Omens Quotes

“He said that people who loved [animals] to excess were capable of the worst cruelties toward human beings. He said that dogs were not loyal but servile, that cats were opportunists and traitors, that peacocks were heralds of death, that macaws were simply decorative annoyances, that rabbits fomented greed, that monkeys carried the fever of lust, and that roosters were damned because they had been complicit in the three denials of Christ.”
― Gabriel García Márquez, Love in the Time of Cholera

“It is possibly worth mentioning at this point that Mr. Young thought that paparazzi was a kind of Italian linoleum.”
― Neil Gaiman, Terry Pratchett

“Man always finds the omens he wants.”
― Yukio Mishima, The Temple of Dawn

“Some dreams matter. Most don't. Often it can be hard to know which might be which.”
― Dean Koontz, Saint Odd

“When you are open to living and trust the process of life and ready to face all your fears, and not afraid to go astray with life, life definitely comes and talk to you, in its own language.”
― Roshan Sharma

“Then, sometime during the fourth year, the omens will abandon you, because you've stopped listening to them.”
― Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist

“Little by little they all gathered around him, entering through the cracks like moonbeams...[b]ut once the wind of misfortune blows, people disperse like little clouds around the moon when the wind blows off the mountains.”
― Grazia Deledda, Reeds in the Wind

“It's not anyone's fault that this world is full of omens.
By all accounts, history is a practice

of ignoring things & hoping for the best. You can drive
yourself crazy with looking. You can expect

bad luck to mark you unfooled, fooled.
Light to mark you with light.”
― Emily Skaja, Brute: Poems

“The Indians did not like to see anything odd -- a white squirrel, for instance. . . . They thought such oddities were messages, were omens of evil. . . . And the Indians put a great deal of faith in dreams.”
― Karen Joy Fowler, Sarah Canary

“The feast lasted nine days, the last three becoming a continuous circle dance accompanied by songs and music. Noemi always stayed on the belvedere among the banquet remains. ... No, she didn't dance, she didn't laugh, but it was enough for her to see people enjoying themselves, because she too hoped to take part in the festival of life.”
― Grazia Deledda, Reeds in the Wind

“Omens, stars, roses, seasons, bodies and their most intricate love paths.”
― Paul Valéry

“Her niece had the parenting skills of a … Rose didn’t even know how to finish that sentence. Any creature in nature so incapable of caring for its young would have died out centuries ago.”
― Kelley Armstrong

“Sacred signs always come when your soul calls out in pain or joy.”
― Lawren Leo, Love's Shadow: Nine Crooked Paths

“Out to sea, the calm lagoon waters were darkening, while the comets overhead glowed brighter, omens in the gloaming.”
― Julian May, Perseus Spur

“Life knows what you want, and gives you exactly the same thing, at the moment. You attract exactly what you want in the moment. You have to remain present in the moment. If you are already lost in yourself, you can never understand the ways of life.”
― Roshan Sharma

“I have never been one to ignore the signs. Unless, of course, it works in my favor.”
― Jaida Jones, Dragon Soul

“What does that mean? I do not have the heart to tell you but know if only half of what is whispered of this damnant is true, his evil is twice all the hate of the ages. I do not wish to strand you, but if I tell you now, my words might deflect your courage and prevent you from becoming the man you must. But I promise, I will tell you all that is yours to hear before you grow too doddered, before old age frosts what it doesn’t rub away, lest this secret freeze the warm wealth of your heart. Just know at the banquet for this particular revelation, plums are better than prunes.”
― David Jetre, Elsuon: The Stonecutter's Son

“All our omens hold the mystery of some grave human consequence, now forgotten, leaving only the gleaming symbol in its aftermath. In attempting to comprehend a turn of ill-fortune, we may search for an omen as prelude, for to find such a sign imposes meaning on the chaotic. In seeking an omen, we frequently seek a bird.”
― Doireann Ní Ghríofa, A Ghost in the Throat

“The untuned mind receives no signal from the universe.”
― Michael Bassey Johnson, Song of a Nature Lover

“The only clear pattern I’ve seen is that, whether the hunting party is led by a pagan god, a demon, or a ghost, it’s always bad luck to see it. Some say it’s an omen of death.”
“Oh, I’m so glad we saw it, then.” Stacey shook her head and went back to work.”
― J.L. Bryan, The Lodge

“The Seer's Map by Stewart Stafford

Howling dog, thou cursèd hound,
Plaguest thy master with baleful sound,
The cur's yelps taint the air around;
A dirge for all that hear thy wound.

