Quotes about lawn (81 quotes) | Quotes of famous people

“Because in the end, you won’t remember the time you spent working in the office or mowing your lawn. Climb that goddamn mountain.”

Jack Kerouac (1922–1969) American writer

Sometimes credited to Jack Kerouac, from his book The Dharma Bums. It is not a quote by Kerouac. It first appeared as a very brief description of The Dharma Bums in Esquire's list of "The 80 Best Books Every Man Should Read" in 2010: http://www.esquire.com/entertainment/books/g96/80-books/?slide=71. It was later copied by Kilburn Hall in his list of 30 "Books and Authors Every Man Should Read" which he first posted online in 2012: https://kilburnhall.wordpress.com/2012/03/17/the-books-and-authors-every-man-should-read/
Misattributed

Mountain , Time

“Summer is the season of motion, winter is the season of form. In summer everything moves save the fixed and inert. Down the hill flows the west wind, making wavelets in the shorter grass and great billows in the standing hay; the tree in full leaf sways its heavy boughs below and tosses its leaves above; the weed by the gate bends and turns when the wind blows down the road. It is the shadow of moving things that we usually see, and the shadows are themselves in motion. The shadow of a branch, speckled through with light, wavers across the lawn, the sprawling shadow of the weed moves and sways across the dust.”

Henry Beston (1888–1968) American writer

Source: The Northern Farm: A Glorious Year on a Small Maine Farm

Tree , Light , Grass , Winter

“Did you ever think that in a past life Alec was an old woman with ninety cats who was always yelling at the neighborhood kids to get off her lawn? Because I do”

Cassandra Clare book City of Glass

Source: City of Glass

Life , Cats , Thinking , Past

“Bran was stripping her futon down to the bare mattress when she entered her apartment. It was sort of like watching the president mowing the White House lawn or taking out the trash.”

Patricia Briggs book Cry Wolf

Source: Cry Wolf

Housing

“Death is a process as straightforward as mowing a lawn.”

Antonella Gambotto-Burke book The Eclipse: A Memoir of Suicide

Source: The Eclipse: A Memoir of Suicide (2004), P. 188.

Death

“What do you think it is?"
"It could be anything from a lawn trimmer to a bomb, for all I know."
"I would never build a lawn trimmer," Myrnin said. "What did the lawn ever do to me?”

Rachel Caine (1962) American writer

Source: Ghost Town

Thinking

“They’re a rotten crowd’, I shouted across the lawn. ‘You’re worth the whole damn bunch put together.”

F. Scott Fitzgerald The Great Gatsby

Variant: They're a rotten lot," I shouted, across the lawn. "You're worth the whole damn bunch put together.
Source: The Great Gatsby

“We don't really believe in mowing the lawn; we do it only to avoid unnecessary engagement with the neighbors.”

Miranda July (1974) American performance artist, musician and writer

Source: No One Belongs Here More Than You

“I just listened to the music, and breathed in the day, and remembered things. Things like walking around the neighborhood and looking at the houses and the lawns and the colorful trees and having that be enough.”

Stephen Chbosky book The Perks of Being a Wallflower

Source: The Perks of Being a Wallflower

Music , Color , Tree , Housing

“The sky was electric blue above the trees but the yard felt dark. Stephanie went to the edge of the lawn and sat her forehead on her knees. The grass and soil were still warm from the day. She wanted to cry but she couldn't. The feeling was too deep.”

Jennifer Egan A Visit from the Goon Squad

Source: A Visit from the Goon Squad

Feeling , Tree , Grass , Cry

“Myst hasn't returned yet, But you know that, or else you'd both be naked and fornicating on the front lawn"
"The night's young. Give us time, and it was a field a mile away."

A Valkyrie and Nikolai Wroth pg 322”

Kresley Cole book A Hunger Like No Other

Source: A Hunger Like No Other

Time , Night

“I’m having a hard time writing about Sunday. Getting the long hollow feeling of Sundays. No mail and faraway lawn mowers, the hopelessness.”

Lucia Berlin (1936–2004) American writer

Source: A Manual for Cleaning Women: Selected Stories

Feeling , Time

“They kind of look like evil lawn gnomes”

Cassandra Clare book City of Fallen Angels

Source: City of Fallen Angels

Evil

“Could you please put this--could you all put these--could you get dressed, please?"
The woman only bestowed a serene smile on me. "We are as the Goddess requires."
"The Goddess requires you to be naked on my lawn?”

