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Where Does It All Lead? What Will Become Of Us? These Were Our Young Questions, And Young Answers Were Revealed. It Leads To Each Other. We Become Ourselves.

-Patti Smith

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Where Does It All

Patti Smith

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Where Does It All Lead? What Will Become Of Us? These Were Our Young Questions, And Young Answers Were Revealed. It Leads To Each Other. We Become Ourselves.

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I Worked For Hillary [clinton] When I Was Young - When She Was Running For The Senate. I Was Fundraising And Things, I See All Of These People As Political In A Way That Isn't Humanistic. I'm Just Watching And Hoping That Someone Is Going To Distinguish Himself Or Herself As Comprehending What We Need.

I Had A Handful Of Records, But When I Was 11 Years Old, I Liked Puccini As Much As Little Richard. They Both Made Sense To Me.

New York Is The Thing That Seduced Me.

Everybody's Got To Reclaim These Thingspoetry, Rock'n'roll, Political Activismand It's Got To Be Done Over And Over Again. It's Like Eating: You Can't Say,'oh, I Ate Yesterday'.you Have To Eat Again.

I Believe We All Have A Unique Journey, Whether Its A Journey Of Pure Energy, If There's Any Intelligence Within The Journey. But I Think Each Of Us Have Our Own Way Of Dissipating Or Entering A New Field.

What I've Always Tried To Do Is To Express The Highest Point Of Me, And Rock 'n' Roll Is The First And The Most Open Form Created By Our Generation. The Cool Thing About It Is That You Get The Power, You Get The Rhythm; You Can Be Taken Over Sexually, You Can Be Taken Over Cerebrally; It's Great To Look At - It's A Package Deal.

I Don't Think," He Insisted. "i Feel.

I Imagined Myself As Frida To Diego, Both Muse And Maker. I Dreamed Of Meeting An Artist To Love And Support And Work With Side By Side.

I Have Seen A Lifetime Of Transgender People And It Was Hard Enough Being Gay In The '50s And Early '60s. One Couldn't Imagine The Cruelty That Trans People Had To Face Back Then.

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.

Will You Pretend You're My Boyfriend?

Everyone Thinks Of God As A Man - You Can't Help It - Santa Claus Was A Man, Therefore God Has To Be A Man.

I Had Met Michael Stipe, And He Was Such A Kind Person, And Extremely Understanding, So I Asked Him If He Knew A Photographer Who Would Come To Detroit, Where I Lived, Who Would Be Child Friendly And Who Would Respect My Home. Michael Suggested Steven [ Sebring]. One Day A Knock Came At My Door, And When I Opened It, There Was Steven. He's Been Like A Brother Ever Since.

There Were Days, Rainy Gray Days, When The Streets Of Brooklyn Were Worthy Of A Photograph, Every Window The Lens Of A Leica, The View Grainy And Immobile. We Gathered Our Colored Pencils And Sheets Of Paper And Drew Like Wild, Feral Children Into The Night, Until, Exhausted, We Fell Into Bed. We Lay In Each Other's Arms, Still Awkward But Happy, Exchanging Breathless Kisses Into Sleep.

I Had Gone To Paris To Immerse Myself In Painting And I Came Back Wholly Involved In Words And Rhythms.

Spare The Child And Spoil The Rod, I Am Not Sellin' Myself To God.

I've Always Thrived On The Encouragement Of Others.

Sure I Destroyed My Guitar At Every Concert, But It Was Okay, Because I'd Always Get A Shiny New One The Very Next Day.

That Whole Thing About Masturbating. Most Girls, I Guess Nobody Has To Tell Them, They Just Figure It Out. I Had To Be Told. Some Girl Actually Had To Show Me A Hairbrush And Demonstrate Exactly What To Do. I Just Never Figured That Stuff Out Naturally.

The Film [dream Of Life] Is The Way It Is Because It Was The Rhythm Of My Life, And Also Because The Director And The Editor Are Both Gifted And Both Fine Human Beings.

When I'm On My Own With My Camera, Taking These Pictures, It Feels As If I Am In A Room Of My Own, A Self-contained World.

I've Said This Over And Over, But I'll Say It A Million More Times - I'm Concerned More About The Death Of A Bee Than I Am About Terrorism. Because We're Losing Hives And Bees By The Millions Because Of Such Strong Pesticides.

