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John Coltrane, He Talks To God. He Starts Playing His Solo, He Might Play For 14 Minutes. For 14 Minutes, It Seems Like He's Talking To God, But He Always Takes A Hold Of The Melody.

-Patti Smith

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John Coltrane, He Talks

Patti Smith

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John Coltrane, He Talks To God. He Starts Playing His Solo, He Might Play For 14 Minutes. For 14 Minutes, It Seems Like He's Talking To God, But He Always Takes A Hold Of The Melody.

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I Realize That People Need Something To Believe In.

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First Of All, Anybody Who Has Lasted 30 And Went Through The 60's Is Really A Survivor.

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I Was Real Religious When I Was Young. I Wanted To Be A Missionary.

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A Good Artist's Always Got His Hand In His Zipper.

I've Never Felt Grounded Because Of My Ancestry Or My Gender. I Think Until Women Get Away From That They're Not Going To Be Great Writers.

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Life Is Like A Roller Coaster. It's Never Going To Be Perfect - It Is Going To Have Perfect Moments, And Then Rough Spots, But It's All Worth It.

I Don't Consider Writing A Quiet, Closet Act. I Consider It A Real Physical Act. When I'm Home Writing On The Typewriter, I Go Crazy. I Move Like A Monkey. I've Wet Myself, I've Come In My Pants Writing.

He Found It Was As Easy To Hurl Beauty As Anything Else. (on Robert Mapplethorpe)

I Have Disciplined Myself When I'm Working. When I Discovered Art, I Realized That One Could Keep That Search Going Within Creation. But I Also Realize That In Order To Create The Art, You Have To Stay, You Can't Go Too Far.

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I Gave You A Wrist Watch, Baby, And You Wouldn't Even Give Me The Time Of Day.

Americans Just Don't Know What Being A Movie Star's All About.

I've Written A Lot Of Prose. I Just Haven't Published It.

When I Was A Kid, I Loved Sherlock Holmes. I'm Not Interested In Crimes. I'm Interested In The Mind Of The Detective And His Process, Which To Me Is A Lot Like The Artist.

All The Traumas I Went Through Separating Art From Writing Don't Exist Anymore. That's Why I Love Being In Rock 'n' Roll. It's A Whole Life Thing.

The Sea Is Greater Than Us - It Has Its Rhythm, Its Art. It Comes With Our Earliest Memory, Of Respiration, Breathing In And Out.

The Thing I've Always Liked About Performing Is That I Decide What I Want To Wear, Whether I Want To Comb My Hair.

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In The '50s You Had To Wear Pink Ribbons If You Were A Girl, And You Were Supposed To Become A Hairdresser Or A Secretary. I Couldn't Stomach It. Later On, When I Fell In Love With My Husband And Had Children, That's When My Mother's Earthiness Or Sense Of Femaleness Kicked In.

Sometimes [people] Seem To Think I Came Out Of The Womb, You Know, Cursing, With An Electric Guitar.

Even As A Child, I Knew What I Didn't Want. I Didn't Want To Wear Red Lipstick.

It Got To The Point Where I Started Hiding Because I Didn't Want To Be Photographed. (on Living With Robert Mapplethorpe)

Why Can't I Write Something That Would Awake The Dead? That Pursuit Is What Burns Most Deeply.

I Didn't Know Kurt Cobain Or Amy Winehouse, But I Was Affected By Both Of Their Deaths Because I Admired Their Work So Much And Mourned Their Youth And Work They Would Never Produce.

There Are So Many Great 19th-century Photographers, And It's Really My Favorite Period, But The Amateurs Did Such Beautiful Work.

What A Model Of An Artist Was For Me Was An Artist Who Worked. Picasso Was The Ultimate Model, Because The Work Ethic He Had.

I Don't Know Why, The Very First Word On My Very First Record Is 'jesus.' I Still Invoke Him As An Entity To Reckon With.

I Didn't Want Any Middle-of-the-road Creep. I Always Wanted The Toughest Guy In School, The Guy From South Philly Who Wore Tight Black Pants. Y'know, The Guy Who Carried The Umbrella And Wore White Shirts With Real Thin Black Ties. I Was Really Nuts Over This Guy Named Butchie Magic 'cause He Let Me Carry His Switchblade.

Since I Was A Child, I Hated Having To Deal With My Hair. I Hated Having To Change My Clothes. As A Kid, I Had A Sailor Shirt And The Same Old Corduroy Pants, And That's What I Wanted To Wear Everyday.

I Hadn't Performed Or Been In The Public Eye For About 16 Years. When My Husband Passed Away, I Was Obliged To Go Back To Work To Take Care Of Our Kids. I Also Wanted To Do A Record In Memory Of Him. So We Did Gone Again. During That Process, I Had To Be Photographed And Had To Go Back To Doing Articles And Interviews.

I Can't Bear Working With A Click Track, We're Not Click Track People. But For "mercy Is ..." We All Got In One Mind Because The Song Is Delicate; It's Not A Song That Showcases A Vocal Or Some Virtuoso.

