imitate the oak trees, stripped naked by the dark winter frost; who recover in the spring to resemble a powerful towering statue of emerald; and relate to its origin, consisting of soil, clouds, and dead plants.“

—  RJ Intindola (Gandolfo)

1979

„Is there some particular reason that you're here?"…
"Not this again."
"Not what again?" said Clary.
"Every time I annoy him, he retreats into his No Mundanes Allowed tree house." Simon pointed at Jace.“

—  Cassandra Clare, book City of Ashes

Source: City of Ashes

„Learning is to a man as the leaves and branches are to a tree, and it can be said that he should not be without it. Learning is not only reading books, however, but is rather something that we study to integrate with our own way of life.
One who is born into the house of a warrior, regardless of his rank or class, first acquaints himself with a man of military feats and achievements in loyalty, and, listening to just one of his dictums each day, will in a month know 30 precepts. Needless to say, if in a year he learns 300 precepts, at the end of that time he will be much the better.
Thus, a man can divide his mind into three parts: he should throw out those thoughts that are evil, take up those ideas that are good, and become intimate with his own wisdom… I would honor and call wise the man who penetrates this principle, though he lacks the knowledge of a single Chinese character. As for those who are learned in other matters, I would avoid them regardless of how deep their knowledge might be. That is how shallow and untalented this monk is.“

—  Takeda Shingen Japanese daimyo of the Sengoku period 1521 - 1573

William Scott Wilson, ‎Gregory Lee. Ideals of the Samurai: Writings of Japanese Warriors, 1982. p 95

„Spring: trees flying up to their birds“

—  Paul Celan Romanian poet and translator 1920 - 1970

„If only, if only," the woodpecker sighs,
"The bark on the tree was as soft as the skies."
While the wolf waits below, hungry and lonely,
Crying to the moo-oo-oon,
"If only, If only.“

—  Louis Sachar, book Holes

Source: Holes

„I'm trying to remember what I felt about a certain cypress tree and I feel if I remember it, it will last me quite a long life.“

—  Joan Mitchell American painter 1925 - 1992

In 'Art News', April 1965, p. 63; as quoted in in The Paintings of Joan Mitchel, ed. Jane Livingstone, Joan Mitchell, Linda Nochlin, p. 26
1950 - 1975

„If I am going to be drowned — if I am going to be drowned — if I am going to be drowned, why, in the name of the seven mad gods, who rule the sea, was I allowed to come thus far and contemplate sand and trees?“

—  Stephen Crane, book The Open Boat

Pt. VI
The Open Boat (1894)
Source: The Open Boat and Other Stories

„Each flower her son, and every tree her daughter.“

—  Vita Sackville-West English writer and gardener 1892 - 1962

"The Island", in Bulletin of the Garden Club of America (1929), p. 1, also in Collected Poems (1934), p. 54
Context: She walks among the loveliness she made,
Between the apple-blossom and the water—
She walks among the patterned pied brocade,
Each flower her son, and every tree her daughter.

„There's nothing wrong with having a tree as a friend.“

—  Bob Ross American painter, art instructor, and television host 1942 - 1995

„Jnana marga is like Ramphal. Bhakthi marga is like Sitaphal (custart apple), easy to deal with and very sweet. The pulp of Ramphal is inside and difficult to get at. Ramphal should ripen on the tree and plucked ripe, If it falls down it is spoilt. So if a Jnani falls, he is ruined. Even for a Jnani there is the danger of a fall, i. e., by a little negligence or carelessness.“

—  Sai Baba of Shirdi Hindu and muslim saint 1835 - 1918

Sources

„A fool sees not the same tree that a wise man sees.“

—  William Blake English Romantic poet and artist 1757 - 1827

„If the Olive Trees knew the hands that planted them, Their Oil would become Tears.“

—  Mahmoud Darwich Palestinian writer 1941 - 2008