Kelley Armstrong book Dime Store Magic

Source: Dime Store Magic

Smile

“Someone can break your heart, leave you dead on the lawn, and still you never learn what to say to stop it all over again.”

Daniel Handler book Adverbs

Source: Adverbs

Learning , Heart , Dead , Sad

“He wore his happiness like a mask and the girl had run off across the lawn with the mask and there was no way of going to knock on her door and ask for it back.”

Ray Bradbury book Fahrenheit 451

Source: Fahrenheit 451

Way , Girl , Happiness

“Men throw huge shadows on the lawn, don't they? Then, all their lives, they try to run to fit the shadows. But the shadows are always longer.”

Ray Bradbury (1920–2012) American writer

Source: I Sing the Body Electric! & Other Stories

Men

“My bodyguard was mowing the lawn in a pink bikini when the body fell from the sky.”

Charlaine Harris (1951) American writer

Source: Dead Over Heels

“I would never build a lawn trimmer," Myrnin said. "What did the lawn ever do to me?”

Rachel Caine (1962) American writer

Source: Ghost Town

“Grow the lawn and mow the lawn
always keep the TV on,
brush your teeth and kill the germs,
poison apples, poison worms.”

Trenton Lee Stewart The Mysterious Benedict Society

Source: The Mysterious Benedict Society

“This is the archetypal suburban-conservative nightmare — anonymous hordes of leftist boat-rockers viciously assaulting the champion of the decent people, who is just a really nice guy given to tending his lawn and minding his own business. Being "nice" is a central part of the Brooks yuppie's guilt-proofing self-image rationale; so long as you're the kind of guy who lets people merge on highways, stands politely in line at Starbucks, doesn't put garish Christmas decorations on his lawn and pays his taxes, you're not really doing anything wrong. It gets a little tiring after a while, hearing people who vote for wars tell you how nice they are.”

Matt Taibbi (1970) author and journalist

"David Brooks and the DLC: Best Friends Forever?", AlterNet (3 August 2006)

War , People , Guy , Business

“The crowd of ragged Confederates on the White House lawn had doubled and more since he went in to confer with Lincoln. The trees were full of men who had climbed up so they could see over their comrades. Off in the distance, cannon occasionally still thundered; rifles popped like firecrackers. Lee quietly said to Lincoln, "Will you send out your sentries under flag of truce to bring word of the armistice to those Federal positions still firing upon my men?" "I'll see to it," Lincoln promised. He pointed to the soldiers in gray, who had quieted expectantly when Lee came out. "Looks like you've given me sentries enough, even if their coats are the wrong color." Few men could have joked so with their cause in ruins around them. Respecting the Federal President for his composure, Lee raised his voice: "Soldiers of the Army of Northern Virginia, after three years of arduous service, we have achieved that for which we took up arms-" He got no further. With one voice, the men before him screamed out their joy and relief. The unending waves of noise beat at him like a surf from a stormy sea. Battered forage caps and slouch hats flew through the air. Soldiers jumped up and down, pounded on one another's shoulders, danced in clumsy rings, kissed each other's bearded, filthy faces. Lee felt his own eyes grow moist. At last the magnitude of what he had won began to sink in.”

Harry Turtledove book The Guns of the South

Source: The Guns of the South (1992), p. 180

Men , Color , Kiss , Tree

“Does he really want to step into the ring with best fighter of this era and embarrass himself? Being the coward that he is, I doubt he'll get in the ring. We'll see what his excuse will be this time… When I retire, I'll get Ricky Hatton to wash my clothes and cut my lawn and buckle my shoes.”

Floyd Mayweather Jr. (1977) American boxer

About Ricky Hatton, as quoted in BBC http://news2.thdo.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/boxing/6328555.stm.

Shoe , Time , Clothes

“What for? I don't go to the Daisy or any of that. We don't give parties under a striped awning out over the lawn for two hundred people, four of whom we like.”

Brian Keith (1921–1997) actor

PhotoplayMagazine.com
Brian Keith on his handsomeness

People

“Men love women because they are the loveliest things on God's earth. Women love men because chocolate can't mow the lawn. Some men prefer to love other men. Equally, some women prefer to love other women. There is a word to describe this kind of behaviour. Love.”

Guy Browning (1964) British comedian

How to... Love, Never Hit a Jellyfish with a Spade: How to Survive Life’s Smaller Challenges (2004).

Love , Women , Men , God

“And that was as far as he got before i heard it. The thumping of footsteps, running up the lawn toward me: It seemed like I could hear it through the grass, like leaning your ear to a railroad track and feeling the train coming, miles away. As the noise got closer I could hear ragged breaths, and then a voice.”

