All at once I felt so vain, like a girl posturing for the crowds as she walks along, only to discover the street is empty.

My mother once told me I was like water. Water can carve its way even through stone. And when trapped, water makes a new path.

Seeing him again after so long awakened something inside me. I was surprised to find myself feeling sad rather than joyful, as I would have imagined.

A tree may look as beautiful as ever; but when you notice the insects infesting it, and the tips of the branches that are brown from disease, even the trunk seems to lose some of its magnificence.

A mind troubled by doubt cannot focus on the course of victory.

Hopes are like hair ornaments. Girls want to wear too many of them. When they become old women they look silly wearing even one.

Never give up; for even rivers someday wash dams away.