“I fear I shall never be…good for anything in this world, but composing airs, building towers, forming gardens, collecting old Japan, and writing a journey to China or the Moon.”

“I will build you a castle with a tower so high
It reaches the moon.
I'll gather melodies from birdies that fly
And compose you a tune.
Give you lovin' warm as Mama's oven.
And if that don't do,
Then I'll try something new.”

“Writing is a form of therapy; sometimes I wonder how all those who do not write, compose or paint can manage to escape the madness, the melancholia, the panic fear which is inherent in the human condition.”

“And I shall drive my chariot
Down your streets and cry
'Hey, it's me, I'm dynamite
And I don't know why'
We shall walk and talk
In gardens all misty wet with rain
And I will never, never, never
Grow so old again”

“We will build new ships to carry man forward into the universe, to gain a new foothold on the moon, and to prepare for new journeys to worlds beyond our own.”

“I am strongly of the opinion that possession of plants, however good, does not make a garden; it only makes a collection.”

“I am writing in the garden. To write as one should of a garden one must write not outside it or merely somewhere near it, but in the garden.”

“Writing letters with me is not a thing that can be done at odd scraps of time. I must sit down, compose myself & collect all of my thoughts.”

“I’m thinking about the mythical wonders of the world, the Hanging Gardens of Babylon and the Tower of Babel. It’s as if the collective will comes up with something that has resonance on an individual level and so becomes mythic. I can claim to take that as a model for a way of thinking. Art can do it, and I’m going to have a damn good go. I want to occupy the territory, but the territory is an idea and a way of thinking as much as a context that generates objects.”

“Your writing is never as good as you hoped; but never as bad as you feared.”