Sarah Dessen book Dreamland

Dreamland (2000)

Feeling , Grass , Training

“Insects were scurrying about in the shade cast by the grass, and the lawn was a huge monotonous forest of thousands of little green blades, all equal, all alike, hiding the world from each other. Anguished, she thought, "I don't want to be just another blade of grass."”

Simone de Beauvoir (1908–1986) French writer, intellectual, existentialist philosopher, political activist, feminist, and social theorist

Regina
All Men are Mortal (1946)

World , Grass

“You too will marry a boy I choose,' said Mrs Rupa Mehra firmly to her younger daughter. Lata avoided the maternal imperative by looking around the great lamp-lit garden of Prem Nivas. The wedding-guests were gathered on the lawn. 'Hmm,' she said. This annoyed her mother further.”

Vikram Seth A Suitable Boy

A Suitable Boy (1993)

Boy , Wedding , Maternity , Daughters

“I care not, Fortune, what you me deny;
You cannot rob me of free Nature's grace,
You cannot shut the windows of the sky,
Through which Aurora shows her brightening face;
You cannot bar my constant feet to trace
The woods and lawns, by living stream, at eve.
Let health my nerves and finer fibres brace,
And I their toys to the great children leave:
Of fancy, reason, virtue, naught can me bereave.”

James Thomson (poet) The Castle of Indolence

Canto II, Stanza 3.
The Castle of Indolence (1748)

Children , Health , Nature

“Good luck distinguishing which sign is the REAL sign when my entire front lawn is covered with thousands of little green signs - each with a different number! Ahahahah! I'll be EVERY address in the whole freakin' township! And what are you gonna do about it? Hopefully, NOTHING!”

Ryan North (1980) Canadian webcomic writer and programmer

E-mail to city hall http://www.insaneabode.com/Polls/cityhall.html

“My men, like satyrs grazing on the lawns,
Shall with their goat feet dance the antic hay.”

Christopher Marlowe (1564–1593) English dramatist, poet and translator

Gaveston, Act I, scene i, lines 57–58
Edward II (c. 1592)

Men , Dance

“You think it a great triumph to make the sun draw brown landscapes for you! That was also a discovery, and some day may be useful. But the sun had drawn landscapes before for you, not in brown, but in green, and blue, and all imaginable colours, here in England. Not one of you ever looked at them, then; not one of you cares for the loss of them, now, when you have shut the sun out with smoke, so that he can draw nothing more, except brown blots through a hole in a box. There was a rocky valley between Buxton and Bakewell, once upon a time, divine as the vale of Tempe; you might have seen the Gods there morning and evening, — Apollo and all the sweet Muses of the Light — walking in fair procession on the lawns of it, and to and fro among the pinnacles of its crags. You cared neither for Gods nor grass, but for cash (which you did not know the way to get); you thought you could get it by what the Times calls "Railroad Enterprise." You Enterprised a Railroad through the valley — you blasted its rocks away, heaped thousands of tons of shale into its lovely stream. The valley is gone, and the gods with it; and now, every fool in Buxton can be at Bakewell in half-an-hour, and every fool in Bakewell at Buxton; which you think a lucrative process of exchange — you Fools Everywhere.”

John Ruskin book Fors Clavigera

Fors Clavigera, letter v (1 May 1871).
Fors Clavigera (1871-1878 and 1880-1884)

Love , God , Fools , Way

“We celebrated a little early at the White House this year, on quatro de Mayo, with a fiesta on the South Lawn. With the mariachi music, folklorika dancing and an ample supply of Mexican food. For a little while, it was just like being in Texas again.”

George W. Bush (1946) 43rd President of the United States

2000s, 2001, Radio address (May 2001)

Food , Music , Dance , Housing

“When I retire, I'll get Ricky Hatton to wash my clothes and cut my lawn and buckle my shoes.”

Ricky Hatton (1978) English former professional boxer

Floyd Mayweather Jr talking the talk http://news2.thdo.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/boxing/6328555.stm
Other boxers on Ricky(Sourced)

Shoe , Clothes

“"I do thank Lord Palmerston for his good offices," he said, "but, as we deny there is any such thing as the government of the Confederate States, Earl Russell can't very well mediate between them and us." Lord Lyons sighed. "You say this, Mr. President, with the Army of Northern Virginia encamped in Philadelphia?" "I would say it, sir, if that Army were encamped on the front lawn of the White House," Lincoln replied.”

