I alwaysthought of myself as a competent, minor poet. I know who I'm up against.

I'd written a lot of songs with hummingbirds in them. None of them ever came to anything, but I did write a few lines last month. It went like this: 'Listen to the hummingbird whose wings you cannot see. Listen to the hummingbird, don't listen to me'.

I’ve seen the nations rise and fall. I’ve heard their stories, heard them all, but love’s the only engine of survival.

The fact that my songs take a long time to write is no guarantee of their excellence.

It’s a pity if someone… has to console himself for the wreck of his days with the notion that somehow his voice, his work embodies the deepest, most obscure, freshest, rawest oyster of reality in the unfathomable refrigerator of the heart’s ocean, but I am such a one, and there you have it.

I noticed that when I was on Prozac my relationship with the landscape improved. I actually stopped thinking about myself for a minute or two, because most of the thoughts one has about oneself are involved with desire or loneliness or isolation or strategies to overcome them.

My son and my daughter have both been an incredibly sustaining force, especially through this recent bad patch [of health]. So, I've been blessed and grateful for their company and for their assistance.