... the natural world is the old river that runs through everything, and I think poets will forever fish along its shores.

it is a serious thing // just to be alive / on this fresh morning / in this broken world.

Someone I loved once gave me a box full of darkness. It took me years to understand that this too, was a gift.

I don't ask for the sights in front of me to change, only the depth of my seeing.

Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?

Instructions for living a life. Pay attention. Be astonished. Tell about it.

One day you finally knew what you had to do, and began.

Keep some room in your heart for the unimaginable.

You do not have to be good. You do not have to walk on your knees for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting. You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.

In this universe we are given two gifts: the ability to love and the ability to question. Which are, at the same time, the fires that warm us and the fires that scorch us.

You must not ever stop being whimsical. And you must not, ever, give anyone else the responsibility for your life.

If you don't appreciate your customers, someone else will.

Reason I know, is only a drug, and, as such, its effects are never permanent. But, like the juice of the poppy, it often gives a temporary relief.

I can testify to what UNICEF means to children because I was among those who received food and medical relief right after World War II.

Nobody's as good as you when you do what you do. I need you to own the time that comes with that.

I will always catch you when you fall

No truth is more evident to my mind than that the Christian religion must be the basis of any government intended to secure the rights and privileges of a free people.

Disgrace is immortal, and living even when one thinks it dead.

I don't think I'm particularly sexual, no more than anyone else, though I am very creative.

All the literati keep An imaginary friend.

Things sweet to taste prove in digestion sour.