Harry Turtledove book The Great War: American Front

Source: The Great War: American Front (1998), p. 6

Housing

“If you don't have a date
Celebrate
Go out and sit on the lawn
And do nothing
'Cause it's just what you must do
Nobody does it anymore.”

Fiona Apple (1977) singer-songwriter, musician

Waltz (Better Than Fine)
Song lyrics, Extraordinary Machine (2005)

“[T]he magician emerges from bed and we recount our tale. Her response lacks gratitude: stammering furiously, she chides us for the damage to her lawns and flowerbed. The boy is smacked; I am Spasmed; we both spend the day with nail-clippers attending to the damage to the garden.”

Jonathan Stroud (1970) British writer of fantasy fiction

After Bartimaeus and 'the boy' defeat enemies entering the yard.
The Bartimaeus Trilogy Official Website, Bart's Journal

Boy , Gratitude

“Colleges being nothing but grooming schools for the middleclass non-identity which usually finds its perfect expression on the outskirts of the campus in rows of well-to-do houses with lawns and television sets in each living room with everybody looking at the same thing and thinking the same thing at the same time while the Japhies of the world go prowling in the wilderness…”

Jack Kerouac book The Dharma Bums

The Dharma Bums (1958)

World , School , Thinking , Time

“Muslims still take their religion too seriously, whereas we have the good sense to blow it off. Catholics don’t follow the Pope. In overwhelming numbers they divorce, they have pre-marital sex, they masturbate. And unlike the Koran, no one here seriously considers following the Bible literally. Guys don't look over their fence on Sunday morning and see a neighbor mowing the lawn and think, "Working on Sunday? I really should kill him."… But, before I conclude, it should in fairness be noted that, in speaking of Muslims, we realize that of course the vast majority are law-abiding, loving people who just want to be left alone to subjugate their women in peace.”

Bill Maher (1956) American stand-up comedian

"The South Park Mohammad controversy" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RUEaMA4gRIk
Real Time with Bill Maher

Love , Women , People , Peace

“From a magician's midnight sleeve
the radio-singers
distribute all their love-songs
over the dew-wet lawns.”

Elizabeth Bishop (1911–1979) American poet

Poem: Late Air

Love

“Now, when our Lord was come to eighteen years,
The King commanded that there should be built
Three stately houses, one of hewn square beams
With cedar lining, warm for winter days;
One of veined marbles, cool for summer heat;
And one of burned bricks, with blue tiles bedecked,
Pleasant at seed-time, when the champaks bud--
Subha, Suramma, Ramma, were their names.
Delicious gardens round about them bloomed,
Streams wandered wild and musky thickets stretched,
With many a bright pavilion and fair lawn
In midst of which Siddartha strayed at will,
Some new delight provided every hour;
And happy hours he knew, for life was rich,
With youthful blood at quickest; yet still came
The shadows of his meditation back,
As the lake's silver dulls with driving clouds.”

Edwin Arnold book The Light of Asia

Book The Second.
The Light of Asia (1879)

Life , Youth , Winter , Time

“These drugs have side effects that go on for fuckin' days, like tendency-to-grow-another-head, oh my God! When we were growing up we knew the side effects of the drugs we were taking. Cocaine, side effects were paranoia, ninjas-on-the-lawn; quaaludes, side effects were talking in tongues, English as a second language; marijuana, side effects were laughter, Frosted Flakes.”

Robin Williams (1951–2014) American actor and stand-up comedian

Weapons of Self Destruction (2010)

God , Laughter , Marijuana

“The hounds are all fagged out after yesterday's Jehovah's Witnesses … we do not want more blood all over the lawns again”

Vivian Stanshall (1943–1995) English musician, artist and author

Sir Henry at Rawlinson End (1978)

“I enjoyed that interview. He's a guy who not only says what he means but backs it up, too. I'll never forget the night I interviewed him. It was a rainy night at his house in L. A. and I kept looking outside on the lawn. He had this big black Doberman he called Rommel, and it sat out there in the rain eating a chaise lounge.”

Arnold Hano (1922) American writer

On Deacon Jones, as quoted in "Loquacious Sportswriter: Arnold Hano Calls 'em as He Sees 'em in World of Sports"
Sports-related

Guy , Housing , Night , Forgetting

“Between the lines it must have hurt
To see the neighborhood go down,
Your neighbor in his undershirt
At dusk come out to mow his lawn.”

