The turnip cannot thrive in the tulips patch of soil. 
But the words she chooses withhold their best qualities, they refuse to match the way she feels inside. 
This city is like no other city in the world. It is brilliant but it is bloated, and I've never called it home 
I thought I deserved them, the sort of people you found only in novels. Quick 
Amsterdam: Where the pendulum swings from God to a guilder. 
Everything Man sees he takes for a toy.Thus is he always, forever a boy.
My life was a beanstalk and I was Jack, and the foliage was shooting up and up, abundant, impressive, at such speed that I could barely cling on. 
Love is best a phantom than reality, better in the chase than caught. 
I see you are working your usual magic this evening." "Not magic, Madame. Just me." Agnes 
Love is better in the chase than caught - by Marin 
Souls and purses, she thinks, these two are obsessed with souls and purses. 
The more they try to look holy the less I am convinced, 
We were born to imagine. 
I feel younger than eighteen but burdened as a eighty-year-old. 
Hard grind got us the glory, 
Freedom is a glorious thing. Free yourself, Marin. The bars on your cage are of your own making. 
What was once, is no longer. 
You are a stone, thrown upon a lake. But the ripples you create will never make you still. 
the browning Assendelft flatlands, this stranger 
She has always thought that kindness was an active thing. But the not doing of something, an act of restraint -- could that be kindness too? 
Neighbours watching neighbours, twisting ropes to bind us all. 
You have to keep your wealth afloat and no one will do it for you. It'll run through your fingers if you don't care. 
A Depressive?' 'Smiles in ballrooms, weeps in bedrooms. Ill in her head.' Olive tapped her temple. 'And here.' She touched her heart.
of fear beats inside her. Who is this woman, watching from afar, who comments 
Words are water in this city. One drop of rumour could drown us. 
Marin believes love is better in the chase than caught. 
A piece of art only succeeds when it's creator...possesses the belief that brings it into being 
In suffering do we find our truest selves," she says. 
The rules of this house are written in water. I must either sink or swim. 
Nothing here is more fabulous than the truth 
Believe it or don't believe it, Madame. But my feet are tired too. Bloody tired. Like a dead man's. 
GOD - the importance of invisible over tangible 
Then the birds flew away, their names turned to kisses, a silence to spell a new world. 
But how right is it to kill a man for something that is in his soul? 
All we can do if we're lucky is stich up the mistakes other people make. 
How do I begin to love you? - the 
Why are we so trapped by the hours, the minutes of every day? Why can't we live the life that's always out of reach? 
In suffering we find our truest selves. 
There is nothing hidden that will not be revealed. 
But words are water in Amsterdam, they flood your ears and set the rot, and the church's east corner is crowded. 
Here she is a puppet, a vessel for others to pour their speech. And it is not a man she has married, but a world. 
There are horizons through the brickwork, you wait and see. 
You are sunlight through a window, which I stand in, warmed. My darling. 
This is not a conversation, it is Agnes sending out darts and watching them pierce. 
From little seeds great flowers grow. 
Love your children, for they are the seeds that will make this city bloom. 
The ink was secret nectar, for Marin isn't married. 