Dar cine goneşte prin noapte şi vânt? Un tată călare cu fiul plăpând. În braţe îşi ţine copilul cuprins Şi braţul se strânge mai cald, într-adins.

- Obrazul, copile, de ce ţi-l fereşti? - O, tată, pe-al ielelor rege-l zăreşti? Tu nu-i vezi cununa şi coada de vrac? - Sunt neguri copile, ce-n vânt se desfac.

"O, dragă băiete, cu mine nu vii?... În jocuri voioase juca-vom zglobii! Flori multe, pestriţe, se-nşiră pe plaur, Iar maică-mea are veşminte de aur!"

- O, tată, o, tată, chiar el mi-a şoptit, Al ielelor rege mi-a făgăduit... - Te-alină, copile, ascultă-mi cuvântul, Prin frunze uscate doar freamătă vântul!

"Vrei, dragă băiete, cu mine să vii? Fecioarele mele cu drag te-or sluji, Fecioarele mele în noapte-or cânta, În dansuri şi jocuri te vor legăna!"

- O, tată, în preajmă-ţi să vezi tu nu ştii? Sunt iele, crăiese, pe plaiuri pustii. - Iubite copile, privesc în zadar, Sunt surele sălcii, cu frunzetul rar...

"Îmi placi, chipul tău mă aţâţă... Ehei! Te-oi lua dar cu sila, chiar dacă nu vrei!" - O, tată, acuma mă strânge-nzecit, Al ielelor rege nespus m-a rănit!

Părintele-n tremuri se-ntrece gonind, Mai strâns prinde-n braţe copilul gemând; Ajunge acasă de trudă învins, În braţele sale copilul s-a stins.

Let's remember that the revolution in Tahrir Square was not anti-American, it was not anti-Israeli, it was for democracy and freedom. That's a good thing.

If you watched 'Lost,' sometimes the episodes were crazy good, and sometimes you're like, 'That one was just sorta there.'

Music was very influential on me as a kid.

It's been told that swimming is a wimp sport, but I don't see it. We don't get timeouts, in the middle of a race we can't stop and catch our breath, we can't roll on our stomachs and lie there, and we can't ask for a substitution.

An optimist is a driver who thinks that empty space at the curb won't have a hydrant beside it.

When you have to work with and exist amongst cynical, burned-out personnel on a set, it doesn't matter what you're shooting or how much you're being paid - it's not worth it.

When I wanted to audition for a dinner-theater junior troupe in my hometown, I needed to have a piece of musical theater music to sing. I wasn't sure what I wanted to use. My mom and dad suggested that I sing 'Edelweiss' because I knew it from the music box.

New York is to the nation what the white church spire is to the village - the visible symbol of aspiration and faith, the white plume saying the way is up!

Everybody feels like [a misfit] at different points in their life. If you feel like who you are is right for you, then you are beautiful.

The more I study religions the more I am convinced that man never worshipped anything but himself.

I think that sometimes you can be an example of what to do and what not to do, and I think most of the time I'm an example of what not to do.

The only thing Steve Jobs has ever asked me in all the years we've been together and have been partners, the only thing he has ever asked me is: 'Make it great.'

Feasts and festivals are a feature of all major religions.

The only barrier to human development is ignorance, and this is not insurmountable.

I used to conduct the last opera in Berlin on Sunday, get on a plane on Monday to Chicago, and start a rehearsal that same night, if it was a performance week.

I'm a gentleman.

For me, conscious parenting is staying attuned to your child, being really open and in the moment. It means staying as present as possible in your own breath for the betterment of your whole family.

Our nation's blood supply is safer than it's ever been, and it's getting safer as we speak.

I write based on powerful inner impulses, and those seem to shift over time.

I'd gotten myself into a kind of journalism that wasn't really compatible with rearing an infant. I'd been a foreign correspondent for a long time and had this subspecialty in covering catastrophes. It had spoiled me a little because you have a tremendous amount of autonomy, and I couldn't really see being an editor in an office.

My frontal lobe doesn't function well. When I'm out with friends, I typically have a cup of coffee, and that's not good for my sleep. And yet I'll do it again, night after night - 'Oh why did I have that cup of coffee?' I can't stop it because I love it.

I'm definitely in a place where I'm looking for different than what I've done in the past, just so I can go to work and do something I haven't done before.

Even when I wasn't doing much 'science for the public' stuff, I found that four or five hours of intense work in physics was all my brain could take on a given day.

The family is the test of freedom because the family is the only thing that the free man makes for himself and by himself.