“Deep summer is when laziness finds respectability.”

“Night came—the deep and purple time
Of summer in a southern clime.”

“When people do not respect us we are sharply offended; yet deep down in his private heart no man much respects himself.”

“When a person can’t find a deep sense of meaning, they distract themselves with pleasure.”

“The first thing I ever noticed about Miss Lyon was her incredible laziness. Laziness was my own specialty, & I did not like this competition. Dear me, I was to find out, in the course of time, that in the matter of laziness I was a runaway train on a down grade & she a-standing still. At my very laziest I could hear myself whiz, when she was around.”

“It’s funny how one summer can change everything. It must be something about the heat and the smell of chlorine, fresh-cut grass and honeysuckle, asphalt sizzling after late-day thunderstorms, the steam rising while everything drips around it. Something about long, lazy days and whirring air conditioners and bright plastic flip-flops from the drugstore thwacking down the street. Something about fall being so close, another year, another Christmas, another beginning. So much in one summer, stirring up like the storms that crest at the end of each day, blowing out all the heat and dirt to leave everything gasping and cool. Everyone can reach back to one summer and lay a finger to it, finding the exact point when everything changed. That summer was mine.”

“It's rainin' but there ain't a cloud in the sky;
Musta been a tear from your eye.
Everything'll be okay.
Funny, thought I felt a sweet summer breeze;
Musta been you sighin' so deep.
Don't worry we're gonna find a way.”

“In the midst of winter, I find within me the invisible summer…”

“It's a fact that people are afraid of what they don't understand. And most are too lazy or ignorant to find out more.”

“Up down / on summer's lake / the flying ant / finds a wall in the air”