Muse Quotes

At the mention of her name, my heart started beating faster. Dawn. Rusty. My muse. ~ Karina Halle

Music is forever. Music is life. Music is something worth believing in...Music is my words, my soul...my muse. ~ Madison Daniel

She has the kind of beauty that takes your breath from your lungs, tears from your eyes and speeds your heart each time you look at her.

She has the kind of beauty reserved for works of art, where men spend years of their life mastering their craft to replicate.

She is beauty, stunning, transcendent, right down through to the bone, the unfathomable depth of her heart.

She is Muse. She is wonder. She is sublime. ~ Kirk Diedrich

From when I was about seven, I thought I wanted to be an architect. I've always loved spaces and dwellings in general. ~ Arizona Muse

A good debater is not necessarily an effective vote-getter: you can find a hole in your opponent's argument through which you could drive a coach and four ringing jingle bells all the way, and thrill at the crystallization of a truth wrung out from a bloody dialogue - which, however, may warm only you and your muse, while the smiling paralogist has in the meantime made votes by the tens of thousands. ~ William F. Buckley, Jr.

But if you cross me again Akil, so-help-me, I'll find a way to kill you this time."
His eyes lit up at the prospect, as though he'd accepted a challenge I didn't even know I'd laid down. "I'd expect nothing less."
Demons; only they can get a cheap thrill from a death threat. ~ Pippa DaCosta

Real writers write. Period. No, the muse does not come to visit everyday. She's a lazy, precocious flirt. You cannot get into the habit of being "in the mood" to write. No writer on Earth is in the mood to write everyday, but the good ones do it anyway. They fight through their fatigue, their stress, their doubt, and they write. They get the words on the page. Period.
So stop waiting for your muse. Trust me, she sleeps around. ~ Darynda Jones

The ways by which you may get money almost without exception lead downward. To have done anything by which you earned money merely is to have been truly idle or worse. If the laborer gets no more than the wages which his employer pays him, he is cheated, he cheats himself. If you would get money as a writer or lecturer, you must be popular, which is to go down perpendicularly. Those services which the community will most readily pay for, it is most disagreeable to render. You are paid for being something less than a man. The State does not commonly reward a genius any more wisely. Even the poet laureate would rather not have to celebrate the accidents of royalty. He must be bribed with a pipe of wine; and perhaps another poet is called away from his muse to gauge that very pipe. ~ Henry David Thoreau

True poetry (inspired by the Muse and her prime symbol, the moon) even today is a survival, or intuitive re-creation, of the ancient Goddess-worship. ~ Robert Graves

Her smile alone could light up the darkest of souls
The scent of a harvest of roses
Skin as soft as silk clothes
Energy explosive ~ Andrew Edward Lucier

Rhyme and meter force gaps in meaning so the muse can enter. ~ Mason Cooley

I'd like to work for as long as possible and form connections with the labels I work for. ~ Arizona Muse

You are capable of great things, he said with conviction. If by great things, he meant complete destruction, then yes, it would seem so. ~ Pippa DaCosta

I think there's probably always been visions and voices, and these were variously ascribed to the divine or demonic or the muses. I think many poets still feel they depend on an inner voice, or a voice which tells them what to do. ~ Oliver Sacks

I am a creature of the Fey
Prepare to give your soul away
My spell is passion and it is art
My song can bind a human heart
And if you chance to know my face
My hold shall be your last embrace.

I shall be thy lover...

I am unlike a mortal lass
From dreams of longing I have passed
I came upon your lonely cries
Revealed beauty to your eyes
So shun the world that you have known
And spend your nights within my own.

I shall be thy lover...

You shall be known by other men
For your great works of voice and pen
Yet inspiration has a cost
For with me know your soul is lost
I'll take your passion and your skill
I'll take your young life quicker still.

I shall be thy lover...

Through the kisses that I give
I draw from you that I will live
And though you think this weakness grand
The touch of death your lover's hand
Your will to live has come too late
Come to my arms and love this fate

I shall be thy lover...

