Let judges secretly despair of justice: their verdicts will be more acute. Let generals secretly despair of triumph; killing will be defamed. Let priests secretly despair of faith: their compassion will be true.

Act the way you'd like to be and soon you'll be the way you act.

I bargain now. I offer buttons for his love.

It's the notion that there is no perfection - that there is a broken world and we live with broken hearts and broken lives but still there is no alibi for anything. On the contrary, you have to stand up and say hallelujah under those circumstances.

...a young nurse is standing close behind me wondering whether she is being drawn by my power or her charity.

People used to say my music was too difficult or too obscure, and I never set out to be difficult or obscure. I just set out to write what I felt as honestly as I could, and I am delighted when other people feel a part of themselves in the music.

I would say the hummingbird really deserves the royalties on [some of my songs].