Denis Johnson Quotes

As soon as the first drop of dawn dilutes the blackness, the neighbors begin their unbelievable racket, first the roosters, then the radios, then the live accompaniment to the radios - and then it's time to wind up the little children and start their screams and tears.

time live children tears wind dawn start neighbors begin

Sometimes what I wouldn't give to have us sitting in a bar again at 9: 00 a.m. Telling lies to one another, far from God.

lies god

When he was dry, he believed it was alcohol he needed, but when he had a few drinks in him, he knew it was something else, possibly a woman; and when he had it all -- cash, booze, and a wife -- he couldn't be distracted from the great emptiness that was always falling through him and never hit the ground.

dark sad alcohol

The Americans won't win. They're not fighting for their homeland. They just want to be good. In order to be good, they just have to fight awhile and then leave.

america vietnam-war

She wanted to eat my heart and be lost in the desert with what she'd done, she wanted to fall on her knees and give birth from it, she wanted to hurt me as only a child can be hurt by its mother.

heart mother desert

English words are like prisms. Empty, nothing inside, and still they make rainbows.

words

What's funny about Jesus' Son is that I never even wrote that book, I just wrote it down. I would tell these stories and people would say, You should write these things down.

funny people

I'd met a woman and I got married, but the money ran out right away. I hadn't had a job for seven months, and it just came over me that I was never going to work again. It hit me.

rights money work