Touch-Me-Not, aka Jewelweed
“She brooks no condescension from mortal hand, you know,
For, touch her e’er so gently, impatiently she’ll throw
Her tiny little jewels, concealed in pockets small
Of her dainty, graceful garment, and o’er the ground they fall.
Her tiny magic jewels may be a fairy’s gift,
For scattered by the brookside they soon small leaflets lift.
What mortal knows the secrets of Flora’s children shy,
Concealed in field and meadow, that with the flowers die?”
Ray Laurance
Blue Hole, Elizabethton
“All shall be well, and all shall be well,
and all manner of things shall be well.”
Julian of Norwich, 1342-1416
English mystic
“Nature is too thin a screen;
the glory of the omnipresent God
bursts through everywhere.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1803-1882
“One of the dreariest spots on life’s road is the point of conviction
that nothing will ever again happen to you.”
Faith Baldwin, 1893-1978
Author of 85 books
“There is an eternity behind and an eternity before,
and this little speck in the center, however long,
is comparatively but a minute.”
John Brown, after his arrest at Harper’s Ferry
American abolitionist
1800-1859
Bass Lake, Blowing Rock
“If we were logical, the future would be bleak indeed.
But we are more than logical. We are human beings,
and we have faith, and we have hope, and we can work.”
Jacques Cousteau, 1910-1997
French explorer and ecologist
Day Lilly
“Everything comes to him who hustles while he waits.”
Thomas Edison, 1847-1931
American inventor and businessman
Tomato farm along Nolichucky River
“It’s difficult to think anything but pleasant thoughts
while eating a homegrown tomato.”
Lewis Grizzard, 1946-1994
Comedian and columnist from Georgia
Gray’s Lily in field on Roan Mountain
“My definition of an expert in any field is a person
who knows enough about what’s really going on to be scared.”
Oscar Wilde, 1854-1900
Irish playwright, novelist, poet
“Sometimes the road less traveled
is less traveled for a reason.”
Jerry Seinfeld, b. 1954
Comedian and actor
“The time which we have at our disposal every day is elastic;
the passions that we feel expand it,
those that we inspire contract it;
and habit fills up what remains.”
Marcel Proust, 1871-1922
French novelist, critic
Hosta leaf
“If you break your neck, if you have nothing to eat,
if your house is on fire, then you got a problem.
Everything else is inconvenience.”
Robert Fulghum, 1939-
Author
“In his holy flirtation with the world,
God occasionally drops a handkerchief.
These handkerchiefs are called saints.”
Frederick Buechner, b. 1926
Novelist and theologian
Hosta flower
“To me every hour of the light and dark is a miracle,
Every cubic inch of space is a miracle.”
Walt Whitman, 1819-1892
American poet
Appalachian Trail, Roan Mountain
“A vigorous five-mile walk will do more good
for an unhappy but otherwise healthy adult
than all the medicine and psychology in the world.”
Paul Dudley White, 1886-1973
American cardiologist who treated several presidents
Pokeberry flowers, before berries
“Any fool can criticize, condemn, and complain
but it takes character and self control
to be understanding and forgiving.”
Benjamin Franklin, 1706-1790
Author, political theorist, printer, scientist
Thistle
“You know…sin is a lot like that thistle you are wrestling with.
It can look so beautiful to the eye, be so pleasing to the senses,
you hardly notice the seeds are spreading
until whole fields are taken over by them.
Then they choke out the grass. Animals won’t eat ‘em.
You can’t cut ‘em down and leave the root.
They’ll come right back. There is nothing to do but
take the time and energy required to pull them out
in one piece and fill the hole with something good.”
“Mosaic: Pieces of My Life So Far“
by Amy Grant, 1960-
Singer-songwriter
Locust-borer on goldenrod
“In religion and politics, people’s beliefs and convictions
are in almost every case gotten at second-hand,
and without examination.”
Mark Twain, 1835-1910
American humorist, satirist, lecturer and writer
Spiderwort
“The worship most acceptable to God
comes from a thankful and cheerful heart.”
Plutarch, 46-120 A.D.
Greek historian
Five-lined Skink, Linville Gorge
“Do I contradict myself?
Very well, then, I contradict myself
(I am large, I contain multitudes).”
Walt Whitman, 1819-1892
American poet
