"The longing to be holy makes us weep, and we trust tears since they are made of water and come from our body, a double blessing."

“At the end of the day, the only people a One Voice doctrine silences are those who should be the most loyal.”

“Go home, Gideon. Please." "I am home." He caught me from behind and buried his face in mu soaked hair. "I'm with you.”

“The vitality of a new movement in Art must be gauged by the fury it arouses.”

“My favorite NBA team are the houston rockets and favorite college team are the duke blue devils.”

“A people always ends by resembling its shadow.”

“My mother was a single working mother; she started having children very young. There was a tension inside her about who she wanted to be and what she wanted to do and how she couldn't achieve the things she wanted to.”

Source : "Natalie Merchant On Motherhood As Muse". Interview with Laura Rowley, www.huffingtonpost.com. January 31, 2012.

“My fear of life is necessary to me, as is my illness. Without anxiety and illness, I am a ship without a rudder. My art is grounded in reflections over being different from others. My sufferings are part of my self and my art. They are indistinguishable from me, and their destruction would destroy my art. I want to keep those sufferings”

“There are so many ways of saying Hi. Hiss it, trill it, bark it, sing it, bellow it, laugh it, cough it. A simple stroll in the hallway calls for paragraphs, sentences in your head, decisions galore.”