American Author Quotes

There was no point in doing art if you were going to be second-rate.

Christopher Bram

The soul of the river had entered my soul, And the gathered power of my soul was moving So swiftly, it seemed to be at rest Under cities of cloud and under Spheres of silver and changing worlds Until I saw a flash of trumpets Above the battlements over Time!

Edgar Lee Masters

The abyss is full of reality, the abyss experiences itself, the abyss is alive.

Wasn't no "death do us part" in slavery; wasn't even no "dead or sold" less'n two peoples made it that. Far as two peoples loving with each other, it was any handy place if you was willing —and sometimes if you wasn't; or you jumped the broom if the masters let you marry. But you couldn't help dreaming. Dreams was one of the reasons you got up the next day.

Sherley Anne Williams

Neither awake nor in a dark dream are perilous blades just as they seem.

Dennis L. McKiernan

A fire-mist and a planet, A crystal and a cell, A jelly-fish and a saurian, And caves where the cave-men dwell; Then a sense of law and beauty And a face turned from the clod — Some call it Evolution, And others call it God.

William Herbert Carruth

To act in a way both sexist and racist, to maintain one's class privilege, it is only necessary to act in the customary, ordinary, usual, even polite manner.

I tried to avoid Mimi. Her presence seemed to call forth every rejection I'd ever experienced-the teachers who'd looked at me as though I held no promise, the boys who didn't like me back. Around her, I became fourteen again.

When there's more sick ones than well ones, by golly the sick ones will lock the well ones up.

Grandfather / advised me: / Learn a trade / I learned / to sit at desk / and condense / No layoff / from this / condensery.

Lorine Niedecker

Oh! sing it in the light of freedom's morn,
Tho' tyrant wars have made the earth a grave;
The good, the great, and true, are, if so born,
And so with slaves, chains do not make the slave!

Albery Allson Whitman

You don't learn to write by going through a series of preset writing exercises. You learn to write by grappling with a real subject that truly matters to you.

If only we could touch the things of this world at their center, if we could only hear tiny leaves of birch struggling toward April, then we would know.

Words came out of the womb of matter;
And whether a man dispassionately
Sees to the core of life
Or passionately
Sees the surface,
The core and the surface
Are essentially the same,
Words making them seem different...

Remembering that God is my source, we are in the spiritual position of having an unlimited bank account. Most of us never consider how powerful the creator really is. Instead, we draw limited amounts of the power available to us. We decide how powerful God is for us. We unconsciously set a limit on how much God can give us or help us. We are stingy with ourselves. And if we receive a gift beyond our imagining, we often send it back.

Hollywood – a place where the inmates are in charge of the asylum.

Laurence Stallings

So I cradle this average violin that knows
Only forgotten showtunes, but argues
The possibility of free declamation anchored
To a dull refrain....

Little brown boy,
Slim, dark, big-eyed,
Crooning love songs to your banjo
Down at the Lafayette—Gee, boy, I love the way you hold your head,
High sort of and a bit to one side,
Like a prince, a jazz prince.

In this crucible of wickedness the true greatness of Mormon shines like a star.

Only once you destroy who you think you are can you embrace who you truly are

God comes to each of us in the form we can best perceive Him. To you, just now, He was a heron. To someone else, He might come as a flower or even a breeze.

Rather than being afraid to ask for help, remember this: When you ask someone to help you, you are actually doing them a tremendous favor by giving them an opportunity to feel needed.

Richard Carlson

The road that leads to heaven is risky, lonely, and costly in this world, and few are willing to pay the price. Following Jesus involves losing your life-and finding new life in him.

David Platt (pastor)

Loaded with note cards for research papers that I was hopelessly behind on, I'd enter the Public Library only to end up wandering around lost, wasting the day.

I've almost come to feel that it doesn't make much difference what you believe in — the thing that's important is a state of belief. It's much better to believe in nonsense than in nothing.

Margaret Ayer Barnes