“The sheer volumes of songs have come from the hours of cold and darkness that one spends inside with the lights on.” LightSongHoursDarknessColdVolumeSheer Author:Paul Westerberg
“My own interest is the responsibility of people to be responsible for their own lives and, with their neighbors, for their public space and actions. To sing their own songs. To make their own inventions..To build and not just to envy. To light that candle which is so much better than cursing the darkness. To be as much as the human condition can sustain, rather than being only what a system can allow.” PeopleHumansLightActionSongInterestMy OwnSpaceResponsibilityDarknessConditionsResponsibleEnvyNeighborInventionCandleHuman ConditionBeing ResponsibleCursing Author:Karl Hess
“In Middle America men are awakening. Like awkward and untrained boys we begin to turn toward maturity and with our awakening we hunger for song. But in our towns and fields there are few memory haunted places. Here we stand in roaring city streets, on steaming coal heaps, in the shadow of factories from which come only the grinding roar of machines. We do not sing but mutter in the darkness. Our lips are cracked with dust and with the heat of furnaces. We but mutter and feel our way toward the promise of song.” MenWayFeelsAmericaSongTurnsMemoriesCitiesBoysDarknessStreetsMiddleFieldsPromiseShadowMachinesTownsLipsHungerAwakeningDustMaturityHeatFactoriesAwkwardCoalCrackedRoaringFurnacesOur TownCity StreetsMiddle America Author:Sherwood Anderson
“A bizarrerie of fires, cunabulum of light, it moved with a deft, almost dainty deliberation, phasing into and out of existence like a storm-shot piece of evening; or perhaps the darkness between the flares was more akin to its truest nature swirl of black ashes assembled in prancing cadence to the lowing note of desert wind down the arroyo behind buildings as empty yet filled as the pages of unread books or stillnesses between the notes of a song.” BookLightSongBlackBehindsExistenceDarknessFirePiecesBuildingWindPagesShotsEmptyMovedFilledNotesStormEveningDesertStillnessAshesTruestDeliberationCadenceFlareSwirlsDaintyUnread BooksPrancing Book:Frost and Fire Source: Frost and Fire
“Reviving Spring, a toast to thy fresh lips! Thy blush is music, and e'en heaven lurks In thy thick perfumed hair that hangs about Thy flowered shoulders like enchanted rain; Thy sigh is song and thy soft breath a balm, Dispelling death -- soft loosing his cold grip, Unravelling darkness in the heart of pain, As o'er dank waters rings the laugh of dawn.” HeartPainSongHeavenWaterDarknessLaughingHairColdSpringRainBreathsLipsRingsShouldersDawnThickSighToastsEnchantedDankDispelling Book:Cloudrifts at Twilight Source: Cloudrifts at Twilight
“When I was a young girl salmon fishing with my father in the Straits of Juan de Fuca in Washington State I used to lean out over the water and try to look past my own face, past the reflection of the boat, past the sun and darkness, down to where the fish were surely swimming. I made up charm songs and word-hopes to tempt the fish, to cause them to mean biting my hook. I believed they would do it if I asked them well and patiently and with the right hope. I am writing my poems like this. I have used the fabric and the people of my life as the bait.” PeopleIfsWritingTryingWellsLooksMeanMadeStatesPastFacesYoungUsedSongGirlFatherCausesWaterMy OwnDarknessSunSeaReflectionRiversFishesBoatCharmLakesFishingSwimmingFabricHookBaitBitingSalmonJuanWashington State Author:Tess Gallagher
“To the uneducated eye, as to the incurious mind, much of the world is in darkness, and a thousand songs are lost on the unlistening ear.” WorldMindEyeSongLostDarknessAwarenessThousandEarsUneducated Author:Margaret Millar
“I always thought my days spent in darkness [as a child she had cataracts and was unable to see for nearly four years] gave me a very special sensitivity. Much later, when I really wanted to hear, really 'see' a song, I'd close my eyes, and when I wanted to bring it out of the very depths of myself, out of my guts, out of my belly, when the song had to come from far away, I'd close my eyes.” YearsChildrenEyeWantedSongDarknessFourSpecialDepthGutsFour YearsFar AwaySensitivityBelly Author:Edith Piaf