For me, the music is always like the small rowboat I get into at the very beginning of my process.

A lot of poets too live on the margins of social acceptance, they certainly aren't in it for the money. William Blake - only his first book was legitimately published.

I didn't get my degree at NYU; I got it later, they gave me an honourary one.

I think of poets as outlaw visionaries in a way.

When I get depressed, or anything, I go 'think of all the music I haven't even heard yet!' So, it's the one thing. Imagine the world without music. Man, just hand me a gun, will you?

If anyone tells you there is only one way, their way, get as far away from them as possible, both physically and philosophically.

It's hard to get lost if you don't know where you're going.

The beauty of life is in small details, not in big events.

Each one of us is a set of shifting molecules, spinning in ecstasy.

The counterculture is always repackaged and made into a product. It's part of America.

I prefer to be subcultural rather than mass-cultural. I'm not interested in hitting the vein of the mainstream.

Love yourself first to love everyone else.

I covet solitude and storms…and rain, with its geography of dark silence and distance

Miracles should run after you and not you running after miracles.

Consistency is contrary to nature contrary to life. The only completely consistent people are the dead.

The music should be first, not the ego or the personality or the style.

And in their motions harmony divine So smoothes her charming tones, that God's own ear Listens delighted.

Working for a big company is, I believe, much risker than it looks.

I am a God-fearing man. In fact, I don't go to church because I'm afraid I'll run into him there.

Nine-tenths of discipline is having the patience to do things right.

Young quarterbacks do well because they have a great defense.