If I'm Really Working On Something, Writing Or Painting Or Really Concentrating, I Don't Even Think About Brushing My Hair.

In The Period Where I Had To Live The Life Of A Citizen - A Life Where, Like Everybody Else, I Did Tons Of Laundry And Cleaned Toilet Bowls, Changed Hundreds Of Diapers And Nursed Children - I Learned A Lot.

Hung-up Women Can't Produce Anything But Mediocre Art, And There Ain't No Room For Mediocre Art.

I’m Not Much A Role Model In Terms Of Hair Care, Though.

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.

Music Television Is All About The Media-oriented Version Of What It Is To Be A Rock Star; It's Not About What Bob Dylan Or Jimi Hendrix Were About - Which Included Great Images, Sure, But They Had Spiritual And Political And Revolutionary Content, Too.

Art Is By Nature Optimistic. Art Is Optimistic Because It Is Alive.

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.

Polaroid By Its Nature Makes You Frugal. You Walk Around With Maybe Two Packs Of Film In Your Pocket. You Have 20 Shots, So Each Shot Is A World.

One Thing I Did Have Under My Belt Was, My Mother Lost Her Mother When She Was 11. She Mourned Her Mother Her Whole Life And Made My Grandmother Seem Present Even Though I Never Met Her. I Couldn't Imagine How My Mom Could Go On But She Did, She Took Care Of Us, She Worked Two Jobs And Had Four Children. She Was Such A Good Example Of How To Conduct Oneself In A Time Of Grief. When I Lost My Husband, I Tried To Model Myself As Much As I Could On Her.

Make Your Interactions With People Transformational, Not Just Transactional.

I Have Vague Memories, Like Impressions On Glass Plates.

I'm Not Afraid Of Terrorism At All. I'm Afraid Of Loss Of Our Freedom, Loss Of Mobility, Loss Of Global Comradeship.

I Started Thinking What Could Happen With My Art And I Realized That The Biggest Thing That Could Is That It Winds Up In A Museum. It's Like Finding A Rare Animal And Putting It In The Zoo.

I Like My Time On Earth. And No Matter What Kind Of Cards I've Been Dealt, I'm Happy To Be There.

Look At Obama - He Is Now [2015] Trying To Help Us Environmentally But He Should Have Done It Eight Years Ago. He's Trying To Salvage His Legacy And Trying To Do Something Good But We Needed For Him To Show Leadership From Day One.

I Started Resenting How Much Art Robs From Life. I'd Go To A Party And I Couldn't Enjoy Myself, Even Sexually. All I Could Think Was How I Was Going To Reinvent The Experience Into A Piece Of Art.

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.

Deep In My Heart How The Presence Of You Shines, In A Light To Last A Whole Life Through.

My Father Came A Couple Of Times, But He Always Blamed His Hearing Loss On My Loud Amplifiers. So He Didn't Come Anymore, But I Had His Support.

Most Women Writers Don't Interest Me Because They're Hung Up With Being A Woman, They're Hung Up With Being Jewish, They're Hung Up With Being Somebody Or Other. Rather Than Just Going, Just Spurting, Just Creating.

The Things I Thought Would Happen Didn't. Things I Never Anticipated Unfolded.

I Wrote Every Day. I Don't Think I Could Have Written Just Kids Had I Not Spent All Of The 80s Developing My Craft As A Writer.

Life Is An Adventure Of Our Own Design Intersected By Fate And A Series Of Lucky And Unlucky Accidents.

People Need Space To Air Out Their Thoughts, To Have A Sense Of Themselves - Unfettered By Anything.

Truthfully, I Don't Really Think Of Myself As A Photographer. I Don't Have All The Disciplines And Knowledge Of A Person Who's Spent Their Life Devoted To Photography.

I Got Over The Loss Of His Desk And Chair, But Never The Desire To Produce A String Of Words More Precious Than The Emeralds Of Cortés.

I Always Hesitate When People Call Me A Musician.i Have Had No Musical Training. I Can't Play Anything. I Really Think Of Myself As A Performer. It's Always Been Writing For Me. I Evolved With My Band In Rock 'n' Roll Through Poetry, Not Through Music.

