War Survivor Quotes

“We must fight for our hopes, Samuel,
they are too precious to lose.
If we carry enough hope, we can heal the world.

So, let this light carry our hopes
and dress the world in bright colours,
just like this alluring rainbow.”
― Susan L. Marshall, All the Hope We Carry

“I feel the searing, burning of my hands,
caught alight by the red-tipped fire.
Silent I am, mesmerised by the flames
that have now caught me in their trap.

Fire is bad.
Fire takes people away.

Claire’s words are accurate.
I am in a burning dream world.
One that I may never leave.
My hands and arms are now alight
and my eyes are stinging with tears.”
― Susan L. Marshall, All the Hope We Carry

“Instinctively, I flap my arms beside me,
streaking fire across the sky
with my red flamed, fluttering wings.

High I am, staring down at
the creased world below me.
A world that I have sworn to protect.”
― Susan L. Marshall, All the Hope We Carry

“The familiar tune returns,
its drifting quality heightened in pitch,
like the sound of a bird,
free flying through the soft breeze.

I allow myself to believe
that I may just be that bird,
taking a small adventure
across my tiny island.

I could have wings that soar,
high above the red stained streets
into a much calmer, brighter sky.”
― Susan L. Marshall, All the Hope We Carry

“If I close my weary eyes,
I can shut the dark out,
just for a single moment
and see the world I hope to see.

Unravel its detail does,
so slowly in the dim light.

It is a fragile dream,
half awake, half asleep.
Sketches of a world I yearn to reach.”
― Susan L. Marshall, All the Hope We Carry

“This hand, it is mine,
yet when I pick up a pencil
it has a mind of its own.

It has a story to draw,
beating the breath of life
through its lines and shapes,
across the wide, open paper.

If I just attune myself
to the unravelling melody,
I know I will be able to take that journey
and heal the torn, aching world.”
― Susan L. Marshall, All the Hope We Carry

“I am pressing my palm gently against the coraline limestone.
It feels warm against my skin, alerting me to
my own physical presence in this moment.
My body exists right here, right now.

I feel the rare, radiant rays of the sun,
warming my neck and back.
Steady the light is, not fading away this time.”
― Susan L. Marshall, All the Hope We Carry

“I am reaching towards the sun.
A source of comfort and reassurance.
I swear I can see Claire’s face in its luminescence.
She is smiling at me.”
― Susan L. Marshall, All the Hope We Carry

“I am knee deep in sea water now,
feeling the energy of the tidal waves
as they roll inwards towards the shore.

A tide that exhales life spent,
across its great, red stained sea.
Its waves’ beats are out of sync,
as they crawl slowly towards land.”
― Susan L. Marshall, All the Hope We Carry

“In this land the only explosions were those of laughter, the only breaking was of bread, and the only shootings we're of stars across the clear Brazzaville sky”
― David Arnold, Kids of Appetite

“He'd thought he'd outlived war. Ultimately, war outlived everyone.”
― Angela Panayotopulos, The Wake Up

“Six months after Lucien traveled to Australia, Mum left her son, her parents, her brothers and sisters, her work, her friends and her country, sailed over the Atlantic Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea, through the Suez Canal, across the Indian Ocean, into the Pacific and joined her husband in Sydney to start a new life. That's the sort of thing people did back then. Everyone was starting again after the war, after losing mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters, children, husbands and wives. It seems shocking now, but there wasn't such a sentimental attitude towards family or such a fear of death then as we have now. (People who live through wars often develop attachment disorders as protection from loss.)”
― Viv Albertine, To Throw Away Unopened

“The old man reached behind his head and unlatched his necklace . . . and retrieved the solid gold Star of David pendant attached to it. Max handed the pendent to his grandson.”
― Mark M. Bello, L'DOR V'DOR: From Generation to Generation