“She blushes like a rose in bloom, though I ripped her up from the roots long ago.”

“she is nearing forty and not so easily forgiven as when her skin bloomed like roses.”

“The honeysuckle was everywhere the day the letter arrived, like heat. Wild roses bloomed in hedges of tendrils and perfume. There were fat bees, dirigible bees, plump and miniature. It was a sweet, tangled morning, and the sun rose, leisurely, in a spectacular blush.”

“The mouth was wide open and ripped at the corners, as though she had choked a little in giving up the tremendous vitality she had stored so long.”

“Love is like the wild rose-briar; Friendship like the holly-tree. The holly is dark when the rose-briar blooms, but which will bloom most constantly?”

“She ripped the wild bun down from the crown of her head, and then brushed her long hair with her fingers. I couldn’t stop staring while she rewrapped it and tied it back again. I imagined that this was what she looked like in the morning, and then had to think about the first ten minutes of Saving Private Ryan to keep my dick from getting hard.”