238 Quotes by Denis Johnson

They’d been here twenty seconds, and already nothing was happening.

There’s nothing wrong with me” – I’m surprised I let those words out. But it’s always been my tendency to lie to doctors, as if good health consisted only of the ability to fool them.

In fact he was no longer persuaded that blood and revolution made useful tools for altering the concepts in a person’s mind. Who said it? – probably Confucius – ” I can’t beat a sculpture from a stone with a sledgehammer; I can’t free the soul of a man by violence.” Peace was here, peace was now. Peace promised in any other time or place was a lie.

I answered instantly, pointing out that in order to accept this proof that Elvis was in Paradise in 1958, we first have to accept life after death, Paradise, ghosts, all of that. Mark answered a couple of days later, I smile and shrug. Life after death, ghosts, Paradise, eternity – of course, we take all that as granted. Otherwise where’s the fun?

Skip experienced no excitement. Only the lethargy and sadness of a man freezing to death.

But every time I entered the place there were veiled faces promising everything and then clarifying quickly into the dull, the usual, looking up at me and making the same mistake.

I don’t remember what I said to them. I remember loneliness crushing first my lungs. Then my heart. Then my balls.

The coyotes sounded like hurt dogs. They agitated plainly for Christ’s return. May they not be heard.

Staring at his own face reflected in a cup of bitter karma. For.