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You are eternity’s hostage A captive of mine.

Boris Pasternak

If you want to know, life is the principle of self-renewal, it is constantly renewing and remaking and changing and transfiguring itself.
BORIS PASTERNAK

Change Figure Life Principle
Man is born to live, not to prepare for life.
BORIS PASTERNAK

Born Life Live Man Preparation
Our evenings are farewells. Our parties are testaments. So that the secret stream of suffering. May warm the cold of life.
BORIS PASTERNAK

Cold Life Ourselves Secret Stream Suffering Warm
During the last years of Mayakovski’s life, when all poetry had ceased to exist . . . literature had stopped.
BORIS PASTERNAK

Existence Life Literature Poetry Stop
I used to be very revolutionary, but now I think that nothing can be gained by brute force. People must be drawn to good by goodness.
BORIS PASTERNAK

Character Force Goodness Myself Revolution Thinking
I love you wildly, insanely, infinitely.
BORIS PASTERNAK

Forever I Love You One Liner Sanity Wild
A corner draft fluttered the flame And the white fever of temptation Upswept its angel wings that cast A cruciform shadow.
BORIS PASTERNAK

Angel Flame Shadow Temptation
I hate everything you say, but not enough to kill you for it.
BORIS PASTERNAK

Enough Hate Kill Myself Yourself
You and I, it’s as though we have been taught to kiss in heaven and sent down to earth together, to see if we know what we were taught.
BORIS PASTERNAK

Heaven Kissing Myself Teaching
When a great moment knocks on the door of your life, it is often no louder than the beating of your heart, and it is very easy to miss it.
BORIS PASTERNAK

Easy Great Heart Knock Life Missing Moments Yourself
What for centuries raised man above the beast is not the cudgel but the irresistible power of unarmed truth.
BORIS PASTERNAK

Man Power Resist Truth
No single man makes history. History cannot be seen just as one cannot see grass growing.
BORIS PASTERNAK

Growth History Man Sight
It is not the object described that matters, but the light that falls on it.
BORIS PASTERNAK

Description Fall Light Object
Literature is the art of discovering something extraordinary about ordinary people, and saying with ordinary words something extraordinary.
BORIS PASTERNAK

Art Discover Extraordinary Literature People Word
Art is unthinkable without risk and spiritual self-sacrifice.
BORIS PASTERNAK

Art Risk Sacrifice Spiritual Thinking
An unshared happiness is not happiness.
BORIS PASTERNAK

Happiness Share
He was a natural, and in the Russian way, tragically above these banalities.
BORIS PASTERNAK

Himself Natural Tragedy
The unarmed power of naked truth.
BORIS PASTERNAK

Arm Naked One Liner Power Truth
As far as modern writing is concerned, it is rarely rewarding to translate it, although it might be easy. Translation is very much like copying paintings.
BORIS PASTERNAK

Modern Paint Rare Translation Writing
You are eternity’s hostage A captive of mine.
BORIS PASTERNAK

Forever Myself Prison Yourself
It is no longer possible for lyric poetry to express the immensity of our experience. Life has grown too cumbersome, too complicated. We have acquired values which are best expressed in prose.
BORIS PASTERNAK

Best Complication Expression Lyrics Poetry Possible Value
But what are pity, conscience, or fear To the brazen pair, compared With the living sorcery Of their hot embraces?
BORIS PASTERNAK

Conscience Embrace Fear Live
What is laid down, ordered, factual is never enough to embrace the whole truth: life always spills over the rim of every cup.
BORIS PASTERNAK

Enough Life Order Truth
All mothers are mothers of great people, and it is not their fault that life later disappoints them.
BORIS PASTERNAK

Disappoint Greatness Life Mom
Even so, one step from my grave, I believe that cruelty, spite, The powers of darkness will in time Be crushed by the spirit of light.
BORIS PASTERNAK

Believe Cruelty Grave Light Spirit Time
Poetry is a rich, full-bodied whistle, cracked ice crunching in pails, the night that numbs the leaf, the duel of two nightingales, the sweet pea that has run wild, Creation’s tears in shoulder blades.
BORIS PASTERNAK

Blade Creation Poetry Rich Tears
To be a woman is a great adventure; To drive men mad is a heroic thing.
BORIS PASTERNAK

Adventure Greatness Hero Madness Woman

You are eternity’s hostage A captive of mine.

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You are eternity’s hostage A captive of mine.

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