I am a creature of the Fey
Prepare to give your soul away
My spell is passion and it is art
My song can bind a human heart
And if you chance to know my face
My hold shall be your last embrace. ~ Heather Alexander

Gratitude
... here at home our faith dwindles
political division
causes tensions to kindle -
we should never forget
who stands at the door -
who shields us with armor
and shall forever more ... ~ Muse

Was there a magical love-of-the-dance moment, when the muse Terpsichore called to us and we lifted our arms and spun at one with the divine music of the Universe? I think not. Although pride and obsession can feel like love, I guess. ~ Meg Howrey

The best cure for cranial constipation is emotional fiber. Feel 'something', anything.
Pain, anger, joy; if your heart goes eerily cold or leaps erratically from your chest, your synaptic bowels will soon find release. ~ Muse

I was sitting in a movie theater at 4:13 in the morning, with a faerie muse who had vaguely psychic vampire tendencies, watching The Sixth Sense.
At this point in my life I'd had some pretty freaky, surreal experiences already, such as (1) watching my best friend move things with her mind, (2) being dragged from my wrecked car by a soulless faerie assassin, and (3) feeling the inexorable pull of the king of the dead's nightly song. And really, sitting with Nuala and watching a crazy little boy tell Bruce Willis that he saw dead people should've been included amongst them. ~ Maggie Stiefvater

Your gracefulness and feminine charms always so tender, you make my heart smile and wonder! ~ Avijeet Das

Tell me, O muse, of travellers far and wide ~ Homer

I am who I need to be at this precise moment; this is my journey. ~ Muse En Lystrala

Melancholy isn't a sign of the book's end; it is its inspiration. Melancholy is reading's muse. ~ Andrew Piper

Forcing the muse to let thoughts flow; equals to pushing a child, into labor. ~ Aniruddha Sastikar

Here you are.
Still standing. Fierce with the reality of love and loss. Wearing the truth of our hearts on your tattered sleeves. And yes, this one very nearly took you out. And yes, there were days when the darkness was heavy and the climb out of that rabbit hole required you to mine your depths for strength you didn't even know you had.

But here you are.
Broken open by hope. Cracked wide by loss. Full of longing and grief and the burn of that phoenix fire. Warrior painted with ashes. Embers from the blaze still clinging to your newborn skin, leaving you forever marked with scars of rebirth.

And just look at you. Heart broken but still beating. Arms empty but still open. Face raised to the sky and giving thanks for the light, even when it hurts your eyes.

My god, you are beautiful. ~ Jeanette LeBlanc

Moon is a shining ball,
from the window on my wall.

Moon is blemish-laden,
from the terrace of my mansion.

Moon is a cold flame,
from the porthole of my airplane.

Yet I have heard,
Moon is muse to philosophy brothers,
Moon is nurse to romantic lovers.
How can it be so various?

Are we not the same?
Or did the Moon really change? ~ Jasleen Kaur Gumber

Visual tonics such as 'timed creativity' need to be introduced to refresh and refurbish the muse. ~ Robert Genn

A Guardian is only as strong as its Muse. ~ Susie M. Hanley

The muse of invention handed me a rifle and I shot a white bear who sat down and said: Ah. ~ Vladimir Nabokov

I sit down to the piano regularly at nine-o'clock in the morning and Mesdames les Muses have learned to be on time for that rendezvous. ~ Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky

She wrote poetry constantly; that was her "work". She was a slow bleeder and she slaved over it for long, exhausting hours, and many a middle of a night I could hear her creaking around the dead house with a pen in one hand, a clipboard and a flashlight in the other, refining her poems, jotting down the lines of a conceit. Writing never came easy for her; it gave her calluses. She never courted the muses, she wrestled them, mauled them all over the house and came up, after weeks of peripatetic labor, with a slim Spencerian sonnet, fourteen lines of imagistic jabberwocky. ~ Millard Kaufman

She is a sunflower! She brings hope to people. ~ Avijeet Das

Arts without a spiritual relative is like frying buns with water. ~ Michael Bassey Johnson

Change shakes us up, and we can thank our Muse for it ... we are driven by change to create, to excel, and to become better humans, perhaps even more sensitive humans! ~ Max Elliott Slade

Most bands have a sound that they're already identified with, so for the producer it becomes a process of helping them find their muse in the studio to make a record that will not only satisfy them artistically, but will also do something in the marketplace. ~ Jerry Harrison

I'm quite competitive. Not with other models but with myself. I have to win. ~ Arizona Muse