Donald Justice (1925–2004) Poet, teacher

To the Unknown Lady Who Wrote the Letters Found In the Hatbox
Night Light (1967)

Hurt

“Hostility towards Microsoft is not difficult to find on the Net, and it blends two strains: resentful people who feel Microsoft is too powerful, and disdainful people who think it's tacky. This is all strongly reminiscent of the heyday of Communism and Socialism, when the bourgeoisie were hated from both ends: by the proles, because they had all the money, and by the intelligentsia, because of their tendency to spend it on lawn ornaments. Microsoft is the very embodiment of modern high-tech prosperity — it is, in a word, bourgeois — and so it attracts all of the same gripes.”

Neal Stephenson (1959) American science fiction writer

"Class Struggle on the Desktop"
In the Beginning... was the Command Line (1999)

Money , Hate , Hostility , People

“One morn I miss'd him on the custom'd hill,
Along the heath, and near his fav'rite tree:
Another came; nor yet beside the rill,
Nor up the lawn, nor at the wood was he.”

Thomas Gray (1716–1771) English poet, historian

St. 28
Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard http://www.thomasgray.org/cgi-bin/display.cgi?text=elcc (written 1750, publ. 1751)

Tree

“Brushing with hasty steps the dews away,
To meet the sun upon the upland lawn.”

Thomas Gray (1716–1771) English poet, historian

St. 25
Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard http://www.thomasgray.org/cgi-bin/display.cgi?text=elcc (written 1750, publ. 1751)

Sun

“[In response to using profanity] We didn’t win lawn bowling, we won at hockey…Kids out there, do not say what your mayor said today.”

Eric Garcetti (1971) American politician

quoted by Lida de Moraes of Deadline Hollywood https://deadline.com/2014/06/eric-garcetti-f-bomb-bill-de-blasio-jimmy-kimmel-kings-stanley-cup-video-791424/ (June 16, 2014)
2014, Los Angeles Kings Stanley Cup celebration

Hockey

“Hughie, get your tanks off my lawn.”

Harold Wilson (1916–1995) Former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

Statement to trade union leader Hugh Scanlon (c. 1969), as quoted in "Lord Scanlon" in The Telegraph (28 January 2004) http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/1452770/Lord-Scanlon.html
Prime Minister

“Half the campus was designed by Bottom the Weaver, half by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe; Benton had been endowed with one to begin with, and had smiled and sweated and and spoken for the other. A visitor looked under black beams, through leaded casements (past apple boughs, past box, past chairs like bath-tubs on broomsticks) to a lawn ornamented with one of the statues of David Smith; in the months since the figure had been put in its place a shrike had deserted for it a neighboring thorn tree, and an archer had skinned her leg against its farthest spike. On the table in the President’s waiting-room there were copies of Town and Country, the Journal of the History of Ideas, and a small magazine—a little magazine—that had no name. One walked by a mahogany hat-rack, glanced at the coat of arms on an umbrella-stand, and brushed with one’s sleeve something that gave a ghostly tinkle—four or five black and orange ellipsoids, set on grey wires, trembled in the faint breeze of the air-conditioning unit: a mobile. A cloud passed over the sun, and there came trailing from the gymnasium, in maillots and blue jeans, a melancholy procession, four dancers helping to the infirmary a friend who had dislocated her shoulder in the final variation of The Eye of Anguish.”

Randall Jarrell book Pictures from an Institution

Source: Pictures from an Institution (1954) [novel], Chapter 1: “The President, Mrs., and Derek Robbins”, p. 3; opening paragraph of novel

Smile , History , Idea , Tree

“Of course, sometimes a species’ invention only benefited itself. Goats developed an ability to eat almost anything, right down to the roots. Goats proliferated. Deserts spread behind them.
Then another creature appeared, one whose originality was unprecedented. Its numbers grew. And in its wake some other types did flourish. The common cat and dog. The rat. Starlings and pigeons. And the cockroach. Meanwhile, opportunity grew sparse for those less able to share the vast new riches—huge expanses of plowed fields and mowed lawns, streets and parking lots…
The coming of the grasses had left its mark indelibly on the history of the world.
So would the Age of Asphalt and Concrete.”

David Brin book Earth

Part II (p. 122)
Earth (1990)

Age , World , Dogs , History

“What is proposed herein is that we have no right, nor any ethical justification, for clearing land or using wilderness while we tread over lawns, create erosion, and use land inefficiently. Our responsibility is to put our house in order. Should we do so, there will never be any need to destroy wilderness.”

Bill Mollison (1928–2016) Australian permaculturist

Source: Permaculture: A Designers' Manual (1988), chapter 3.10

Housing

“Presentiment is that long shadow on the lawn
Indicative that suns go down;
The notice to the startled grass
That darkness is about to pass.”

