Patti Smith

Finally, by the sea, where God is everywhere, I gradually calmed.

— Patti Smith

I know I'm a strong performer. I'm not an evolved musician.

— Patti Smith

I never thought I was gonna live to 30.

— Patti Smith

Hey sister, you're just moving too fast, you're screwing up the quota.

— Patti Smith

“We would work side by side for hours, in a state of mutual concentration.”

— Patti Smith

A good artist's always got his hand in his zipper.

— Patti Smith

The two things that constantly inspired me were books and travel.

— Patti Smith

An artist wears his work in place of wounds.

— Patti Smith

Sometimes [people] seem to think I came out of the womb, you know, cursing, with an electric guitar.

— Patti Smith

When you do controversial work, you're going to upset a certain amount of people.

— Patti Smith

I dreamed of having a book of my own, of writing one that I could put on a shelf.

— Patti Smith

We wanted, it seemed, what we already had, a lover and a friend to create with, side by side. To be loyal,…

— Patti Smith

“I preferred an artist who transformed his time, not mirrored it." - reference to Andy Warhol”

— Patti Smith

There are so many great 19th-century photographers, and it's really my favorite period, but the amateurs did such beautiful work.

— Patti Smith

I've lost lots of men in my life, besides my mother, which is a whole different loss.

— Patti Smith

I'd try to write my poems in a certain rhythm. I had my rock 'n' roll stuff for performing and my denser…

— Patti Smith

My parents were very humanistic, but where we lived was not the cultural center of the world. Hardly. So I came to…

— Patti Smith

“I imagined a lot of things. That I would shine. That I'd be good. I'd dwell bareheaded on a summit turning a…

— Patti Smith

Poetry is a solitary process. One does not write poetry for the masses. Poetry is a self-involved, lofty pursuit. Songs are for…

— Patti Smith

“When does it cease to be something beautiful, a faithful aspect of the heart, to become off-center, slightly off the axis, and…

— Patti Smith

I didn't love Jim Morrison 'cause he was self-destructive. I loved him because of his work. Because of the way he merged…

— Patti Smith

Some of us are born rebellious. Like Jean Genet or Arthur Rimbaud, I roam these mean streets like a villain, a vagabond,…

— Patti Smith

“Inside it he inscribed a few lines of poetry, portraying us as the gypsy and the fool, one creating silence; one listening…

— Patti Smith

John Coltrane, he talks to god. He starts playing his solo, he might play for 14 minutes. For 14 minutes, it seems…

— Patti Smith

Eyeing the traffic circulating the lobby hung with bad art. Big invasive stuff unloaded on Stanley Bard in exchange for rent. The…

— Patti Smith

The artist seeks contact with his intuitive sense of the gods, but in order to create his work, he cannot stay in…

— Patti Smith

I can't judge how another person does their [music] work. Everyone has a choice and the music industry is much more open…

— Patti Smith

America is run by corporations, it is run by banks and Wall Street. That's why we can't get guns under control. It's…

— Patti Smith

“Actually, the only time I ever tried to cultivate being sexy was when I read Peyton Place. I was about sixteen and…

— Patti Smith

“I escaped into daydreams as I did my piecework. I longed to enter the fraternity of the artist: the hunger, their manner…

— Patti Smith

We were walking toward the fountain, the epicenter of activity, when an older couple stopped and openly observed us. Robert enjoyed being…

— Patti Smith

When we got to the part where we had to improvise an argument in a poetic language, I got cold feet. "I…

— Patti Smith

We never had any children," he said ruefully. "Our work was our children.

— Patti Smith

Punk rock is just another word for freedom.

— Patti Smith

My style says, 'Look at me, don't look at me.'

— Patti Smith

Nothing will stifle your human evolution more than fame and fortune.

— Patti Smith

Artists are traditionally resistant to labels.

— Patti Smith

You can't carve up the world. It's not a pie.

— Patti Smith

Words are just rules and regulations to me.

— Patti Smith

Hail brother, the distant thunder is nothing but hearts beating as one.

— Patti Smith