The rooftop magpie foretells:
Herald of guests to visit soon,
A noisy speech announceth,
Companions of the afternoon.

Lucky horseshoe and iron key,
Bringeth good fortune to the finder,
But spilling salt provokes fate,
And draws the evil eye's reminder.

A shoe upon the table laid,
Tempts the dead to live anon,
For this ungracious gesture waketh,
Flesh and blood from skeleton.

Who crosses the path of hare or priest,
A perilous milestone on thy road,
Their very presence signifies
That gathering trouble doth forebode.

A toad on thy merry travels,
Brings sweet smiles and kindest charms,
Keep one about thy person warm,
To shelter safe from danger's harms.

Red sky at night delights the eye,
Of shepherd that beholds thy light,
Thy colour doth betoken dawn
Of weather fair and clear and bright.

Red sky at morn troubles the heart,
Of shepherd that surveys thy shade,
Thy hue doth presage day
Of stormy blast and tempest made.

December's thunder balm,
Speaks of harvest's tranquil mind,
January's thunder, fierce!
Warns of war and gales unkind.

An itchy palm hints at gold
To come into thy hand ere long,
But if thou scratch it, thou dost lose
The fair wind that blows so strong.

A Sunday Christmas forewarns:
Three signs of what the year shall hold;
A winter mild, a Lenten wind,
And summer dry, to then unfold.

Good luck charm on New Year's Day
Maketh fortune bloom all year,
But to lose it or give it away,
Thou dost invite ill-omened fear.

© Stewart Stafford, 2023. All rights reserved.”
― Stewart Stafford

“The evening pulsed with omens gentle to the eyes, and Valentina had a romantic crush on it all, like every good witch should.”
― Lawren Leo, Love's Shadow: Nine Crooked Paths

“I try never to argue with death omens.”
― Seanan McGuire

“The black flags will come from the East, led by mighty men, with long hair and beards, their surnames taken from their home-towns.”
― The Hadith

“When God sends a message of warning through dreams and visions, he is not sending them to instill fear in your heart. He wants to avert the evil that could have happened and soothe your heart with profound peace.”
― Michael Bassey Johnson

“The present apocalypse silences so we may hear.”
― Erica Alex, Cake in the Blackbird Stew

“Snakes, knives, strangers, darkening in the sky— you felt some things with your whole body. What they might mean.”
― Marilynne Robinson, Lila

“There were days when from the moment she came out of sleep, she could feel doom hanging over her head like a low rain cloud. Those were difficult days to live through, not so much because of the sensation of suspended disaster of which she was acutely conscious then, but because the customary smooth functioning of her system of omens was wholly upset. If on ordinary days on her way out to go shopping she turned her ankle or scraped her shin on the furniture, it was easy to conclude that the shopping expedition would be a failure for one reason or another, or that it might be actually dangerous for her to persist in making it. At least on those days she knew a good omen from a bad one. But the other days were treacherous, for the feeling of doom was so strong that it became a hostile consciousness just behind or beside her, forseeing her attempts to avoid flying in the face of the evil omens, and thus all too able to set traps for her.”
― Paul Bowles, The Sheltering Sky

“If only it were possible to dig behind the coming weeks and know! The clouds above the mountains had been a bad sign, but not in the way she had imagined. Instead of the wreck there had been another experience which perhaps would prove more disastrous in its results. As usual she was being saved up for something worse than she expected. But she did not believe it was to be Tunner, so that it really was not important how she behaved now with regard to him. The other omens indicated a horror more vast, and surely ineluctable. Each escape merely made it possible for her to advance into a region of heightened danger. "In that case," she thought, "why not give in? And if I should give in, how would I behave? Exactly the same as now." So that giving in or not giving in had nothing to do with her problem. She as pushing against her own existence. All she could hope to do was eat, sleep and cringe before her omens.”
― Paul Bowles, The Sheltering Sky

“Even as she saw these two men she knew that she would accompany them, and the certainty gave her an unexpected sense of power: instead of feeling the omens, she now would make them, be them herself.”
― Paul Bowles, The Sheltering Sky