We Have To Believe, As Creators - Just Like A Doctor Doing Heart Surgery Has To Believe That He Can Save That Person's Life. You Have To Believe That Your Pursuit Is Not Just A Noble Pursuit, But A Necessary And Inborn Pursuit To Uncover Something.

I Wanted To Go To Portland Because It's A Really Good Book Town.

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 Was Quite An Insomniac. I Rarely Slept As A Child. Having God To Talk To At Night Was Nice.

It Will Not Fall Away. Man Cannot Judge It. For Art Sings Of God, And Ultimately Belongs To Him.

Grief Starts To Become Indulgent, And It Doesn't Serve Anyone, And It's Painful. But If You Transform It Into Remembrance, Then You're Magnifying The Person You Lost And Also Giving Something Of That Person To Other People, So They Can Experience Something Of That Person.

As A Child I Was Such An Intense Daydreamer; I Could Be So Gone That I Had To Be Smacked To Come Back. They Were Really Worried That I Had Some Kind Of Catatonia Or Something Because I Would Go So Far Out. Because All I Wanted To Do Was Talk To God As A Child.

The Moment Of Creative Impulse Is What An Artist Gives You. You Look At A Pollock, And It Can't Give You The Tools To Do A Painting Like That Yourself, But In Doing The Work, Pollock Shares With You The Moment Of Creative Impulse That Drove Him To Do That Work.

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

Rock N' Roll Is Dream Soup, What's Your Brand?

We Used To Laugh At Our Small Selves, Saying That I Was A Bad Girl Trying To Be Good And That He Was A Good Boy Trying To Be Bad. Through The Years These Roles Would Reverse, Then Reverse Again, Until We Came To Accept Our Dual Natures. We Contained Opposing Principles, Light And Dark.

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.

I Think Really That's Just The Basic Christian Lesson That Sometimes Takes Us Years And Years To Understand - Have Equal Concern For Another Human Being As You Have For Yourself Or Perhaps Even More Concern For Another Human Being Than You Have For Yourself.

It's No Secret - I Love Detective Fiction. One Of The Reasons I Love Being In London Is Because I Like To Watch All The Shows On Tv. I Watch Them All.

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

That's What Artists Do, That's What Poets Do - We All Do It. We Start With Something, And Sometimes We Destroy Everything That We've Made In Order To Get To The Core Place Where We Started From.

No One Knows How Powerful Technology Is.

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

My Parents Had Three Kids Right After The Second World War, And We Were All Sort Of Sickly. Then I Had A Fourth Sibling, With Very Serious Asthma. The Medical Bills... So My Parents Always Struggled.

The Best Thing Is To Motivate People To Do Their Own Work. I'm Not Opposed To Making Money. But I Started To Play Rock 'n' Roll To Motivate Others, To Shake Things Up, Wake People Up And To Let Other Skinny, Pimply Marginalized Weirdos Know They're Not Alone.

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.

I Really Feel Concerned About Young People Within Our Present Culture. Our Present Culture, We Have To Change. Change Is Inevitable And I Wasn't Raised In Our Present Culture But It Has Great Pressure That As A Young Person I Never Had. Material Pressure, Social Pressure, Visual Pressure, How You Look, And I Just Try To Appeal To Young People To Think For Themselves, To Be Their Own Person, And To Ask Questions And Also Be Very Attentive To Our Planet And Our Environment.

My Parents Were Very Well Read. They Were Both New Englanders, Not Highly Educated, But They Had A Sophisticated... They Were Both Very Humanistic, And They Were Sophisticated Readers.

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.

The Only Parts I Like Out Of Any Of Those Women Books Is The Dirty Parts. But I Don't Think Their Dirty Parts Are Any Good, Really.

Some Of Us Are Born Rebellious. Like Jean Genet Or Arthur Rimbaud, I Roam These Mean Streets Like A Villain, A Vagabond, An Outcast, Scavenging For The Scraps That May Perchance Plummet Off Humanity's Dirty Plates, Though Often Sometimes Taking A Cab To A Restaurant Is More Convenient.

I Think Its Very Important To Not Be Afraid To Experience Joy In The Middle Of Sorrow.

