Vivid comparisons, from Elyse Sommer and Mike Sommer’s Similes Dictionary, 1988:

• Love is like the moon; when it does not increase it decreases. (Joseph Alexandre Pierre Segur)
• Cities, like cats, will reveal themselves at night. (Rupert Brooke)
• Calm as a virgin discussing flower arrangement. (George MacDonald Fraser)
• The conversations … behaved like green logs, they fumed but would not fire. (Truman Capote)
• Fierce as a lobster making one last lunge out of the pot. (Norman Mailer)
• Dogged as a turtle crossing a road. (Marge Piercy)
• Confident as a man dialing his own telephone number. (Jack Bell)
• His mouth felt as if it had been to a party without him. (Peter De Vries)
• False economy is like stopping one hole in a sieve. (Samuel Johnson)
• Writers, like teeth, are divided into incisors and grinders. (Walter Bagehot)

“Strong men are made by opposition,” wrote Frank Harris. “Like kites they go up against the wind.”