My wife Ricky is my muse. Her personal style and natural beauty have always been my inspiration. ~ Ralph Lauren

The most potent muse of all is our own inner child. ~ Stephen Nachmanovitch

Maybe she was a little dark but she sort of sparkled with it.
Jacob about Muse ~ Z.A. Maxfield

Today there are bars of light on the rug, but Muse Cat prefers his tomato box where he can dream in private ... ~ John Geddes

That poem was not by me. It is among the things which quite overpower me; I have never been able to read it without tears coming to my eyes; it sounds like a voice for which I have been waiting and waiting since childhood. The poem is by my friend Lou ... She is as shrewd as an eagle and brave as a lion, and yet still a very girlish child, who perhaps will not live long. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

I have never experienced writers block and I've written every day since June 1972. But I have experienced the need to get up and walk around, eat ice cream, let ideas percolate, forget the story for a time, and then return to the page. Even the muse needs a vacation to rest up before she gives more of herself. ~ Jan Marquart

A Coy Aversion

...a flutter
too shy
to be seen... ~ Muse

Give all to love: Obey thy heart; Friends, kindred, days, Estate, good fame, Plans, credit, and the Muse,- Nothing refuse. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

There's a phrase, "sitzfleisch", which means just plain sitting on your ass and getting it done. Just showing up for work. My uncle Raphael was a painter, and he used to say, "If the muse is late for work, start without her". You have to be there. You have to be there, and do it, and grind it out, even when it is grinding and you know you're probably going to rewrite all this tomorrow. ~ Peter S. Beagle

The Muse visits during the act of creation, not before. Don't wait for her. Start alone. ~ Roger Ebert

There is indeed a poetical attitude to be adopted towards all things, but all things are not fit subjects for poetry. Into the secure and sacred house of Beauty the true artist will admit nothing that is harsh or disturbing, nothing that gives pain, nothing that is debatable, nothing about which men argue. He can steep himself, if he wishes, in the discussion of all the social problems of his day, poor-laws and local taxation, free trade and bimetallic currency, and the like; but when he writes on these subjects it will be, as Milton nobly expressed it, with his left hand, in prose and not in verse, in a pamphlet and not in a lyric. This exquisite spirit of artistic choice was not in Byron: Wordsworth had it not. In the work of both these men there is much that we have to reject, much that does not give us that sense of calm and perfect repose which should be the effect of all fine, imaginative work. But in Keats it seemed to have been incarnate, and in his lovely ODE ON A GRECIAN URN it found its most secure and faultless expression; in the pageant of the EARTHLY PARADISE and the knights and ladies of Burne-Jones it is the one dominant note. It is to no avail that the Muse of Poetry be called, even by such a clarion note as Whitman's, to migrate from Greece and Ionia and to placard REMOVED and TO LET on the rocks of the snowy Parnassus. Calliope's call is not yet closed, nor are the epics of Asia ended; the Sphinx is not yet silent, nor the fountain of Castaly dry. For art i ~ Oscar Wilde

When you craft something you create an eternity. When you tear down you hurt and you destroy, but anger doesn't last forever and soon your destruction is but dust under the muse of another's creation. ~ Matthew Williamson

The Price of a Muse

I write for
resurrection

to see bodies reassemble
and rise

I've tried to write my dog
off of the pavement

my first girlfriend back
into my arms

a love into more everlasting
than it was

my own soul
into being.

I know now the price
of a muse.

My writing
has not saved me.

It won't
save you.

But let me try
to raise us up. ~ Nancy Boutilier

Oh I'll die I'll die I'll die
My skin is in blazing furore
I do not know what I'll do where I'll go oh I am sick
I'll kick all Arts in the butt and go away Shubha
Shubha let me go and live in your cloaked melon
In the unfastened shadow of dark destroyed saffron curtain
The last anchor is leaving me after I got the other anchors lifted
I can't resist anymore, a million glass panes are breaking in my cortex
I know, Shubha, spread out your matrix, give me peace
Each vein is carrying a stream of tears up to the heart
Brain's contagious flints are decomposing out of eternal sickness
other why didn't you give me birth in the form of a skeleton
I'd have gone two billion light years and kissed God's ass
But nothing pleases me nothing sounds well
I feel nauseated with more than a single kiss
I've forgotten women during copulation and returned to the Muse
In to the sun-coloured bladder
I do not know what these happenings are but they are occurring within me
I'll destroy and shatter everything
draw and elevate Shubha in to my hunger
Shubha will have to be given
Oh Malay
Kolkata seems to be a procession of wet and slippery organs today
But i do not know what I'll do now with my own self
My power of recollection is withering away
Let me ascend alone toward death
I haven't had to learn copulation and dying
I haven't had to learn the responsibility of sheddi ~ Malay Roychoudhury

