The Bird of Time has but a little way
To flutter--and the Bird is on the wing.
-Omar Khayyam (trans. Fitzgerald)


The natural inheritance of everyone who is capable of spiritual life is an unsubdued forest where the wolf howls and the obscene bird of night chatters.
-Henry James Sr. (as quoted by Donoso)


I found Melissa, washed up like a half-drowned bird, on the dreary littorals of Alexandria...
-Justine, Lawrence Durrell