It's Steven's [sebring] View Of What He Saw In Traveling And Working With Me. But On Another Scale, I Think The Film [dream Of Life] Is Very Humanistic: It Touches On Motherhood, Death, Birth, Art, Laundry, Anger Against The Bush Administration... While I Don't Think It's The Kind Of Film Where One Goes To Find Some Of The Darker, Edgier Aspects Of Life, The Film Was Born Of Grief.

Well, I'm Not One Of Those People Who Needs The Limelight. If I'm Performing, That's What I'm Doing. If I'm Not, I Don't Long For It. I Don't Need The Approval Of An Audience, Or Applause.

I Never Thought Of Being A Performer, Never Thought Of Being A Singer, Never Thought Of Being A Photographer. It's Just The Trajectory Of My Work. I Go To The Medium That Serves The Vision.

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.

I'm Not Really A Nostalgic Person.

By The Time I Was 10 Or 11, I Was Completely Demoralized. I Thought, "i'm Done. I'm Never Going To Be A Missionary," Because My Indiscretion Column, Whether It Was Little Lies Or Stealing A Chunky Bar, Kept Me From Sainthood.

Sometimes You're Doing Really Well, Then, After Three Or Four Years, Everything Inexplicably Crashes Like A House Of Cards And You Have To Rebuild It. It's Not Like You Get To A Point Where You're All Right For The Rest Of Your Life.

I Didn't Begin My Life In 1975 With 'horses.' I Recorded 'horses' In 1975, But Was Drawing In Paris In 1969.

Blessedness Is Within Us All.

If I Have Any Regrets, I Could Say That I'm Sorry I Wasn't A Better Writer Or A Better Singer...when I Was Younger, I Felt It Was My Duty To Wake People Up. I Thought Poetry Was Asleep. I Thought Rock 'n' Roll Was Asleep...an Artist May Have Burdens The Ordinary Citizen Doesn't Know, But The Ordinary Citizen Has Burdens That Many Artists Never Even Touch.

Punk Rock Is Just Another Word For Freedom.

I Was Never A Singer, I Can't Play Any Instruments, I Had No Training. Plus, I Was Brought Up In A Time When All The Great Rock Stars Were Male. I Didn't Have Any Template For What I Was Doing. I Did What I Did Out Of Frustration And Concern.

I'd Try To Write My Poems In A Certain Rhythm. I Had My Rock 'n' Roll Stuff For Performing And My Denser Stuff For Writing.

I'm A Worker. I Do The Work To Communicate, And I Want People To Embrace It, And When They Do I'm Happy.

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.

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

My Sunglasses Are Like My Guitar.

I Personally Am Not Interested In People Trying To Pigeonhole Me.

I Believe Myself To Be An Artist. That Was My Calling, To Do My Work, And What's Most Important To Me Is To Do The Best Work I Possibly Can. And That Is What Means The Most, That Is What Will Endure.

I'm Not A Critic. I'm Not A Journalist. I'm Not A Philosopher. Arguing That Punk Has Run Its Course Is Like Saying Painting Ran Its Course After The Renaissance. Punk Is An Idea. It's Freedom. And It'll Be Around 200 Years From Now For The People Who Want It.

I Had This Idea That The Coolest Thing That Could Happen To You Was Talking With God.

Please, No Matter How We Advance Technologically, Please Don't Abandon The Book. There Is Nothing In Our Material World More Beautiful Than The Book.

For I Desired, As Youth Does, To Be Taken By The Hand And Hurled Into The World.

I Hated The Makeup. I Hated All That Pancake Makeup. I Didn't Really Like Dressing For Parts.

The Bible Is Very Resonant. It Has Everything, Creation, Betrayal, Lust, Poetry, Prophecy, Sacrifice. All Great Things Are In The Bible And All Great Writers Have Drawn From It And More Than People Realise, Whether Shakespeare, Herman Melville Or Bob Dylan. Of Course There Are Stories That Are Still Relevant And Inspiring; Lessons That Need To Be Taught Over And Over Again. And They Give People Hope.

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.

As Far As I'm Concerned, Being Any Gender Is A Drag.

Maybe I'll Be 48 And Die In The Gutter In Paris.

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

I Am Not Really Certain How Original My Contribution To Music Is As I Am Obviously An Amateur.