My mother's English, and she always was fascinated by the desert. ~ Arizona Muse

While the concept of the muse is noteworthy, the development of the muse has changed substantially in today's online world. The tables have practically turned as the artist who is responsible for creating music in today's world is now being the muse to others. They have been responsible for the creation of "fan art," a style of performance where people create new forms of media based off of existing creations.
It was originally that the muse was what prompted the artist to create something new. Today it has changed to where the artist is the muse to others in society. ~ Kytka Hilmar-Jezek

She remembered timidly standing atop the Luthadel city wall, afraid to use her Allomancy to jump off, despite Kelsier's coaxing. Now she could step off a cliff and muse thoughtfully to herself on the way down. ~ Brandon Sanderson

I'm an agnostic. Sometimes I muse deeply on the forces that are for me invisible. When I am almost close to the idea of God, I feel immediately estranged by the horrors of this world, which he seems to tolerate ... ~ Stanislaw Ulam

As the profoundest philosophy of ancient Rome and Greece lighted her taper at Israel's altar, so the sweetest strains of the pagan muse were swept from harps attuned on Zion's hill. ~ Edward Thomson

Sometimes the writing flows, sometimes it's like wading through concrete. But I keep showing up each day, whether the Muse joins me or not. ~ Bruce Hale

Sleeping Atlantis

Silent cool waters
dancing upon her skin ~
silent cool water
ushering dreams within... ~ Muse

I went out under the sky, Muse! and I was your vassal. ~ Arthur Rimbaud

Logic is the subject that has helped me most in picking stocks, if only because it taught me to identify the peculiar illogic of Wall Street. Actually Wall Street thinks just as the Greeks did. The early Greeks used to sit around for days and debate how many teeth a horse has. They thought they could figure it out just by sitting there, instead of checking the horse. A lot of investors sit around and debate whether a stock is going up, as if the financial muse will give them the answer, instead of checking the company. ~ Peter Lynch

Fashion is a MUSE, you must seduce her. ~ Anna Dello Russo

If they named him Tate, we could call him Tater Tot," I muse.
Two red blotches appear on Kitty's cheeks, and just like that, she looks as young as I always picture her in my head: a little kid. "I don't want them to have another baby. If they have a baby, I'll be in the middle. I'll be nothing."
"Hey!" I object. "I'm in the middle now!"
"Margot's oldest and smartest, and you're the prettiest." I'm the prettiest?? Kitty thinks I'm the prettiest? I try not to look too happy, because she's still talking. ~ Jenny Han

The credit for Erté's rediscovery must be given to French writer Jacques Damase, who met the artist when preparing a book on the Parisian music-hall. It was not merely his active presence which astounded Damase, but the fact that neatly stored away were thousands of perfectly preserved drawings representing a life's work. The immediate result was an exhibition at Galerie Motte in 1965, organised with Jacques Perrin, who the following year held another exhibition at his own gallery in Paris. Through the Motte exhibition, Erté was brought to the attention of galleria Milano, which in 1965 included some of his work in a pioneering exhibition of Art Déco. The most prominent event in this sequence was was Erté inclusion in the important exhibition Les Années 25 held at Musée des Arts Décoratifs, Paris, in 1966, which put an historical and artistic seal on Art Déco and the diverse artistic activities of the 'twenties.

