Man is a bird full of mud, I say aloud. And death looks on with a casual eye and scratches his anus.

Emerald as heavy as a golf course, ruby as dark as an afterbirth, diamond as white as sun on the sea.

Saints have no moderation, nor do poets, just exuberance.

I am a collection of dismantled almosts.

Put your ear down close to your soul and listen hard.

As it has been said: Love and a cough cannot be concealed. Even a small cough. Even a small love.

I’m lost. And it’s my own fault. It’s about time I figured out that I can’t ask people to keep me found.

Watch out for intellect, because it knows so much it knows nothing and leaves you hanging upside down, mouthing knowledge as your heart falls out of your mouth.

Meanwhile in my head, I’m undergoing open-heart surgery.

O starry night, This is how I want to die

O yellow eye, let me be sick with your heat, let me be feverish and frowning.

Most people do not really want others to have freedom of speech, they just want others to be given the freedom to say want they want to hear.

Strange things conspire when one tries to cheat fate

When you break rules, break 'em good and hard

The thing that enchants me the most is the ability women have to feel other people's pain. The total empathy that women have is extraordinary.

You can't start taking away benefits if people don't have any opportunities.

I try to remember that the job - as well as the plight, and the unexpected joy - of the artist is to embrace uncertainty, to be sharpened and honed by it.

Moderation in people who are contented comes from that calm that good fortune lends to their spirit.

You can never be sure whether you are discovering the truth or inventing it.

Hug me and you will see the moon. Love me and I will bring the moon to you!

The people who came to hear me perform or to buy my records were not the type who would be offended [by the song 'The Vatican Rag']. But I gather that there were other people who were offended.