I Really Don't Want Somebody Writing Something Positive About Me If They Don't Believe In It. I'd Rather Somebody Write Something Real Mean. I Like Reading Bad Stuff, It Gets Me Excited. In Fact, The Only Reviews I Keep Are The Bad Ones 'cause I Think They're The Cool Ones.

I Know Fashion Is A Material Thing, But We Live In A Material World And I Love Clothes.

When We Got To The Part Where We Had To Improvise An Argument In A Poetic Language, I Got Cold Feet. "i Can't Do This," I Said. "i Don't Know What To Say." "say Anything," He Said. "you Can't Make A Mistake When You Improvise." "what If I Mess It Up? What If I Screw Up The Rhythm?" "you Can't," He Said. "it's Like Drumming. If You Miss A Beat, You Create Another." In This Simple Exchange, Sam Taught Me The Secret Of Improvisation, One That I Have Accessed My Whole Life.

Obviously, I'm Not Homeless. I'm Not An Old Alcoholic. I'm Not Jumping Trains. I Just Like To Live In A Certain Way.

We Go Through Life. We Shed Our Skins. We Become Ourselves.

I Always Thought My Father [influenced Me Most] Because He Was So Well Read, I Tried To Model Myself On Him, But Really As I Go Through Life I Realise It Was My Mother Who Gave Me The Most Valuable Instructions. I Didn't Understand Or Accept It At The Time. She Taught Me To Read And To Pray - Two Things That Have Really Stayed With Me.

I Have Abandoned So Many Projects But In The '80s When I Left Public Life To Be Married And Have Real Children - I Love My Children And I Would Never Sacrifice Them For Anything - I Had To Find A Way To Simultaneously Be A Mother And Wife And Fulfill My Duties And Still Be True To Myself As A Writer.

Vowels Are The Most Illuminated Letters In The Alphabet. Vowels Are The Colors And Souls Of Poetry And Speech. (1976 Penthouse Interview)

The Truth Is, No Matter How Modest Steven [sebring] Is, He Was Obsessed With The Outcome Of The Film [dream Of Life]. Every Single Frame Was Important To Him.

The New Artists Coming Through Were Very Materialistic And Hollywood, Not So Engaged In Communication.

Committing Great Work Does Not Necessarily Feed You.

All Of My Role Models, Whether It Was The Disciples, Or John The Baptist Or Arthur Rimbaud, Slept Under The Stars.

I Always Wear The Same Thing Onstage.

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

I Was So Horny In School It Felt Like My Body Was Filled With Electricity. I Felt Like I Had Neon Bones Or Something.

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.

I'm An Artist. I'm Interested In How Art Gets Made.

The Artist Seeks Contact With His Intuitive Sense Of The Gods, But In Order To Create His Work, He Cannot Stay In This Seductive And Incorporeal Realm. He Must Return To The Material World In Order To Do His Work. It's The Artist's Responsibility To Balance Mystical Communication And The Labor Of Creation.

I've Lost Lots Of Men In My Life, Besides My Mother, Which Is A Whole Different Loss.

We Imagined Ourselves As The Sons Of Liberty With A Mission To Preserve, Protect, And Project The Revolutionary Spirit Of Rock And Roll. We Feared That The Music Which Had Given Us Sustenance Was In Danger Of Spiritual Starvation. We Feared It Losing Its Sense Of Purpose, We Feared It Falling Into Fattened Hands, We Feared It Floundering In A Mire Of Spectacle, Finance, And Vapid Technical Complexity.

The Idea Of Redemption Is Always Good News, Even If It Means Sacrifice Or Some Difficult Times.

Ultimately, I Want To Make Everyone Horny.

My Public Life Was So Demanding That I Wasn't Doing The Things That I Deemed The Most Important.

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

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

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

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.

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.

I'm Estranged From Social Media And I Don't Really Deal With It. I Tried To Work On A Website And It Took Up All My Time. People Wanted Me To Have A Twitter Account And I Spent The Whole Day Figuring Out What Would Be The First Message. I Still Haven't Wrapped My Head Around It.

The Two Things That Constantly Inspired Me Were Books And Travel.

