“Nature repairs her ravages, but not all. The uptorn trees are not rooted again; the parted hills are left scarred; if there is a new growth, the trees are not the same as the old, and the hills underneath their green vesture bear the marks of the past rending. To the eyes that have dwelt on the past, there is no thorough repair.”

“These scars bear witness but whether to repair or to destruction I no longer know.”

“To repair the irreparable ravages of time.”

“To be international, you have to first be local. … When you take a tree that is rooted in the ground, and transfer it from one place to another, the tree will no longer bear fruit. And if it does, the fruit will not be as good as it was in its original place. This is a rule of nature. I think if I had left my country, I would be the same as the tree.”

“As the mist leaves no scar
On the dark green hill
So my body leaves no scar
On you and never will”

“Now fields are green, and trees bear silver buds.”

“Before the gods and after, always, are the streams. Caves, stones, hills. Trees. The earth. The darkness of the earth.”

“I moved to New England partly because it has a real literary past. The ghosts of Hawthorne and Melville still sit on those green hills. The worship of Mammon is also somewhat lessened there by the spirit of irony. I don't get hay fever in New England either.”

“There came to the beach a poor exile of Erin,
The dew on his thin robe was heavy and chill;
For his country he sigh'd, when at twilight repairing
To wander alone by the wind-beaten hill.”

“I am a mighty Garage,
On the corner of the Square,
And it is all my pleasure,
To provide a quick repair,
Or I can do your service,
In the blinking of an eye,
I wouldn't say it's thorough,
But it'll get you by.”