A hungry tiger is patient only when waiting for the best moment to attack.
From The Fears That Bind, one of 296 sayings written by John Sarris over thirty years.
From Alfred’s journal
The cat from the blue house sat under the feeder for forty minutes this morning without moving anything but the end of her tail. Switch said she had given up and gone philosophical about it. I used to think the same about stillness, that a thing which waits has made some peace with waiting. Then a junco came down and the forty minutes turned out to have been one long crouch, and I understood that a hungry tiger is patient only when waiting for the best moment to attack. The junco got away; the cat went back to being a statue, which is the part I keep turning over. From the walnut branch I could not tell the difference between her two stillnesses, and I had the better view.
He reads what you tell him and writes a page of his journal back, with a few of these chosen for you. It costs nothing and asks for nothing.
More like it
- Two dogs alone have more fun than two dogs and a bone.
- Fight for every inch and you'll rarely move a foot.
- Rarely does all good sense dwell on one side of a fence.
- A cornered animal does not heed wise counsel.
- People fight hardest to defend their right not to say what they are fighting about.
- Louder isn't righter.