It is fair to say, however, that complete international reappraisal only came about after Grosvenor gallery in London became his world agents. Jacques Damase had suggested an exhibition of Erté's work to this London gallery, to which, at that time, I was acting as an art consultant. As a result we were able to prepare his first ever London exhibition in 1967. The remarkable success it achieved was presaged by a smaller exhibition in New York a few months earlier. It had planned to follow the London show with a similar collection in new York, based on work b ~ Charles Spencer

In Poems of Love and Light: The Light of The Sun…Our Breath as One, the tenor seems to have changed slightly, as the progression of Love and lovers is, in many cases (if not all) quixotic, dependent upon mutual understanding, the conditions of the moment, the awareness of the future, as well as the mundane life, in which we all must exist, embracing real life, as is the natural state, which sentient individuals traverse – illusion may help those in the 'moment', but does nothing for the long-term, except misdirect it.

Poetry has always been a way to leave something for those who come after, a legacy of inspiration, methodology, spirit, love, emotion, historical sense and utility, depending upon the subject matter, intentions of the bard, and the situations, which frame the creation of that sense of experience, with which the Poet receives his Muse.

Poems of Love and Light: In The Light of the Sun, Our Breath as One ~ Frank L. DeSilva

January 8 has been a lucky day for me. I have started all my books on that day, and all of them have been well received by the readers. I write eight to ten hours a day until I have a first draft, then I can relax a little. I am very disciplined. I write in silence and solitude. I light a candle to call inspiration and the muses, and I surround myself with pictures of the people I love, dead and alive. ~ Isabel Allende

Follow through.
Make your dreams come true.
Don't give up the fight.
You will be alright.
Cause there's no one like you in the universe ~ Muse

Music from my fourth year began to be the first of my youthful occupations. Thus early acquainted with the gracious muse who tuned my soul to pure harmonies, I became fond of her, and, as it often seemed to me, she of me. ~ Ludwig Van Beethoven

Hasten Little Maiden
...
stop and listen
for pearls of wisdom
stop and listen
as the river glistens ... ~ Muse

The student is to read history actively not passively. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

Everyone has left me
except my muse,
that good nurse.
She stays in my hand,
a mild white mouse. ~ Anne Sexton

The number of guests at dinner should not be less than the number of the Graces nor exceed that of the Muses, i.e., it should begin with three and stop at nine. ~ Marcus Terentius Varro

Sometimes, when you sleep with the enemy, waking up is the hardest part." ~ Muse ~ Pippa DaCosta

Brahma and Airavata
Long ago in lands of golden sand
Brahma turned to Saraswati
and gently kissed her inked hand ... ~ Muse

The muse is fickle; ergo, when she knocks, ANSWER! It may take a while, but trust me, she WILL knock. In the meantime, keep your ear pressed firmly to the door. ~ Quentin R. Bufogle

Musicians have blocks, just like writers do. You'll find your muse again. ~ Colleen Hoover

Some people have human muses - mine is a city. I feel a startling ambivalence towards London, but for better or worse my work has come utterly to depend upon it. ~ Will Self

You are my Muse..."
~I Belong to You (Mon Coeur S'Ouvre A Ta Voix) ~ Matthew J. Bellamy

When The Daily Muse initially wanted to launch a job board, our first ideas were insanely (and needlessly) complex. We wanted to integrate with social networks, gather rich personal data to build predictive algorithms, and put together numerous cool visualization tools before launching out to the world. We were just sure users would love it! ~ Kathryn Minshew

I have played in every toilet but you still want to spoil it to prove I've made a big mistake ~ Muse

My relationship with my muse is a delicate one at the best of times and I feel that it is my duty to protect her from influences that may offend her fragile nature.
She comes to me with the gift of song and in return I treat her with the respect I feel she deserves - in this case this means not subjecting her to the indignities of judgement and competition. ~ Nick Cave

Do You Believe
... on this road of life
on this day
I take you
now husband and wife ... ~ Muse

Health is the first muse, and sleep is the condition to produce it. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

A Bluesman hates to be told what to do. Authority rankles him, inspires his rebellion, and plays to his need to self-destruct. A Bluesman doesn't take to having a boss unless he's on a chain gang (for the chain gang boss ranks below only a mean old woman and a sweet young thing in the hierarchy of the Blues Muse, followed closely by bad liquor, a dead dog, and the Man). ~ Christopher Moore

How astonishingly does the chance of leaving the world improve a sense of its natural beauties upon us. Like poor Falstaff, although I do not 'babble,' I think of green fields; I muse with the greatest affection on every flower I have know from my infancy - their shapes and colours are as new to me as if I had just created them with superhuman fancy. ~ John Keats