Emily Dickinson (1830–1886) American poet

Nature, p. 118
Collected Poems (1993)

Grass , Sun

“"It might interest you to know that our state is tired of being used as a chemical toilet so that people in Utah can have plastic lawn furniture."
"I can't believe an assistant attorney general came right out and said that."
"Well, I wouldn't say it in public."”

Neal Stephenson book Zodiac

"Cohen," the assistant attorney general of an unnamed East Coast state meeting covertly with Sangamon Taylor near the Jersey Shore. Chapter 11
Zodiac (1988)

People

“As the night passed, Rifle updated me on the readiness of our forces, the locations of our aircraft carrier battle groups, and the "Global power" timelines for missions by B-2 stealth bombers flying from Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri. I had received an intelligence alert that as many as thirty additional terrorist strikes were possible worldwide. But there had been no more attacks… so far. Maybe this was because we'd buttoned up, sealing our vulnerabilities by going to Threat Con Delta. By now, CNN was running tape of President Bush flying back to Andrews and landing in Marine One on the White House lawn. The immediate crisis was over: the President was back in the Oval Office, the Secretary of Defense was in the wounded Pentagon. America was putting on her "game face."”

Tommy Franks (1945) United States Army general

I was proud of my country.
Source: American Soldier (2004), p. 247

Game , Intelligence , Housing , Flying

“During my high school years, a boy from my neighborhood named Malcolm chose me to be his friend for a season. His elbow nudged my book in the public library one Saturday afternoon as he sprawled forward across the table feigning some condition—boredom, I suppose. His voice was like shadow—as whispery and as indistinct as shadow, due to an adolescent change. “Do you want to wrestle?” he asked. I have never met anyone since who speaks as Malcolm spoke: He daydreamed; he pronounced strategies out loud (as I raked elm leaves from our lawn and piled them in the curb)—about how he would befriend this boy or that boy, never anyone I knew; Malcolm went to a different high school. “First,” he said, “I will tease him about his freckles. Then I will tease him about his laugh—how his laugh sounds a little like a whinny sometimes. I won’t go too far. You should see how his wrist pivots as he dribbles down the court. “He’s got these little curls above his sideburns. I wish I had those.””

Richard Rodríguez (1944) American journalist and essayist

(He would catch me up on the way to the library.) “What are you reading? We read that last year. Not really a war story, though, is it? Want to go eat French toast?”
Darling: A Spiritual Autobiography (2013)

War , Books , School , Way

“It was a yellow voice, a high, shrill treble in the nursery
White always and high, I remember it so,
White cupboard, off-white table, mugs, dolls’ faces
And I was four or five. The garden could have been
Miles away. We were taken down to the green
Asparagus beds, the cut lawn, and the smell of it
Comes each summer after rain when white returns. Our bird,
A canary called Peter, sang behind bars. The black and white cat
Curled and snoozed by the fire and danger was far away.”

Elizabeth Jennings (1926–2001) poet

" A Bird in the House" in Collected Poems (Carcanet, 1987)

Cats , Bird , Summer

“Every morning during certain seasons of the year, the thrushes and blackbirds on all the lawns throughout the country draw out of their holes an astonishing number of worms; and this they could not do, unless they lay close to the surface.”

Charles Darwin book The Formation of Vegetable Mould through the Action of Worms

Source: The Formation of Vegetable Mould through the Action of Worms (1881), Chapter 1: Habits of Worms, p. 16. http://darwin-online.org.uk/content/frameset?pageseq=31&itemID=F1357&viewtype=image

Drawing , Country , Season

“From my point of view it is better to be alive and young again, and broke, than it is to be the richest corpse in Forest Lawn.”

Robert A. Heinlein book I Will Fear No Evil

Source: I Will Fear No Evil (1970), Chapter 1, p. 24

“Technical progress and more comfortable living permit the systematic inclusion of libidinal components into the realm of commodity production and exchange. But no matter how controlled the mobilization of instinctual energy may be (it sometimes amounts to a scientific management of libido), no matter how much it may serve as a prop for the status quo—it is also gratifying to the managed individuals, just as racing the outboard motor, pushing the power lawn mower, and speeding the automobile are fun.”

Herbert Marcuse book One-Dimensional Man

Source: One-Dimensional Man (1964), p. 75

Speed

“Somehow, white South Africans believed that black labor was like a lawn mower: you could have it around, and when you didn’t need it, you could hide it in its little shed where it would be good and quiet-until you needed it again.”

