Quotes on Words

I want to sound like an instrument. I want my voice and my words to marry the beat. I go with the rhythm of it and the words start to come to my mind and those words could be based on things that's been on my mind for the past year, the past month, the past week, whatever; I write it.

I usually work in a direction until I know how to do it, then I stop. At the time that I am bored or understand - I use those words interchangeably - another appetite has formed. A lot of people try to think up ideas. I'm not one. I'd rather accept the irresistible possibilities of what I can't ignore.

A priest once said to me, 'Think of a priest going to the altar as you walk out on the stage.' I would hate to think that anyone thought I was coming to preach. But art and music open up things that you can't put into words. It's about bringing joy when you go out there.

For a long time, rich countries have promised to reduce poverty but have failed to match their words with adequate action. Of course, some important progress has been made and millions of lives have been saved, but millions more could be saved.

If you would be pungent, be brief; for it is with words as with sunbeams - the more they are condensed, the deeper they burn.

There is immeasurably more left inside than what comes out in words.

You may choose your words like a connoisseur, And polish it up with art, But the word that sways, and stirs, and stays, Is the word that comes from the heart.

Sincere words are not fine; fine words are not sincere.

No matter what people tell you, words and ideas can change the world.

With poets, the choice of words is invariably more telling than the story line; that's why the best of them dread the thought of their biographies being written.

Every device there is in language is there to be used, if you will. Poets have got to enjoy themselves sometimes, and the twistings and convolutions of words, the inventions and contrivances, are all part of the joy that is part of the painful, voluntary work.

History will not judge HIV/AIDS kindly... the harshest words will be reserved for how the world responded, or rather failed to respond, to the epidemic.

The short words are best, and the old words are the best of all.

No matter how wonderful the story, it has to move on something, and that is language. The words that I use, the pace, the rhythm and cadences all need to be there. If they're not there, the story is like a boat that just sits there and doesn't move on the ocean.

I look out at the stadiums full of people and see them all knowing the words to songs I wrote. And curling their hair! I remember straightening my hair because I wanted to be like everybody else, and now the fact that anybody would emulate what I do? It's just funny. And wonderful.

My own cancer experience has taught me that the most comforting words from friends have often been both the simplest and the most honest.

Use the word 'zeitgeist' as often as possible. Ideally, you want to find words that sound familiar but people don't really know their definitions: 'zeitgeist,' 'bildungsroman,' 'doppelganger' - better yet, anything Latin. But avoid 'paradigm.' It's so 1994. If you say the word 'paradigm,' everybody knows you're a poser.

I noticed words crudely spray-painted upon the wall, perhaps by a young Berliner: 'This wall will fall. Beliefs become reality.' Yes, across Europe, this wall will fall. For it cannot withstand faith; it cannot withstand truth. The wall cannot withstand freedom.

It gets quite difficult for me when I listen to pop music. I don't often understand the words, but when someone translates them to me, I think, 'What is this song representing? That women are just there to be treated like objects?'

It is wrong if nearly every time we hear a black or Asian actor portraying their lives they are actually speaking the words of someone who has never experienced their reality. And to effectively silence disabled people from telling their own truth on film or TV is close to criminal and will not help wider society understand their reality.

When I came out to my mother in 1990, her first words of advice were to not tell anyone. She said being gay could hurt my nascent career. The reaction was as painful as it was understandable: Back then, the world was a very different place for a 20-something LGBTQ American.