quotations about grief
The greatest griefs are those we cause ourselves.
SOPHOCLES
Oedipus Rex
They say time heals all wounds, but that presumes the source of the grief is finite.
CASSANDRA CLARE
Clockwork Prince
If my neighbors manage to survive without killing themselves, without going mad, maintaining an interest in political parties, not yielding to despair, resolutely pursuing the fight for existence, can their griefs really be genuine?
OSAMU DAZAI
No Longer Human
I will instruct my sorrows to be proud: For grief is proud, and makes his owner stoop.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
King John
People talk as if grief were just a feeling -- as if it weren't the continually renewed shock of setting out again and again on familiar roads and being brought up short by the grim frontier post that now blocks them.
C. S. LEWIS
letter to Sir Henry Willink, December 3, 1959
When you spun away in the whirlwind
my grief followed you
a whimpering spaniel
you were gone your absence
was absolute & my grief sat
on my kitchen table
a vase of bloody roses
my grief sprang from my breastbone
a young birch swaying & scabrous
my grief was a dull pot
at the back of the stove.
SANDRA M. GILBERT
"Grief: A History", Aftermath
My grief was like a mountain that hid all of heaven from me.
MACRINA WIEDERKEHR
The Song of the Seed
But what was there to say? Only that there were tears. Only that Quietness and Emptiness fitted together like stacked spoons. Only that there was a snuffling in the hollows at the base of a lovely throat. Only that a hard honey-colored shoulder had a semicircle of teethmarks on it. Only that they held each other close, long after it was over. Only that what they shared that night was not happiness, but hideous grief.
ARUNDHATI ROY
The God of Small Things
Grief tears his heart, and drives him to and fro,
In all the raging impotence of woe.
HOMER
The Iliad
Grief is a most peculiar thing; we're so helpless in the face of it. It's like a window that will simply open of its own accord. The room grows cold, and we can do nothing but shiver. But it opens a little less each time, and a little less; and one day we wonder what has become of it.
ARTHUR GOLDEN
Memoirs of a Geisha
But grief is also a tonic. It is a healing elixir, made of tears that lubricate the heart.
ELIZABETH LESSER
Broken Open: How Difficult Times Can Help Us Grow
Grief is natural; the absence of all feeling is undesirable, but moderation in grief should be observed, as in the face of all good or evil.
PLUTARCH
"Consolatio Ad Uxorem"
The darker the night, the brighter the stars,
The deeper the grief, the closer is God.
FYODOR DOSTOEVSKY
Crime and Punishment
Grief is a healthy emotion, and it's healthy to embrace it. By accepting loss, we clarify our values and the meaning of our lives.
DEAN KOONTZ
Forever Odd
Small leisure have the poor for grief.
JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER
"The Witch's Daughter"
Grief is real because loss is real. Each grief has its own imprint, as distinctive and as unique as the person we lost. The pain of loss is so intense, so heartbreaking, because in loving we deeply connect with another human being, and grief is the reflection of the connection that has been lost. We think we want to avoid the grief, but really it is the pain of the loss we want to avoid. Grief is the healing process that ultimately brings us comfort in our pain.
ELISABETH KUBLER-ROSS
On Grief and Grieving
Give sorrow words; the grief that does not speak knits up the o-er wrought heart and bids it break.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
Macbeth
Time ebbs, but Grief abides--
Grim flotsam of Life's tides.
NELLIE SEELYA EVANS
"On the Shore"
The tears I feel today
I'll wait to shed tomorrow.
Though I'll not sleep this night
Nor find surcease from sorrow.
My eyes must keep their sight:
I dare not be tear-blinded.
I must be free to talk
Not choked with grief, clear-minded.
My mouth cannot betray
The anguish that I know.
Yes, I'll keep my tears til later:
But my grief will never go.
ANNE MCCAFFREY
Dragonsinger
Grief is not just a series of events, stages, or timelines. Our society places enormous pressure on us to get over loss, to get through grief. But how long do you grieve for a husband of fifty years, a teenager killed in a car accident, a four-year-old child: a year? Five years? Forever? The loss happens in time, in fact in a moment, but its aftermath lasts a lifetime.
ELISABETH KUBLER-ROSS
On Grief and Grieving