I Don't Care Whether They're Men Or Women, That's Bullshit. A Good Writer Can Get Into Any Gender, Can Get Into Any Mouth. When I Write I May Be A Brando Creep, Or A Girl Laying On The Floor, Or A Japanese Tourist, Or A Slob Like Richard Speck. You Have To Be A Chameleon When You're Writing.

Steven [sebring] Just Fell In With My Family Life. He Helped Me Wash The Dishes And Play With The Kids. I Could Tell That He Was A Person Who Understood Families.

Who Can Know The Heart Of Youth But Youth Itself?

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

It Was Like Being At An Arabian Hoedown With A Band Of Psychedelic Hillbillies (p. 171).

The Film [dream Of Life], In The End, Is Life-affirming, And I Think It's Always Useful For People To Be Reminded That No Matter How Rough Things Get, No Matter What Kind Of Twists And Turns Our Lives Can Take, We Can Keep Going, We Can Create Something New.

I Felt Alien My Whole Life But I Didn't Feel Alien Because Of My Gender. Other People Made Me Aware Of My Gender.

For Life Is The Best Thing We Have In This Existence. And If We Should Desire To Believe In Something, It Should Be A Beacon Within. This Beacon Being The Sun, Sea, And Sky, Our Children, Our Work, Our Companions And, Most Simply Put, The Embodiment Of Love.

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

Somehow I Started Introducing Writing Into My Drawings, And After A Time, The Language Took Over And I Started Getting Very Involved With The Handwriting And Then The Look Of The Handwriting.

Besides Me Wanting To Be An Artist, I Wanted To Be A Movie Star.

My Mission Is To Communicate, To Wake People Up, Just To Give Them My Energy And Accept Theirs.

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

You Can't Make A Mistake When You Improvise.

[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 Was A Lower Middle-class Kid. My Family Had No Money. There Was No Room In Our Small House Where There Were Already Four Kids, Including Myself, Living.

When I Was Working On The Lyrics, I Thought Of All The Lullabies We Learn As Children: "away In The Manger," William Blake's Lullabies. I Realized That The Key To Lullabies Is Simplicity.

Often The Simplest Song Is The Hardest To Write.

I Dreamed Of Having A Book Of My Own, Of Writing One That I Could Put On A Shelf.

I'm Not Really A Musician. I'm A Performer And I Love Rock 'n' Roll.

I Think I'm Constantly In A State Of Adjustment.

I'm Okay With Roaming Around The World In My Bunk For Days On End. Maybe Every Third Day I'll Get A Shower Or Stumble Out At Dawn And Realize I'm In A Field In Poland. I Like That Kind Of Life.

With The Death Of Robert Mapplethorpe, I Had Lost My Main Collaborator In Taking Photographs. So I Didn't Know Who To Work With.

I Want To Be Around A Really Long Time. I Want To Be A Thorn In The Side Of Everything As Long As Possible.

People Came At Me With All Sorts Of Offers, Wanting To Make Me Into A Hard-core Cher. I Had No Desire For Any Amount Of Money To Be Reformed For Someone's Vision, Because In The End, That's What You Got: Your Clay In Someone Else's Hands.

I Could Have A Job As A Teacher Because I Like Talking In Front Of People.

Steven's [sebring] Presence Was Not Threatening; He Told Me That If I Never Wanted The Footage To Be Seen By Anyone, He Would Give It To Me. So I Had Nothing To Lose And Everything To Gain, And What I Gained Was His Supportive Energy And The Supportive Energy Of His Wife, Who Was Sometimes The One Schlepping The Equipment Or Doing The Sound.

I Never Felt Oppressed Because Of My Gender. When I'm Writing A Poem Or Drawing, I'm Not A Female; I'm An Artist.

Everything Distracted Me, But Most Of All Myself.

I Don't Think People Should Do Biopics Of Living People. I'm Totally Opposed To That.

The Film [dream Of Life] Doesn't Hide Anything, Except Maybe Moments Of Sorrow Or Darkness That Belonged To Me.

...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.

Steven [sebring] Was Documenting Me As A Widow With Two Children, Going From 50 To 60 Years Old. My Focus, During That Time, Was To Rediscover Myself, Stay Healthy, Take Care Of My Kids And Reestablish A Relationship With The People.

