When we make appreciation the central theme of our value system, then all the painful elements of our past become meaningful lessons we could not have done without. Acceptance becomes natural when we become adept at finding the silver lining, even in...
this is thy hour o soul, thy free flight into the wordless, away from books, away from art, the day erased, the lesson done, thee fully forth emerging, silent, gazing, pondering the themes thou lovest best, night, sleep, death and the stars.
Write about small, self-contained incidents that are still vivid in your memory. If you remember them, it's because they contain a larger truth that your readers will recognize in their own lives. Think small and you'll wind up finding the big themes...
And then the lights went low, and our song began. The song I’d been working on since I’d arrived on the island. The one that morphed into something else entirely, something I never intended it to be. But music is like that. Much like life. It tel...
A book is like a key that fits into the tumbler of the soul. The two parts have to match in order for each to unlock. Then— —a world opens.
Strangely enough, when the Sugababes' 'Freak Like Me' went to number 1, which was built around my 'Are 'Friends' Electric' song, I had another song called 'Rip' go to number 1 in the Kerrang TV chart, so I was pulling new people in from very differen...
I started playing guitar and writing songs when I was 15. I think what mainly sparked my interest was just the fact that I grew up listening to Cheryl King, Joni Mitchell, and James Taylor, and was just always inspired by that sort of organic art, an...
a song can take you back instantly to a moment, or a place, or even a person. No matter what else has changed in you or the world, that one song stays the same, just like that moment. Which is pretty amazing, when you actually think about it.
Hope was never meant to be A future shared alone, As life cannot be won or lost It was never ours to own.
Is it not enough to shine, To know that friends are true? That love is born of friendship, And who you are is you?
It comes down to this: we're pieces of equipment To be counted and signed for. On occasion some of us break down, And those parts which can't be salvaged Are replaced with other GI parts, that's all.
[He] went on to tell her that certain work songs made the work a little easier, but that there were others, depending upon the time of day, that dragged a body down, so 'you just gotta be careful with your songs and your hummin' and whatnot.
For I have known them all already, known them all— Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons, I have measured out my life with coffee spoons.
I write music—for whales. You can’t hear it, but rest assured, it’s excellent. Mostly they’re love songs. Listen with your heart—but be careful, because my songs have an irregular beat.
At that moment a solitary violin struck up. But the music was not dance music; it was more like a song - a solemn, sweet song. (I know now that it was Beethoven's Romance in F.) I listened, and suddenly it was as if the fog that surrounded me had bee...
Our songs travel the earth. We sing to one another. Not a single note is ever lost and no song is original. They all come from the same place and go back to a time when only the stones howled.
Bright morning comes; the bloody-fingered dawn with zealous light sets seas of air ablaze and bends to earth another false beginning. My eyes open like cornflowers, stick, crusted with their own stale dew, then take that light.
A beam from the everlasting sun of God. Rude and unresponsive are the stones; Yet in them divine things lie concealed; I hear their imprisoned chant:– “We are fragments of the universe, Chips of the rock whereon God laid the foundation of the wor...
I like for you to be still: it is as though you are absent distant and full of sorrow as though you had died One word then, one smile is enough And I'm happy; happy that it's not true
Dry fingers of decaying branches protruded upward, above what was left of the canopy of green. They rattled like skeletal bones, grasping for a final breath from the last silvery clouds of evening that slowly drifted by.
A theology that cannot be sung is not worth having.... Authentic Christian faith is not merely believed. Nor is it merely acted upon. It is sung - with utter joy sometimes, in uncontrollable tears sometimes, but it is sung.