He Dreamed Of Amassing Musicians From All Over The World In Woodstock And They Would Sit In A Field In A Circle And Play And Play. It Didn't Matter What Key Or Tempo Or What Melody, They Would Keep On Playing Through Their Discordance Until They Found A Common Language.

We Believe We Will Raise The Sky, We Got To Fly Over The Land, Over The Sea. Fate Unwinds And If We Die, Souls Arise. God, Do Not Seize Me Please.

I Think It's Really Great That People Share Their Work [on Myspace] And No One Is Paying For It. I Think That's A Very Healthy Thing And It's Not A Corporate Thing.

Paths That Cross Will Cross Again

I Don't Think The Average American Understands What Patriotism Truthfully Is. That's Why When I Attack Our Country Or Attack The Government, It's Sometimes Looked At As Unpatriotic. It's Not.

If The Postman Is Saying Hello To You, Then I Feel Like, Wow, Thats Something Special.

I Never Had Aspirations To Go Into Politics Or Medicine. I Always Wanted To Be An Artist Of Some Sort. I Wasn't So Politically Motivated. I Felt That The World From An Early Age Was Disappointing. My Father Taught Me About The Bomb, And It Was Eye-opening. From Then On, I Thought Grown-ups Needed To Do A Better Job. I Still Think That.

New York Is The Thing That Seduced Me.

I Always Hope That Young People Will Think For Themselves And Also Most Importantly, Understand That They Should Judge Themselves On Their Own Merit, Their Good Deeds, However Simple, To Not Judge Themselves By What They Have Materially, By What Other People Think Of Them, Through Social Media.

For Me, Personally, I Think Drugs Are Sacred And Should Be Used For Work. That's What I Believe In. Drugs Have A Real Shamanistic Value. I Can Handle Drugs. I've Never Had A Problem.

When I Started Making Music, We'd Lost A Lot Of Our Great People. Rock Was Moving In A Direction I Didn't Like. Rock Was My Generation's Revolutionary, Sexual, Poetic, And Political Voice, But It Had Become Corporatized. It Was Going Into Stadiums. It Was So Far Removed From Its Basic Roots.

A Lullaby Should Be Timeless Because It's A Timeless Concept - The Birth Of The Child.

A Writer, Or Any Artist, Can’t Expect To Be Embraced By The People [but] You Just Keep Doing Your Work - Because You Have To, Because It’s Your Calling.

My Father's Mother Was From Liverpool And She Had This Very Beautiful English China. I Only Wanted To Drink My Cocoa Out Of My Grandmother's Cup And Saucer.

If I Have Any Regrets, I Could Say That I'm Sorry I Wasn't A Better Writer Or A Better Singer.

The Film [dream Of Life] Looks At A Time In My Life.

In 1974, When I Started Working With The Material That Became Horses, A Lot Of Our Great Voices Had Died. We'd Lost Jimi Hendrix And Jim Morrison And Janis Joplin, And People Like Robert Kennedy, Martin Luther King And Malcolm X.

I Was Like One Of The Boys In School Who Flap Their Legs Frantically Under The Desk. I Always Had This Weird Feeling Between My Legs And I Had No Idea What It Was. I Didn't Know Girls Masturbated. I Never Touched Myself Or Anything.

We Never Had Any Children," He Said Ruefully. "our Work Was Our Children.

Technology Is 50% Of Rock 'n' Roll - The Magic, The Art, The Performance. If You Don't Have Good Technicians And A Strong Road Crew Who Are Devoted And Believe In You And Protect You, You're Totally Naked.

I Was Horny, But I Was Innocent 'cause I Was A Real-late Bloomer And Not Particularly Attractive. In Fact, Homely.

I Think Its Very Important That We Enjoy Our Life, That We Get Everything We Can Out Of It.

We Tried Not To Age, But Time Had Its Rage.

My Mother Loved Rock And Roll. She Loved High-energy Music.

New Generations Are Intoxicated With The Idea That They Can Make Their Presence Known On The Internet. When I Was Young, There Wasn't Anything Comparable. Very Few Got Their Picture In A Magazine, Fewer Made Records. We Have To Stand Back And Let Them Get Their Footing. Hopefully They'll Come To The Realization That The Most Important Thing Is Their Work And How They Conduct Themselves.

Artists Are Traditionally Resistant To Labels.

One Thing I Like About Getting Older Is Things, Your Spectrum Widens, Your Capacity For Compassion Widens.

I Reflected On The Fact That No Matter How Good I Aspired To Be, I Was Never Going To Achieve Perfection

Yet You Could Feel A Vibration In The Air, A Sense Of Hastening. It Had Started With The Moon, Inaccessible Poem That It Was. Now Men Had Walked Upon It, Rubber Treads On A Pearl Of The Gods. Perhaps It Was An Awareness Of Time Passing, The Last Summer Of The Decade. Sometimes I Just Wanted To Raise My Hands And Stop. But Stop What? Maybe Just Growing Up.