What I Say Should Always Be Prefaced With This: I'm Not Really Politically Articulate. I Just Try To Be Like Thomas Paine: What Is Common Sense? So When I Say These Things To You, I Am Speaking From A Humanist Point Of View. I Just Look Around And See What's Wrong.

I Wasn't Writing, I Wasn't Drawing, And Personality-wise, I Was Just Completely Arrogant. I'm Not Trying To Be Overly Apologetic For My Behavior - I Wasn't Evil. The Lifestyle I Had Was One That Lent Itself To Becoming More And More Self-involved.

When I Was A Teenager, I Had Trouble Getting A Boyfriend, So I Imagined Arthur Rimbaud Or Bob Dylan As My Boyfriend.

Lets Just Say That I Think Any Person Who Aspires, Presumes, Or Feels The Calling To Be An Artist Has A Built-in Sense Of Duty.

My Mother And Father Had So Many Ups And Downs And Stayed With Each Other And Helped Each Other. My Mother Took In Ironing And She Was A Waitress. My Father Was Working In The Factory And He Did People's Tax Returns.

When I Was Younger, I Felt It Was My Duty To Wake People Up. I Thought Poetry Was Asleep. I Thought Rock 'n' Roll Was Asleep.

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.

It's Not That I Have Compromised Or Anything, But It's Always Been Important To Me To Take Good Care Of Myself And Be A Good Example. I'm Not Much A Role Model In Terms Of Hair Care, Though.

I'm Right Here Right Now And I Want Now To Be The Golden Age ...if Only Each Generation Would Realize That The Time For Greatness Is Right Now When They're Alive ... The Time To Flower Is Now.

Patti, Did Art Get Us?' I Looked Away, Not Really Wanting To Think About It. 'i Don't Know, Robert. I Don't Know.' Perhaps It Did, But No One Could Regret That. Only A Fool Would Regret Being Had By Art; Or A Saint.

The People Have The Power To Redeem The Work Of Fools. Upon The Meek The Graces Shower, It's Decreed The People Rule.

I Always Wanted To Be An Artist, Writer And Poet Since I Was Seven, And One Has To Live Long Enough To Evolve As An Artist And Do One's Finest Work.

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

My Introduction To Photography And A Lot Of How I Developed Aesthetically Was Through '50s And Early-'60s Fashion Magazines Like Harper's Bazaar And Vogue.

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.

My Style Of Performance Poetry Came From The Beatniks, Allen Ginsberg.

I Don't Feel That Censorship Keeps Me From Doing The Work, Though. I'm My Bigger Censor.

My Mother Had No End Of Tragedy In Her Life. She Would Make Herself Get Up And Take A Deep Breath And Go Out And Do Laundry. Hang Up Sheets.

More Than Anything That's Been The Thread Through My Life - The Desire To Write, The Impulse To Write. I Mean, It's Taken Me Other Places, But It Was The Impulse To Write That Led Me To Singing.

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.

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

Talking To God And Coming Back Because That's What We Have To Do. That's Your Responsibility As A Director, As An Artist, As A Performer. Your Responsibility Is Back Again To Your People.

My Father Was A Dreamy Fellow - He Read Plato And Socrates And Watched Phillies Games.

I Think Guys Are More Emotional. Men Are Supposed To Be The Strong Ones, They Have Pressure On Them To Be Strong, But When It Comes To Sex Men Are Much More Emotional Than Women.

I Like Photographing Dresses In Windows. I Actually Wore A Lot Of Dresses In The '70s. I Like Them On Other People Now.

Since Childhood, It Was My Dream To Go Where All The Poets And Artists Had Been. Rimbaud, Artaud, Brancusi, Camus, Picasso, Bresson, Goddard, Jeanne Moreau, Juliette Greco, Everybody - Paris For Me Was A Mecca.

I Understood That In This Small Space Of Time We Had Mutually Surrendered Our Loneliness And Replaced It With Trust.

As An Artist, I Used To Think That My Responsibility Was To Do Good Work. But I Had To Learn From The 70s On That Being A Public Figure Presents Another Aspect Of Responsibility.

I'm Not Saying I Wasn't Flawed Or Amateurish. But You Can Never Say I Did Anything To Appease The Music Business.

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.

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Jim Sensenbrenner

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