The mocking bird is music-mad to-night,
He thinks the stars are notes;
That he must sing each spattered star, and be
A choir of many throats.The earth is his cathedral, and its dome
Is all the light-pricked sky;
The pear-tree is his choir loft, and there
He flings his mad songs high.
Quotations about:
singing
Note not all quotations have been tagged, so Search may find additional quotes on this topic.
Be like the bird, who
Halting in his flight
On limb too slight
Feels it give way beneath him,
Yet sings
Knowing he hath wings.[Soyez comme l’oiseau, posé pour un instant
Sur des rameaux trop frêles,
Qui sent ployer la branche et qui chante pourtant,
Sachant qu’il a des ailes!]
Victor Hugo (1802-1885) French writer
“In the Church of *** [Dans l’eglise de ***],” Songs of Dusk [Les chants du crepuscule], #33 sec. 6 (1836)
(Source)
Full French poem. Alternative translations:
- Be like the bird that, on a bough too frail
To bear him, gaily sings!
He carols -- thought he slender branches fail:
He knows that he has wings. [Source]- Be like the bird that seeks its short repose
And dauntless sings
Upon that bending twig, because it knows
That it has wings. [Source]- Be like that bird, that halting in her flight
A while on boughs too slight;
Feels them give way beneath her,
And yet sings, yet sings,
Knowing that she hath wings.
[Laura Sedgwick Collins 1890s song, "Be Like That Bird"]- Thou art like the bird
That alights and sings
Though the frail spray bends --
For he knows he has wings.[tr. Kemble (Butler)]
I believe in kindness. Also in mischief. Also in singing, especially when singing is not necessarily prescribed.
Love, I find is like singing. Everybody can do enough to satisfy themselves, though it may not impress the neighbors as being very much.
Zora Neale Hurston (1891-1960) American writer, folklorist, anthropologist
Dust Tracks on a Road, ch. 14 “Love” (1942)
(Source)
The Owl looked up to the Stars above
And sang to a small guitar,
“Oh lovely Pussy! O Pussy, my love,
What a beautiful Pussy you are.”
Edward Lear (1812-1888) English artist, musician, author, poet
“The Owl and the Pussy-Cat,” l. 5 (1871)
MINSTREL: [singing]
He was not in the least bit scared to be mashed into a pulp,
Or to have his eyes gouged out and his elbows broken,
To have his kneecaps split and his body burned away,
And his limbs all hacked and mangled, brave Sir Robin!
His head smashed in, and his heart cut out,
And his liver removed, and his bowels unplugged,
And his nostrils raped, and his bottom burnt off,
And his penis —SIR ROBIN: That’s enough music for now, lads.
Monty Python (contemp.) British comedy troupe
Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975)
Who loves not wine, women, and song
Remains a fool his whole life long.[Wer nicht liebt Weib, Wein und Gesang,
A Der bleibt ein Narr sein Leben lang.]Martin Luther (1483-1546) German religious reformer
(Attributed)
Attributed in Matthias Claudius, Der Wandsbecker Bothe (1775). Inscription in the Luther Room, Wartburg, Germany.
There is more in you of good than you know, child of the kindly West. Some courage and some wisdom, blended in measure. If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world.
J.R.R. Tolkien (1892-1973) English writer, fabulist, philologist, academic [John Ronald Reuel Tolkien]
The Hobbit, ch. 18 “The Return Journey” [Thorin] (1937)
(Source)
The Lord respects me when I work,
But He loves me when I sing.Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941) Indian Bengali poet, philosopher [a.k.a. Rabi Thakur, Kabiguru]
“Fireflies” (1926)
(Source)
Alt. trans.:
"God honours me when I work,
He loves me when I sing."