Social Media Could Be Very Strong In Terms Of Bringing People Together But It Also Takes Up So Much Of People's Time That I Wonder If We've Lost The Ability To Daydream.

Should I Pursue A Path So Twisted? Should I Crawl Defeated And Gifted?

Unanswered Questions

People Like Beauty And Purity. They Pretend That's What It's All About.

I Like Energy. I Like To Feel It Cracklin', I Like Sexual Energy In A Room, And I Like Tension.

I Love Being Alive. I Like Being A Human Being.

We Went Our Separate Ways, But Within Walking Distance Of One Another.

Who Can Know The Heart Of Youth But Youth Itself?

One Day We’ll Go In Together, And The Work Will Be Ours.

We Need A New Cosmology. New Gods. New Sacraments. Another Drink.

All I've Ever Wanted, Since I Was A Child, Was To Do Something Wonderful.

I'm From South Jersey: The Idea Of Eating A Roll With Olive Oil And Anchovies Or Some Kind Of Sardine And Drinking Mint Tea Definitely Comes From Reading Paul Bowles.

I Walk Alone, Assaulted It Seems, By Tears From Heaven.

I Think I Work In Two Worlds. I'll Always Try To Kick Through A Wall. I Did That When I Was Younger And I Still Have My Way Of Doing That.

What Is The Soul? What Color Is It? I Suspected My Soul, Being Mischievous, Might Slip Away While I Was Dreaming And Fail To Return. I Did My Best Not To Fall Asleep, To Keep It Inside Of Me Where It Belonged.

...heroine: The Artist, The Premier Mistress Writhering In A Garden Graced W/highly Polished Blades Of Grass... Release (ethiopium) Is The Drug...an Animal Howl Says It All...notes Pour Into The Caste Of Freedom...the Freedom To Be Intense...to Defy Social Order And Break The Slow Kill Monotony Of Censorship. To Break From The Long Bonds Of Servitude-ruthless Adoration Of The Celestial Shepherd. Let Us Celebrate Our Own Flesh-to Embrace Not Ones Race Mais The Marathon-to Never Let Go Of The Fiery Sadness Called Desire.

I Don't Think The Palestinian People Or Afghan Children Or Some Other Things I'm Concerned About Are At The Top Of Other People's Agendas - Not Right Now, When America Is Going Through Such A Recession And People Are Suffering Across The Board Financially. But I Think All That Will Change.

In My Low Periods, I Wondered What Was The Point Of Creating Art. For Whom? Are We Animating God? Are We Talking To Ourselves? And What Was The Ultimate Goal? To Have One's Work Caged In Art's Great Zoos - The Modern, The Met, The Louvre?

I Remember When You Were Born, It Was Dawn And The Storm Settled Near My Belly. And I Rolled In The Grass And Spit Out The Gas, And I Lit A Match And The Void Went Flash. And The Sky Split And The Planets Hit, Balls Of Jade Dropped And Existence Stopped.

I Just Know That Young People Suffer, And I Also Know Music Is One Of The Things That Help You Get Through - Music And Friends.

Put Down Your Cell Phones, Put Everything Away, And Feel Your Blood Pulsing In You, Feel Your Creative Impulse, Feel Your Own Spirit, Your Heart, Your Mind. Feel The Joy Of Being Alive And Free.

[steven Sebring] Presence Was Also Nice For My Children, Who, Having Just Lost Their Father, Quite Naturally Craved Warm Male Attention. They Gravitated To Him Right Away.

I Use Drugs To Work. I Never Use Them To Escape Or For Pleasure. When You Turn To Drugs, All You're Doing Is Turning Inside, Anyway. I Only Use Drugs For Construction. It's Like One Of My Architectural Tools.

What Is The Impulse That Drove To Direct? To Me, It Seems So Immense. Just Having A Rock 'n' Roll Band, Or To Go From The Solitude Of Writing And To Having To Collaborate, Is Almost Schizophrenic.

What Helps Me Is Watching Other People Negotiate Loss. I Think About How We Dropped A Bomb On People In Hiroshima And 150,000 People Were Killed In One Night. Those People Had To Mourn And They Had To Rebuild Their City Right Away.

We Wanted, It Seemed, What We Already Had, A Lover And A Friend To Create With, Side By Side. To Be Loyal, Yet Be Free.

I Had No Proof That I Had The Stuff To Be An Artist, Though I Hungered To Be One.

I Think Some Of That Hopelessness Of My Generation Got Passed On To Later Generations - The Sense Of Uselessness.

John Coltrane, He Talks To God. He Starts Playing His Solo, He Might Play For 14 Minutes. For 14 Minutes, It Seems Like He's Talking To God, But He Always Takes A Hold Of The Melody.

I Don't Wear Makeup. I Can't Stand Nothin' On My Face. It's A Phobia. It's Not A Platform.

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