Our bones ache only while the flesh is on them. Stretch it as thin as the temple flesh of an ailing woman and still it serves to ache the bone and to move the bone about; and in like manner the night is a skin pulled over the head of day that the day may be in a torment. We will find no comfort until the night melts away; until the fury of the night rots out its fire.
Djuna BarnesNew York is the meeting place of the peoples, the only city where you can hardly find a typical American.
Djuna BarnesA man's sorrow runs uphill; true it is difficult for him to bear, but it is also difficult for him to keep.
Djuna BarnesNo man needs curing of his individual sickness; his universal malady is what he should look to.
Djuna BarnesWhen one wants to become cognizant of the color and the texture of the soil, one does not get a ladder; one gets a shovel. When one wants to get into touch with the texture of the universal mind, one does not go to Boston; one goes to the Bowery.
Djuna BarnesLove becomes the deposit of the heart, analogous in all degrees to the 'findings' in a tomb. As in one will be charted the taken place of the body, the raiment, the utensils necessary to its other life, so in the heart of the lover will be traced, as an indelible shadow, that which he loves.
Djuna Barnes