26
" This womens skin is shimmering and pale, her long black hair is tied with dozens of silver ribbons that fall over her shoulders. Her gown is white, covered in what to Bailey looks like looping black embroidery, but as he walks closer he sees that the black marks are actually words written across the fabric. When he is near enough to read parts of the gown, he realizes that they are love letters, inscribed in handwritten text. Words of desire and longing wrapping around her waist, flowing down the train of her gown as it spills over the platform.
The statue herself is still, but her hand is held out and only then does Bailey notice the young woman with a red scarf standing in front of her, offering the love letter-clad statue a sungle crimson rose.
The movement is so subtle that it is almost undetectable, but slowly, very, very slowly, the statue reaches to accept the rose.
Her fingers open, and the young woman with the rose waits patiently as the statue gradually closes her hand around the stem, releasing it only when it is secure.
....The statue is lifting the rose, gradually, to her face. Her eye lids slowly close. "
― Erin Morgenstern , The Night Circus
27
" She said to herself: 'Is not the gown the natural raiment of extremity? What nation, what religion, what ghost, what dream has not worn it—infants, angels, priests, the dead; why—should not the doctor, in the grave dilemma of his alchemy, wear his dress?' She thought: 'He dresses to lie beside himself, who is so constructed that love, for him, can be only something special; in a room that giving back evidence of his occupancy, is as mauled as the last agony. "
― Djuna Barnes , Nightwood
29
" She was not at the concert any more. She looked around the rustic room, blinking. What the hell?The singer had her in his arms still. There was no balcony between them now.His hands slid into her hair, keeping her head still. " Not yet," he begged, sliding his lips down her throat, nuzzling her jaw. " There's time yet, Toireasa," he murmured. " Time to say fare thee well properly,." " We should have returned to Ireland, Breandan," she whispered, as he loosened the ties on her gown and dropped it from her shoulders. The words came to her naturally, even as a tiny voice was raging in her mind, " What on earth are you saying, Taylor?" But that voice was being drowned out by the pure sensuousness he was stirring in her. "
30
" She was beautiful, only hers was the dark beauty of night, just as Sherry's was the bright beauty of daytime. Her hair was raven-black, ending in a sort of widow's peak low on her forehead, and her face and arms were alabaster- white. Her gown was a clinging thing of swirling black, almost like smoke, and two peculiar shoulder-draperies she wore, hanging down loosely and caught at the wrists, almost suggested great triangular wings when her arms were in motion.Her lips were a red gash in the pallor of her face, and they glistened as though she had daubed them with fresh blood instead of rouge." What's your name?" I asked." Call me Faustine," she said low. I saw her staring fixedly at me, with a sort of half-smile on her face, but her gaze rested a little lower than my own face. I fingered my neck uneasily. " Is there something on my collar?" (" Vampire's Honeymoon" ) "
32
" He roars, “What have you done?”
I don’t answer. My heart beats crazy happy just to see her get across the iron. She’s not burned. She’s still human.
“Zara.” His voice is measured. “I need her to maintain control.”
“You don’t need to be in control. You’re all trapped. So there’ll be no more stealing boys, no more shooting arrows in the woods, getting people lost. It’s all over.” The metal is cold on my fingers.
Devyn grabs more wire, starts another flight. A group of pixies leaps for him, screaming, a wild, chaotic mess. They start clawing at each other, lost in fear and hunger, angry. A pixie in a pink dress shrieks when another wearing a black gown lashes at her, slashing through the skin on her arm.
“Zara?” The king tries to be calm and nice. He tries to look human. It doesn’t work. “Do you know what this means? Do you know the power that I’ll lose? The need? We will fight in here. We will kill each other.”
“I know,” I say and my voice shakes as I stare at him, this man who is in my blood, but not me. He is not me. Still, I understand his need, his fear. He is stuck in this awful place where there is no moral way to move forward. “I’m so sorry.”
And I am. "
― Carrie Jones , Need (Need, #1)
33
" In the darkness of the night while removing the long colourful gown that covers my nakedness, there is chill penetrating bare cells and the sky is as silent as ever. Another day has withered unto the lap of mighty earth, to make her heart fertile, to feed those lives sprouting and then again to raise up to the skies to kiss life!
This home is not yours, nor this earth! A breeze that caresses the orphan longings of the senses, like that of the softest music – so is life, a passing breeze! All I own is this moment! O night, do you see stars blinking hidden amidst the darkest clouds? O life, can you inhale the fragrance of unborn flowers dancing wet in the rain?
O life, do you hear a song from the farthest skies, a secret melody of silence that I cherish deep within? "
― Preeth Nambiar , The Solitary Shores