You realize, half-bloods are impossible. A human body shouldn't be able to contain an elemental demon. It's physically and mentally impossible. Something about how you and your demon are tied together goes beyond scientific explanation. You shouldn't exist. It's a wonder you're not a jabbering lunatic. ~ Pippa DaCosta

He felt that if he had a love he would have hung her picture just facing the tub so that, lost in the soothing steamings of the hot water, he might lie and look up at her and muse warmly and sensuously on her beauty. ~ F Scott Fitzgerald

Let the old Muse loosen her stays
Or give me a new Muse with stockings and suspenders
And a smile like a cat,
With false eyelashes and finger-nails of carmine
And dressed by Schiaparelli, with a pill-box hat.
...
Give me a houri but houris are too easy,
Give me a nun;
We'll rape the angels off the golden reredos
Before we're done. ~ Louis MacNeice

Every time I hear writers talk about 'the muse,' I just want to bitch-slap them. It's a job. Do your job. ~ Nora Roberts

She tells me that she would not make for a good conversation. Yet every time that she talks, I don't want her to ever stop! ~ Avijeet Das

The loveliest Muse in the world does not feed her owner; these girls make fine mistresses but terrible wives ~ Alfred De Vigny

Muse is the brain-sensing headband that allows you to track your cognitive and emotional activity. It boosts your attention and helps you become more aware of the emotions that you're having. ~ Ariel Garten

We're never alone. As soon as we step outside the campfire glow, our Muse lights on our shoulder like a butterfly. The act of courage calls for infallibly that deeper part of ourselves that supports and sustains us. ~ Steven Pressfield

My mum is deeply, deeply a man's woman, a man's muse. Maybe because I'm a kid from the '80s, I'm a bit more dominant. I wanted to be the muse and the director also. I wanted to be the man and the woman. ~ Lou Doillon

Writing is self-reinforcing. Don't make a fetish out of it, and don't surrender to the myth of the garret, or the myth of the chained muse. It's like playing the guitar, or practicing taekwondo, or having sex. The more you do, the better you get. The better you get, the better it feels. The better it feels, the more you want to do. ~ Jay Lake

I have thought of you much, and have shared with you in thought much that has been elevating, stirring, and gay, so much so that it has been like living with my dear friends. If only you know how novel and strange that seems to an old hermit like me? How often it has made me laugh at myself! ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

Tell me, O Muse, of that ingenious hero who travelled far and wide after he had sacked the famous town of Troy. ~ Homer

Truth? Sometimes I question every last thing I'm doing.
Truth? Right now, those questions swirl every damn day.
Is this also true for you?
Still, we keep moving forward, you and I. We try new things. We doggedly keep on doing the old things because though they may not have worked in the past it doesn't feel like crazy to continue, it feels like the space of trusting some wild sort of knowing. We love, good and hard. We show up for life. In the midst of depression, insanely messy houses, and bank accounts sliding closer and closer to that fine red line, and panic attacks, and kids who won't listen but who damn well know how to question and love.
And we make stuff. My god, the way we keep on making stuff. Because we can and we have to. Because it's the only damn thing that feels right when everything else feels a hundred kinds of wrong. We create. Defiant and determined and true. Weary hearts brought to blazing life if only for those wild moments we dance with the muse. ~ Jeanette LeBlanc

Writing is total grunt work. A lot of people think it's all about sitting and waiting for the muse. I don't buy that. It's a job. There are days when I really want to write, days when I don't. Every day I sit down and write. ~ Jodi Picoult

Her voice would die before she ran out of rage. She could scream a hole in her throat and come unraveled, fall to pieces like moth-chewed silk, and still, from the leftover shreds of her, the little pile of tatters, would pour forth this unending scream. ~ Laini Taylor

Okay, you need to eat something. Before we do anything else, you have to eat."
"I just did."
I gave him a hard look, but his face was entirely innocent. He was fucking with me, right? He had to be. "Man cannot live by pussy alone," I said. ~ Ava Lore

And when her biographer says of an Italian woman poet, 'during some years her Muse was intermitted,' we do not wonder at the fact when he casually mentions her ten children. ~ Anna Garlin Spencer