The Merro Tree Quotes

“Have you ever gotten a bad review, Master Huud?"
"Hundreds of them."
"Do they hurt?"
"Of course. But you get over it. Critics are just people, lad. They're entitled to their opinions. They're not the enemy."
"Who is the enemy?"
"Censors.”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree

“When we touch...our gods lay down their weapons and I can forgive every trespass...”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree

“When you sing, think of birds. When you dance, think of fish (Or snakes. Doesn’t matter.). When you play music, think of water, and when you act, think of god.”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree

“What an impossible character you are!”

“Characters are my specialty,” Mikk said.”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree

“I'm swimming upstream. Fighting the tide while the happy dead drift past me to the pools of ignorance.”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree

“. . . maybe the arts are as much about giving people questions as answers. Maybe they don’t just provide a diversion from our mundane lives or reaffirm what we already know or attempt to solve what we don’t. Maybe, sometimes, they are supposed to throw the wheel out, push us into the wilderness.”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree

“Sometimes, our true mothers reveal themselves in unexpected forms.”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree

“Pride is a thick, unsavory brew, but you must swallow it.”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree

“I am a maggot,’ he said in ritual greeting. ‘Crush me.”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree

“There are many names for ones like you: Keraha, V’z-R’k, Umshoosass, Coyote—you are a troublemaker.”

“As long as the trouble has a point,” Mikk grinned.”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree

“Did you know children are called ‘the little gods’ because each one reinvents the world?”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree

“Art is not static,’ he said. ‘It dies without innovation.”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree

“When you play music, pour the flames, and, when you act, laugh at god.”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree

“Everything passes around the wheel to its beginning . . . Everything rises to its own collapse.”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree

“It's true everywhere. Those who want power are usually the least qualified to hold it.”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree

“The Belians call unknown space travelers ‘messengers.’”

“Yes, I know. Why is that?”

“Because they tell us something we didn’t know before.”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree

“Why did the gods make so many dangerous things so attractive?”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree

“Is there a world where a woman can be alone and not have to do anything for anyone?” she whispered. “Not have to smile when she feels like screaming?”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree

“All wars without outworlders are civil wars.”

“That’s not how we define it.”

“It should be.”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree

“. . . I want to touch that sacred flame I see in you with the one I feel in me.”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree

“Everything is part of everything. Pass the soup.”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree

“The seeds are there, the master thought. Anyone who is generous to the weak can learn to be generous to himself.”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree

“… if the young can’t be young when they are young, they will never become adults.”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree

“Finally, after a dozen apprentices, he was witnessing the birth of his successor and, somehow, it was immensely reassuring. Still, common wisdom throughout the galaxy dictated that the special ones were not only the most treasured, but the most likely to get hurt, and that did distress him.”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree

“Life is too various for perfection.”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree

“What does anger have to do with emptiness? with peace? Doesn’t anger destroy peace?”

“If it does,” the elder said, “then the peace was not a true and lasting one. Don’t confuse peace with calm, my young friend, and don’t label all anger destructive. I know you’ve seen plenty of that kind. She will answer for it in her own time.”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree

“You are a young man filled with many things. Is there room in you for emptiness?”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree

“He gave us music that reached into the ear like a lover's tongue and changed the color of our feelings. He presented movement so exquisite and fluid it coaxed our souls out of our bodies to dance with him, weightless in the perfume of divinity.”
― Katie Waitman, The Merro Tree