How can the life of such a man be in the palm of some fools hand?

Ah, current music. What would that be? Ah, really, a lot of it sounds defective to me. It makes me restless.

Abe said, where do you want this killing done? God said, out on highway 61.

What looks large from a distance, close up ain’t never that big.

You say you're looking for someone who'll pick you up each time you fall, to gather flowers constantly and to come each time you call, a lover your life and nothing more. But it ain't me, babe.

Anybody can be specific and obvious. That's always been the easy way. It's not that it's so difficult to be unspecific and less obvious; it's just that there's nothing, absolutely nothing, to be specific and obvious about.

My songs were influenced not so much by poetry on the page but by poetry being recited by the poets who recited poems with jazz bands.