“But also read against yourselves, read for questioning and impotence, for despair and erudition…”

And also read those whose darkness or malice or madness or greatness you can’t understand because only in this way will you grow, outlive yourself, and become what you are.

More ocean than terra firma. More shadow than form.

This day’s nothingness as if from spite became a flame and scorched the lips of children and poets.

What’s astonishing and refreshing is his ability to combine the reporter’s perspective with a deep knowledge of poetry, including pre-Islamic Arab poems.

Defend the value of the spiritual experience and if somebody tells you it’s an old fashioned notion, laugh loudly and serenely.

The odds and ends of your mental surplus you carelessly throw at the world, one wants to be at a loss, in a maze; amazed, and amazingly unabashed.

Gabriel Levin’s book is a journey through time and through entrenched animosities of the Middle East.

And tracing the labyrinthine ways of your mind, the haphazard vagaries of your thoughts at ease,

Read for yourselves, read for the sake of your inspiration, for the sweet turmoil in your lovely head.

I drink from a small spring, / my thirst excedes the ocean.

A brilliant poet is at work here-a poet in the rugged landscape of conflict and pain.

Be sober, be intelligent, be educated, rely on the tangible reality as long as you can.

As if entrapped in a tropical heatwave, with dozens of whirlwinds swirling in one’s mind, one thinks of a way out, or a way in: out of the scorching bosom of a volcano, and in – into the centre of a raging hurricane.

A blessing because it brings about a movement, an energy which, when it peaks, creates a poem. Or a moment of happiness.

Remember that the act of writing is a tiny part of a bigger something.

And now, advice for beginning mystics.

We are at a good level. Our secret is that we play the same way against each opponent.

It’s impossible to protect your kids against disappointment in life.

A government is the most dangerous threat to man’s rights: it holds a legal monopoly on the use of physical force against legally disarmed victims.

No, painting is not interior decoration. It is an instrument of war for attack and defense against the enemy.

We last longer if we compete against ourselves for the good of others instead of competing against others for the good of ourselves.

I’m for truth, no matter who tells it. I’m for justice, no matter who it is for or against. I’m a human being, first and foremost, and as such I’m for whoever and whatever benefits humanity as a whole.

In order to control myself I must first accept myself by going with and not against my nature.

Together, we will continue to support the fight against this cruel disease as cancer through elements as important as prevention and research.