“The old faiths light their candles all about, But burly Truth comes by and puts them out.”

“Moths, and all sorts of ugly creatures, hover about a lighted candle. Can the candle help it?”

“You know the sultans used to light their garden parties with turtles? They'd put candles on their backs and let them wander around. Hundreds of them.”

“I'm Gentleman Death in silk and lace, come to put out the candles. The canker in the heart of the rose.”

“Days to come stand in front of uslike a row of lighted candles—golden, warm, and vivid candles. Days gone by fall behind us,a gloomy line of snuffed-out candles;the nearest are smoking still,cold, melted, and bent. I don’t want to look at them: their shape saddens me,and it saddens me to remember their original light.I look ahead at my lighted candles. I don’t want to turn for fear of seeing, terrified,how quickly that dark line gets longer,how quickly the snuffed-out candles proliferate.”

“There isn't enough darkness in all the world to snuff out the light of one little candle.”