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“TWENTY bridges from Tower to Kew -
Wanted to know what the River knew,
Twenty Bridges or twenty-two,
For they were young, and the Thames was old
And this is the tale that River told:”
― Rudyard Kipling

“My New Year's Eve is always 2 July, the night before my birthday. That's the night I make my resolutions. And this year scares the life out of me, because no matter how successful, how good things appear, there is always a deep core of failure within me, although I am trying to deal with it. My biggest fear, this coming year, is that I will be waking up alone.

It makes me wonder how many bodies will be fished out of the Thames, how many decaying corpses will be found in one-room flats.

I'm just being realistic.”
― Tracey Emin, Strangeland

“The Thames Shouldered its way past Blackfriars Bridge, impatient with the ancient piers, no longer the passive stream that slid past Chelsea Marina, but a rush of ugly water that had scented the open sea and was ready to make a run for it.”
― J.G. Ballard, Millennium People

“I have admired the romantic elegance of the Place de la Concorde in Paris, have felt the mystic message from a thousand glittering windows at sunset in New York, but to me the view of the London Thames from our hotel window transcends them all for utilitarian grandeur - something deeply human.”
― Charles Chaplin, My Autobiography

“There is no river in the world to be compared for majesty and the witchery of association, to the Thames; it impresses even the unreading and unimaginative watcher with a solemnity which he cannot account for, as it rolls under his feet and swirls past the buttresses of its many bridges; he may think, as he experiences the unusual effect, that it is the multiplicity of buildings which line its banks, or the crowd of sea-craft which floats upon its surface, or its own extensive spread. In reality he feels, although he cannot explain it, the countless memories which hang for ever like a spiritual fog over its rushing current.

("The Phantom Model")”
― Hume Nisbet, Gaslit Nightmares: Stories by Robert W. Chambers, Charles Dickens, Richard Marsh, and Others

“The Thames was beautiful, dark, and swift beneath the billion yellow and white lights of the cityâ€�”
― Charles Finch, The Last Enchantments

“They bear down upon Westminster, the ghost-consecrated Abbey, and the history-crammed Hall, through the arches of the bridge with a rush as the tide swelters round them; the city is buried in a dusky gloom save where the lights begin to gleam and trail with lurid reflections past black velvety- looking hulls - a dusky city of golden gleams. St. Paul's looms up like an immense bowl reversed, squat, un-English, and undignified in spite of its great size; they dart within the sombre shadows of the Bridge of Sighs, and pass the Tower of London, with the rising moon making the sky behind it luminous, and the crowd of shipping in front appear like a dense forest of withered pines, and then mooring their boat at the steps beyond, with a shuddering farewell look at the eel-like shadows and the glittering lights of that writhing river, with its burthen seen and invisible, they plunge into the purlieus of Wapping.

("The Phantom Model")”
― Hume Nisbet, Gaslit Nightmares: Stories by Robert W. Chambers, Charles Dickens, Richard Marsh, and Others

“But why have you dear English Jew whose forefathers fought to enter the country of Johnny Mill, the Stuart with a little heart, saunter in Haridwar, no pubs or fish and chips' counters here, only Ganga-Jal, -the holy ale- Quaff it for the spirit and carry it to the banks of Thames in a holy grail.”
― Aporva Kala, Life... Love... Kumbh...

“The Thames here had a vastly different character to the wide, muddy tyrant that seethed through London. It was graceful and deft and remarkably light of heart. It skipped over stones and skimmed its banks, water so clear that one could see the reeds swaying deep down on her narrow bed. The river here was a she, he'd decided. For all its sunlit transparency, there were certain spots in which it was suddenly unfathomable.”
― Kate Morton, The Clockmaker's Daughter

“A RIB is a rigid inflatable boat, and this has an engine at the rear which pushes the nose up and out of the water as it bounces along at a great speed. This was a good-sized one and I realised that it must have an antigrav component because it never sank in the water though the team of Neptunians got on with us. The marine engineer steering it took us out to the dive boat, a large â€� to our eyes â€� vessel over a mile offshore. We sat back and gripped the rope lacings along the sides and breathed in salt spray air, grinning foolishly at our friends and each other. The RIB engine was so noisy that we couldn’t really talk but we were relishing being right down at water level, streaking across the Thames estuary, heading for the most dangerous boat in the world.”
― Clare O'Beara, Dining Out Around The Solar System

“Fifteen feet away, the wide River Thames rolled past, dark and deep and mysterious is the sullen-not-quite sunrise.”
― Amy Butler Greenfield, Chantress Alchemy

“Undulating rivulets emerged when
Paleocene glacial ice had formed
Fluvial rifts worn in naked chalk hills,
Currents flowed over burnished boulders
Moving past numinous burial mounds.”
― Ruth Ann Oskolkoff, The Bones of the Poor

“Numerous gifted objects; black granite
Etchings, carved statues, broken goddesses,
Inscriptions, pottery, jewelry, rough-hewn
Garnets, flowers, consecrated herbs, skulls,
Gold ornaments, weapons, prized artifacts;
Sacrifices, ancestors� ageless prayers
Left with olden Father Thames. For them,
The sinuous streams were alive, full worlds
Of votive offerings inside murky depths,
Lifeblood pleas, observances thereafter
Troubles now vanished, solemn promises,
Treasures carefully bestowed upon
Spirits, watchful deities; faithfully
Invoking his ancient name Tamesas.”
― Ruth Ann Oskolkoff, The Bones of the Poor

“From seasonal splashes near Trewsbury
European eels migrate upstream;
Myriad carp, redfin perch, brook lamprey,
Dragonflies, mosquitoes, wee midges,
Pale cormorant, herring gulls, wagtails,
Swans glide round woodland tapestry,
Braided channel islands rest alone,
Arched medieval stone slab bridges,
Tree lines fête ash, alder, chestnut, beech.
Floodplains, tangled sedge reedbeds,
Owls speed above tree-covered islets,
Teaming alluvium water-meadows
Growing lavender, iris, marigold.”
― Ruth Ann Oskolkoff, The Bones of the Poor

“Father Thames drifts beside misty heath
Dark surfaces veil universes beneath,
Hushed verge our temple, tall hedge my altar,
Heeding eerie owl calls some reveal they
have heard, long-expected wintery freeze,
Unending run which travels further east,
Aquatic animals receive refuge below.”
― Ruth Ann Oskolkoff, The Bones of the Poor

“Visiting sheer essence of bog and fen,
Walking rough footpaths along edges
Slowly nearing home, greeting itinerant
Passers-by, contemplating end journeys
We all take, flying towards distant seas
Like great blue herons do, understanding
Harmony amid nature’s undulate ways
Of old river rhythms, oh Father Thames.”
― Ruth Ann Oskolkoff, The Bones of the Poor