Impulse Quotes

“Love means holding on to someone just as hard as you can because if you don't, one blink and they might disappear...forever.”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“Act
on your impulse,
swallow the bottle,
cut a little deeper,
put the gun to your chest.”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“Grandma once told me it's easy to overthink love, to dissect it and question it until it is no more.”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“Wish you could turn off the questions, turn off the voices, turn off all sound.
Yearn to close out the ugliness, close out the filthiness, close out all light.
Long to cast away yesterday, cast away memory, cast away all jeapordy.
Pray you could somehow stop uncertainty, somehow stop the loathing, somehow stop the pain.
Act on your impulse, swallow the bottle, cut a little deeper, put the gun to your chest.”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“One foot in front of the other, counting tiles on the floor so I don't have to focus the blur of painted smiles, fake faces.”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“Memory is a tenuous thing. . . .

flickering glimpses, blue
and white, like ancient,
decomposing 16mm film.
Happiness escapes
me there, where faces
are vague and yesterday
seems to come tied
up in ribbons of pain.

Happiness? I look for it intead
in today, where memory
is something I can still
touch, still rely on.
I find it in the smiles
of new friends, the hope
blossoming inside.

My happiest memories
have no place in the
past; they are those
I have yet to create.”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“It [death] chokes you, gags you, but you have to pretend that you're doing just fine, not trembling with this fear because the end is close.”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“Too much to take in, too much to purge. Why must every memory, once sweet, dead end in such ugliness?”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“You believe this is a game, and you may be right. But if you think you can play it better than me, think again.”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“My happiest memories have no place in the past; they are those I have yet to create.”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“Now that I have opened that bottle of memories they're pouring out like wine, crimson and bittersweet.”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“I'd sleep outside naked in the blizzard,for you.”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“Forever has no meaning when you're living in the moment.”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“Everyone's afraid of everybody else...maybe because we're all afraid of ourselves.”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“I mean, if you're gonna
purposely lose your mind,
you want to get it back some
day. Don't you? Okay, maybe not.”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“I tattered their wings and tore off their legs, joint by joint, watched them crawl in circles, like little lost infants, untill they decide to die.”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“TRIAD:
Three
separate highways
intersect at a place
no reasonable person
would ever want to go.

Three
lives that would have
been cut short, if not
for hasty interventions
by loved ones. Or Fate.

Three
people, with nothing
at all in common
except age, proximity,
and a wish to die.

Three
tapestries, tattered
at the edges and come
unwoven to reveal
a single mutual thread.”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“The truth is, I don't have a real clue what love is - how to find it, how to give it. Once upon a time I thought I knew.”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“....a perfect paper airplane.”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“And the thought of that makes me want to open a vein, experience pain, know I'm alive, despite this living death.”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“Standing Here


My entire world far beneath
my feet, I should be filled
with pride. Instead, I feel
overwhelmed by a sense of defeat.

Suddenly it comes to me,
toes tempted to test the ledge,
that there is a way out of this.
Clam surety flows through

my veins, and as I turn to wave
good-bye, I wonder if it will
hurt or if a single person
will cry at my funeral.

I take a deep breath, a final
taste of sweet mountain air.
I conjure Leona, Emily.
Move my feet closer. Closer

There's Grandma One, Grandma
Two, and their spouses, waiting
for me. I see Dad. Cara. Mommy.
I screw up my courage, step over”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“As the old saying goes, "sometimes loving someone means letting them go.”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“But then, my entire life is bullshit. The best things in it have vanished, ghosts. Ghosts I'll admit I created.”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“Grown up? Me? I suppose I have. Killing things, and almost killing myself, must have changed me some, after all.”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“I wonder how long it would take him to realize I'm right as sin - it's the rest of the world that's wrong. I'm not even sure how I qualify for admission to Aspen Springs. Does wanting to die equal losing your mind?”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“But Hey, Guess What
Crazy means I'm not liable
for my actions. So screw it,
I'll go home, propped up on
Prozac against distractions”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“No, of course not. But surely you know your affair couldn't go on forever."
"Forever has no meaning when you're living in the moment and I wasn't ready for that moment to end.”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“It was the exact opposite
for me. At first all I
wanted was sex with her,
but soon I wanted more.

More sex, yes, in unusual
places, and all different kinds.
But that wasn’t all. I wanted
her to fill the empty spaces

left by a father who never
once praised me, ‘friends’ who
used me, an ice princess mom
who raised me with glass kisses.”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“Freedom is a double-edged ideal, because true freedom comes without the protection of laws that also enslave us by defining us--female, male; Christian, Islamic; good, evil. All at the whim of a frail minority.”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse

“It is hard to believe that something that seems so permanent was once so different. Change. I guess that really is one thing you can count on...”
― Ellen Hopkins, Impulse