Ani DiFranco Quotes

“Course numb is an old hat, old as my oldest memories.
See that one's my mother, and that one's my father, and that one in the hat, that's me.
It's a skill I'd hoped to abandon, when I got out on the open road,
But any more pent up emotion and I think I'm gonna explode.”

“I did not design this game; I did not name the stakes. I just happen to like apples; and I am not afraid of snakes.”

“… I try to laugh at whatever life brings…”

“I am getting nowhere with you and I can't let you go and I cant get through.”

“They can call me crazy if I fail
All the chance that I need
Is one in a million
And they can call me brilliant
If I succeed…”

“Love is a piano dropped from a four story window and you were in the wrong place at the wrong time.
-Two Little Girls (Little Plastic Castle)”

“I always feel I have to take a stand,
And there's always someone on hand
To hate me for standing there.
I always feel I have to open my mouth,
And every time I do, I offend someone, somewhere.”

“We discovered we are both pleasantly furious half of the time,
When we're not just toeing the line.”

“And everything seems to have gone terribly wrong that can.
But one breath at a time is an acceptable plan,
She tells herself.”

“Some of life's best lessons are learned at the worst times.”

“If more people were screamin', I could relax.”

“When I need to wipe my face, I use the back of my hand,
And I like to take up space just because I can,
And I use my dress to wipe up my drink.
I care less and less what people think.”

“People used to make records, as in the record of an event, the event of people playing music in a room, and now everything's cross-marketing, its about sunglasses and shoes, or guns and drugs that you choose.”

“There's a crowd of people harbored in every person, there are so many roles that we play.
And you've decided to love me for eternity. I'm still deciding who I want to be today”

“Freedom and democracy,
That's the word from Washington every day.
Put America to sleep with warm milk and clichés,
And people are expendable along the way.”

“I know there is strength in the differences between us,
And I know there is comfort where we overlap.”

“I don't need anyone to hold me, I can hold my own.”

“I don't like my language watered down, I don't like my edges rounded off.”

“Don't treat me like I am something that happened to you.”

“You know
Taken out of context I must
Seem so strange.”

“When I look down, I miss all the good stuff
And when I look up, I just trip over things…”

“Maybe you don't like your job, maybe you didn't get enough sleep--
But nobody likes their job, nobody got enough sleep.
Maybe you just had the worst day of your life;
Well, you know, there's no escape.
That's no excuse. Just suck up and be nice.”

“Because the world owes me nothing
And we owe each other the world.”

“I don't care if they eat me alive, I've got better things to do than survive.”

“If you don't ask the right question, every answer seems wrong”

“I fight with love, and I laugh with rage.
You've gotta live light enough to see the humor,
And long enough to see some change.”

“When you sit right down in the middle of yourself you're gonna wanna have a comfortable chair.”

“Maybe you can keep me from never being happy, but you're not going to stop me from HAVING FUN!”

“Every tool is a weapon - if you hold it right.”

“We have to be able to criticize what we love,
Say what we have to say,
'Cause if you're not trying to make something better,
Then as far as I can tell, you are just in the way.”

“i do it for the joy it brings
because i'm a joyful girl
because the world owes me nothing
and we owe each other the world”

“My idea of feminism is self-determination, and it's very open-ended: every woman has the right to become herself, and do whatever she needs to do.”

“Men make angry music and it's called rock-and-roll; women include anger in their vocabulary and suddenly they're angry and militant.”

“I would like to perfect the art of being studiously aloof”

“For every hand extended another lies in wait. Keep your eye on that one girl… anticipate.”

“If you're not getting happier as you get older, then you're fuckin' up”

“The bathroom mirror has not budged, the woman who lives there can tell the truth from the stuff they say and looks me in the eye- says do you prefer the easy way? No? Well ok then, dont cry.”

“fate is not just whose cooking smells good, but which way the wind blows”

“Everyone is a fuckin' Napoleon.”

“a lesson must be lived
in order to be learned
and the clarity to see and stop this now
that is what i've earned”

“There's a paradox in every paradigm.”

“I've played the powerless in too many dark scenes. I was blessed with a birth and a death and I guess I just want some say in between”

“I am not a pretty girl. I don't want to be a pretty girl. No, I want to be more than a pretty girl.”

“I am writing graffiti on your body.
I am drawing the story of how hard we tried.”

“She says “Do I know you?” I say “Well, no, not biblically,
But I've been waiting for you to come and talk to me.
I have been playing too many of those boy-girl games.”
She says, “Honey, you are safe here. This is a girl-girl thing.””

“Now I wonder who is gonna be president: Tweedle Dumb, or Tweedle Dumber--
And who is gonna have the big block buster box office this summer.”

“Because I know the biggest crime
Is just to throw up your hands
And say "This has nothing to do with me,
I just want to live as comfortably as I can.”

“The windows of my soul are made of one way glass
Don't bother looking into my eyes
If there's something you want to know - just ask.”

“Let's grow old and die together. Let's do it now.”

“And I was shocked to see the mistakes of each generation will just fade like a radio station, if we drive out of range.”

“But what if no one's watching?
What if when we're dead, we are just dead?
What if there's no time to lose?
What if there's things we gotta do,
Things that need to be said?”

“I love all those great 'f' words - feminism, folk music..”

“So I’ll walk the plank and I’ll jump with a smile.
If I’m gonna go down, I’m gonna do it with style,
and you won't see me surrender, you won't hear me confess,
'Cuz you've left me with nothing, but i've worked with less.”

“They're gonna be mad at us.
They're gonna be mad at me and you.
They're gonna be mad at us and all the things we wanna do.”

“I am looking for the holes,
The holes in your jeans
Because I want to know:
Are they worn out in the seat,
Or are they worn out in the knees?”

“There's this brutal imperial power, that my passport says I represent.
But it will never represent where my heart lives, only vaguely where it went.”

“Life is a b movie.
It's stupid and it's strange,
A directionless story,
And the dialogue is lame.
But in the he said, she said,
Sometimes there's some poetry,
If you turn your back long enough,
And let it happen naturally.”

“So we're led by denial like lambs to the slaughter
Serving empires of style and carbonated sugar water
And the old farm road's a four-lane that leads to the mall
And our dreams are all guillotines waiting to fall.”

“I remember now how our bright spring green deepened.
With the years the seasons changed,
And we were lush as the underside of August.”

“And we hold these truths to be self-evident:
Number one-- George W. Bush is not president.
Number two-- America is not a true democracy.
And, Number three-- the media is not fooling me.”

“My distraction's my defense against this lack of inspiration
Against this slow deflation
Yeah the further the horizon
The more it holds my gaze
The foreground's out of focus but you know I kinda hope it's just a phase
Just a phase.”

“And their eyes are all asking
Are you in or are you out?
And I think, oh man
What is this about?
Tonight you can't put me
Up on any shelf
Cuz I came here alone
And I'm gonna leave by myself.”

“My thighs have been involved in many accidents,
And now I can't get insured,
And I don't need to be lured by you.
My cunt is built like a wound that won't heal,
And now you don't have to ask
Because you know how I feel.”

“They say that the truth will set you free
But then again, so will a lie…
It depends if you're trying to get to the promised land
Or if you're just trying to get by.”

“My life may not be something special
But it's never been lived before.”

“I am still praying for revolution.”