Construed as turf, home just seems a provisional claim, a designation you make upon a place, not one it makes read more

Construed as turf, home just seems a provisional claim, a designation you make upon a place, not one it makes on you. A certain set of buildings, a glimpsed, smudged window-view across a schoolyard, a musty aroma sniffed behind a garage when you were a child, all of which come crowding in upon your latter-day senses -- those are pungent things and vivid, even consoling. But to me they are also inert and nostalgic and unlikely to connect you to the real, to that essence art can sometimes achieve, which is permanence.

The house a woman creates is a Utopia. She can't help it -- can't help trying to interest her nearest read more

The house a woman creates is a Utopia. She can't help it -- can't help trying to interest her nearest and dearest not in happiness itself but in the search for it.

When your time comes to die, be not like those whose hearts are filled with fear of death, so that read more

When your time comes to die, be not like those whose hearts are filled with fear of death, so that when their time comes they weep and pray for a little more time to live their lives over again in a different way. Sing your death song, and die like a hero going home.

Home is home, though it be never so homely.

Home is home, though it be never so homely.

A man builds a fine house; and now he has a master, and a task for life: he is to read more

A man builds a fine house; and now he has a master, and a task for life: he is to furnish, watch, show it, and keep it in repair, the rest of his days.

I've read in many a novel, that unless they've souls that
grovel--
Folks prefer in fact a hovel read more

I've read in many a novel, that unless they've souls that
grovel--
Folks prefer in fact a hovel to your dreary marble halls.

What if in Scotland's wilds we viel'd our head,
Where tempests whistle round the sordid bed;
Where read more

What if in Scotland's wilds we viel'd our head,
Where tempests whistle round the sordid bed;
Where the rug's two-fold use we might display,
By night a blanket, and a plaid by day.

Home is a place you grow up wanting to leave, and grow old wanting to get back to

Home is a place you grow up wanting to leave, and grow old wanting to get back to

At length his lonely cot appears in view,
Beneath the shelter of an aged tree;
Th' expectant read more

At length his lonely cot appears in view,
Beneath the shelter of an aged tree;
Th' expectant wee-things, toddling, stacher thro'
To meet their Dad, wi' flichterin noise an' glee.