Arthur Kemp (1962) British writer

The Lie of Apartheid

“The local rock group down the street
Is trying hard to learn their song.
They serenade the weekend squire
Who just came out to mow his lawn.
Another pleasant valley Sunday.
Charcoal burning everywhere.
Rows of houses that are all the same.
And no one seems to care.”

Carole King (1942) Nasa

Pleasant Valley Sunday (1967), co-written with Gerry Goffin, recorded by The Monkees
Song lyrics, Singles

Learning , Housing

“Once when Adam had still lived in the trailer park, he had been pushing the lawn mower around the straggly side yard when he realized that it was raining a mile away. He could smell it, the earthy scent of rain on dirt, but also the electric, restless smell of ozone. And he could see it: a hazy sheet of water blocking his view of the mountains. He could track the line of rain travelling across the vast dry field towards him. It was heavy and dark, and he knew he would get drenched if he stayed outside. It was coming from so far away that he had plenty of time to put the mower away and get under cover. Instead, though, he just stood there. he closed his eyes and let the storm soak him.
That was this kiss.”

Maggie Stiefvater (1981) American writer

pg 242-243
The Raven Cycle Series, The Raven King (2016)

Travel , Mountain , Kiss , Water

“It certainly isn't croquet, and it certainly isn't lawn bowls.”

Godfrey Wenness (1967)

"ABC Radio interview 02/25/2007" http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/02/25/1856328.htm
Godfrey compares paragliding to other sports, in light of 3 accidents during the 10th Paragliding World Championships.

“Or almost like a spider, who, confin'd
In her web's centre, shakt with every winde,
Moves in an instant if the buzzing flie
Stir but a string of her lawn canapie.”

Guillaume de Salluste Du Bartas (1544–1590) French writer

First Week, Sixth Day. Compare: "Much like a subtle spider which doth sit In middle of her web, which spreadeth wide; If aught do touch the utmost thread of it, She feels it instantly on every side", John Davies, The Immortality of the Soul.
La Semaine; ou, Création du monde (1578)

“In the middle of the lawn was a lake adorned with an ornamental fountain, depicting an amorous Greek god trying to kiss a dolphin.†
† Inadvisable”

Jonathan Stroud book The Amulet of Samarkand

The Amulet of Samarkand (2003)

God , Kiss

“God forbid, if the British rule disappears from India. Hindus will lord over it, and we will be in constant danger of our life, property and honour. The only way for the Muslims to escape this danger is to help in the continuance of the British rule. If the Muslims are heartily with the British, then that rule is bound to endure. Let the Muslims consider themselves as a British army ready to shed their blood and sacrifice their lives for the British Crown… Wherever you are, whether in the football field or in the tennis lawn, you have to consider yourselves as soldiers of a British regiment. You have to defend the British Empire, and to give the enemy [Hindus] a fight in doing so. If you bear it in mind and act accordingly, you will have done that and your name will be written in letters of gold in the British Indian history. The future generations will be grateful to you.”

Nawab Waqar-ul-Mulk Kamboh (1841–1917) Politician for India's independence

Viqar-ul-Mulk addressing a students’ gathering at Aligarh. Cited by R.C. Majumdar (ed.), History and Culture of the Indian People, Volume XI, Bombay, 1981, p.146. Quoted from Goel, Sita Ram (1995). Muslim separatism: Causes and consequences. ISBN 9788185990262

Life , God , Way , History

“Folds of scarlet drapery shut in my view to the right hand; to the left were the clear panes of glass, protecting, but not separating me from the drear November day. At intervals, while turning over the leaves in my book, I studied the aspect of that winter afternoon. Afar, it offered a pale blank of mist and cloud; near, a scene of wet lawn and storm-beat shrub, with ceaseless rain sweeping away wildly before a long and lamentable blast.”

Charlotte Brontë book Jane Eyre

Jane (Ch. 1)
Jane Eyre (1847)

Books , Study , Winter

“Mowing your lawn is against nature.”

Rufus Wainwright (1973) American-Canadian singer-songwriter and composer

Responding to Reverend Lou Sheldon insisting on homosexuality being against the very force of nature, Bill Maher's talk show Politically Incorrect, August 2001

Nature

“The moon, full-orbed, forsakes her watery cave,
And lifts her lovely head above the wave;
The snowy splendours of her modest ray
Stream o'er the glistening waves, and quivering play;
Around her, glittering on the heaven's arched brow,
Unnumbered stars, enclosed in azure, glow,
Thick as the dew-drops of the April dawn,
Or May-flowers crowding o'er the daisy lawn;
The canvas whitens in the silvery beam,
And with a mild pale-red the pendants gleam;
The masts' tall shadows tremble o'er the deep;
The peaceful winds a holy silence keep;
The watchman's carol, echoed from the prows,
Alone, at times, awakes the still repose.”

