A Quote by John Jeremiah Sullivan

The greenness of Ireland is a false greenness, after all. Not that it isn't green - the place can still make you have to pull off and swallow one of your heart pills. It's that the greenness doesn't mean what it seems. It doesn't encode a pastoral past, much less a timeless vale where wee folk trip the demesne.
Who would have thought my shrivel'd heart could have recovered greenness?
yet it seems Life scarce can cast a fragrance on the wind, Scarce spread a glory to the morning beams, But the torn petals strew the garden plot; And there's but common greenness after that.
Could have recovered greenness?
The beauty of that June day was almost staggering. After the wet spring, everything that could turn green had outdone itself in greenness and everything that could even dream of blooming or blossoming was in bloom and blossom. The sunlight was a benediction. The breezes were so caressingly soft and intimate on the skin as to be embarrassing.
I have a longing for wilderness and for greenness. I wish I were a person who longed for animals, but I'm not.
My mind was once the true survey Of all these meadows fresh and gay; And in the greenness of the grass Did see its hopes as in a glass.
I was surprised when they sent me to Hollywood, Then I thought as soon as they discovered my 14 fathom greenness, I'd be out on my ear. But everything kept going.
Therefore all seasons shall be sweet to thee, Whether the summer clothe the general earth With greenness, or the redbreast sit and sing Betwixt the tufts of snow on the bare branch Of mossy apple tree.
Of two men looking at a green field, one estimates its yield in bushels and calculates the price of the bushels in silver and in gold. The other drinks the greenness of the field with his eye, and kisses every blade with his thought, and fraternizes in his soul with every rootlet and pebble, and every clod of earth.
Spring drew on... and a greenness grew over those brown beds, which, freshening daily, suggested the thought that hope traversed them at night and left each morning brighter traces of her steps.
There is sorrow in the world, but goodness too; and goodness that is not greenness, either, no more than sorrow is.
The stones and trees, insensible to time, / Nor age nor wrinkle on their front are seen; / If Winter come, and greenness then do fade / A Spring returns, and they more youthful made; / But man grows old, lies down, remains where once he's laid.
I greatly enjoyed the Hawaiian Islands. They are a real little paradise in spite of the influx of Americans who have made it one of their most pleasant 'centers of resort': the soft climate and luxuriance of the tropics; the greenness, the fragrance, the flowers - extraordinary flowers covering the tallest trees and turning them into huge bouquets.
The trees are coming into leaf Like something almost being said; The recent buds relax and spread, Their greenness is a kind of grief. Is it that they are born again And we grow old? No, they die too. Their yearly trick of looking new Is written down in rings of grain. Yet still the unresting castles thresh In fullgrown thickness every May. Last year is dead, they seem to say, Begin afresh, afresh, afresh.
I'll plant and water, sow and weed, Till not an inch of earth shows brown, And take a vow of each small seed To grow to greenness and renown: And then some day you'll pass my way, See gold and crimson, bell and star, And catch my garden's soul, and say: "How sweet these cottage gardens are!"
My life is like a faded leaf, My harvest dwindled to a husk: Truly my life is void and brief And tedious in the barren dusk; My life is like a frozen thing, No bud nor greenness can I see: Yet rise it shall - the sap of Spring; O Jesus, rise in me.
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