Tolstoy is one of the greatest artists in history, but he finally became infused with the idea of the uselessness of art. He gave himself to his own kind of religion.

I will look at the footprints going in and out of the water and dream up a small blue good to talk to.

I feel that my job, as an artist, is to disturb the peace. And to disturb it intellectually, linguistically, politically and literally.

I have left out what I don't remember or don't know. Temperament, fear, shyness, obedience, kindness.

Sometimes a person thinks he's attached to one thing and he's really attached to something else.

The artist looks for a subject. You know, a lot of new poets don't seem to have a subject. I don't totally understand that.

Humor is not funny. Humor is something else. Funny is a joke, sometimes silly. Comedy is deep and connected to tragedy; comedy could be deeper than tragedy, in my view.

There are hundreds of prisons - sexual, political, cultural. But being a prisoner also gives you impetus.

It's just that very few poets disturb the peace to any degree.

I've been active in a minor way compared to professional activists. I was a labor leader. I led two labor strikes. I've manipulated boards. I've led marches. I've done many things.

I was ruined before I got started. I say ruined, but I could say blessed; I was too far gone to believe in it. And I'm shocked how generation after generation repeats the behavior.

...when he possessed her, they seemed to swoon together at the very borderland of life’s mystery.

Their manners are more gentle, kind, than of our generation you shall find.

Human suffering is caused mainly by ideas, emotions, and thoughts which are the handiwork of the human itself.

task not unlike coming to grips with the Holy Ghost.' There

It takes spiritual authority to bless others. Many Christians say, "God bless you," but one clearly senses that although the words express a kind wish, they lack real spiritual authority.

I believe that owning our worthiness is the act of acknowledging that we are sacred. Perhaps embracing vulnerability and overcoming numbing is ultimately about the care and feeding of our spirits

I have a dream of what would have happened if what happened instead hadn't.

Writing code is not production, it's not always craftsmanship though it can be, it's design.

I believe because it is absurd.

He hath borne himself beyond the promise of his age, doing, in the figure of a lamb, the feats of a lion.