William Julius Mickle (1734–1788) British writer

Book I, lines 417–430 (pp. 23–24)
The Lusiad; Or, The Discovery of India: an Epic Poem (1776)

Love , Peace , Star , Flowers

“If you look on their lawn, there are… it looks like a tent city of reporters. I don't know what insight they think they're going to glean from these people's grief, but if there's ever a situation where someone who's just lost their daughter has anything to say other than "this sucks," I'd be happy to see a news crew on their lawn, but until then, why are these people there?”

Jon Stewart (1962) American political satirist, writer, television host, actor, media critic and stand-up comedian

On exploitative media coverage of the Danielle Van Dam case, Paley Center for Media interview http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OymCVXtl3-4&feature=channel_page, 2002

People , Thinking , Daughters , Happiness

“"Harold and I tried to plant new trees, but they won't take because of the roots. You got to dig up the old stumps and they go way down. It cost a lot and the roots go everywhere. Under the streets and the lawns. We got them in our cellar. And you seen the sidewalks." I said I had. "You'd like to plant a tree or two, but where?" "The roots will die eventually," I said, trying to be optimistic, since she really wanted to plant trees. "That's what I said. Harold says no. He says they just petrify there in the ground, making it impossible for anything alive to find root and grab ahold. 'Course Harold is a sourpuss. I think sometimes he just says things like that so he won't have to go out and try. Some people would rather do without trees than dig a little hole."”

Richard Russo book The Risk Pool

Source: The Risk Pool (1986), Chapter 42.

People , Way , Thinking , Tree

“The Democrats are the party that says government will make you smarter, taller, richer, and remove the crabgrass on your lawn. Republicans are the party that says government doesn't work, and then they get elected and prove it.”

P. J. O'Rourke book Parliament of Whores

Parliament of Whores (1991)

“In effect, the grocer asks, "Williams, you're demanding that your fellow man, as ranchers and brewers, serve you; what did you do in turn to serve your fellow man?" I say, "I mowed my fellow man’s lawn." The grocer says, "Prove it!" That's when I hand over my certificates of performance -- the $30”

Walter E. Williams (1936) American economist, commentator, and academic

Markets, Governments, and the Common Good, speech at Hillsdale College (27 September 2007)
2000s
Context: Say that you hire me to mow your lawn and afterwards you pay me $30. What I have earned might be thought of as certificates of performance, i. e. proof that I served you. With these certificates of performance in hand, I visit my grocer and demand 3 pounds of steak and a six-pack of beer that my fellow man produced. In effect, the grocer asks, "Williams, you're demanding that your fellow man, as ranchers and brewers, serve you; what did you do in turn to serve your fellow man?" I say, "I mowed my fellow man’s lawn." The grocer says, "Prove it!" That's when I hand over my certificates of performance -- the $30.

“It was one of those winter days in Los Angeles when the wind has swept away the smog and the air is clear and the light still and everything has the immediacy of a dream. I parked on a street called Overland in the Hollywood Hills. It was lined with white-skinned birch trees. Their nude branches shimmered against the sky. Tattered yellow leaves clogged the gutters and the air was scented with the rainy smell of eucalyptus. There were no cars on the street and the houses were barely visible behind walls and fences and sweeping lawns that had never been trod upon except by gardeners.”

Michael Nava (1954) American writer

Source: Henry Rios series of novels, Goldenboy (1988), p.132

Tree , Housing , Light , Dreams

“It might interest you to know that our state is tired of being used as a chemical toilet so that people in Utah can have plastic lawn furniture.”

Neal Stephenson book Zodiac

"I can't believe an assistant attorney general came right out and said that."
"Well, I wouldn't say it in public."
"Cohen," the assistant attorney general of an unnamed East Coast state meeting covertly with Sangamon Taylor near the Jersey Shore. Chapter 11
Zodiac (1988)

People

“Get up and bring fur clothes as Autumn is here
A cold wind is blowing from the Khawrazm yonder
Look at that vine leaf hanging on the vine bough
It looks like the shirt of dyers
The farmer is biting his finger with wonder
As in the lawn or garden is left no more rose or lavender”

Manuchehri (1000–1040) Persian poet

Clothes , Autumn