Notley Quotes & Sayings

Feeling awful is physiological you say.
God I hate you, I say. Yes you can find the neurons for feeling awful. Do you think you can find the neurons for the fact I hate you? — Alice Notley

I think all of our ministers are relatively inexperienced. I'm relatively inexperienced. We're a six-month-old government. — Rachel Notley

Albertans were looking for change. And so I think that we're staying true to our principles by working to deliver on that change. And I think that is what people were looking for — Rachel Notley

you see all night in your dreams. And the blue of my voice can't help but see you. — Alice Notley

I'll never know how to live, will you? — Alice Notley

Bill is about moving forward on a long overdue provision to protect vulnerable paid farm workers in Alberta to the same degree that they are protected in every other province in the country, and we feel confident that once people see how the bill actually applies to the regular family farm, they will see that a lot of the concerns were perhaps misplaced. And it's unfortunate that we created a situation that made people worry; that was not ever our intention. — Rachel Notley

Our government is operating within an unprecedented revenue shortfall and that we have an obligation to all citizens of the province to manage our finances responsibly. And that's what we're going to do. — Rachel Notley

In order to deal with the issues we're going to take a thoughtful, considered, intelligent approach to moving forward, we're going to do it with a great deal of consultation ... but to suggest you never change anything ever, ever, ever going forward I don't think is particularly responsible. — Rachel Notley

'You are your" "Past, Present," "& Future,' he said" " 'You divide into" "those components" "in this room' " " 'But I do not have" "components!' " "our three voices said," " 'My
secret name - " "Time's secret name" "is Oneness," "is One Thing' " "As I - the one" "in the middle - spoke," "the one of us in front - " "who was the Past - " "had already" "finished speaking" "& was awaiting" "his reply" "He said," " 'Don't we seem" "to experience" "things
somewhat this way?" "There is past, present" :& future' " "The Future then cried out," " 'Where is my life?" 'Where is my life?" "You have stolen" "my life!' " "There was a silence" "The man" "reached out &" "pressed a button" "on the cave wall - " "we three united" "into
one again" "while he wrote words on" "a clipboard" "Then he looked up & said," " 'Going forward?" "Going on?" "Death lies ahead, you know' " "Any woman" "may already" "be dead,' " "I said — Alice Notley

... our production of the world, our interpretation of it, what we've been told to experience and what we've been told we have to do, both worry and distress me. I don't want to live in someone else's dream. — Alice Notley

I knew you were in charge of me but my mind broke on its own. — Alice Notley

I didn't care much what happened to me, so chance didn't matter. — Alice Notley

It's all like me; and any song for this would just be bullshit. This is a thing, where they stopped trying, they deserted it, and desertion itself is the only possible song. — Alice Notley

I think that there's no question that, in Alberta as the price of oil continues to drop, that there are families ... that are worried about the instability that that brings to the economy. And so that has to be more and more front and centre in terms of the work that we do as a government. — Rachel Notley

Because we rejected a certain kind of critical language people just assumed that we were dumb — Alice Notley

In love there is no because. — Alice Notley

You're dancing on me
said the cosmic dragon, the galactic surface of all we can see.
So fucking what? she said. — Alice Notley

Abolish these categories of pain
(or is it love)
Let it all be one pain
Pain swallows itself, dies like a star. — Alice Notley

We have endorsements of our plan from key leaders within the environmental movement. That doesn't mean that it includes the whole environmental movement. — Rachel Notley

Industry stakeholders have said to us, which we've heard loud and clear, as we move forward on the climate change discussions we need to do it with a clear eye on the fact that we are also having conversations around royalties and the two can't be separated. — Rachel Notley

We name us and then we are lost, tamed
I choose words, more words, to cure the tameness, not the wildness — Alice Notley

I'm not going to bargain in the media because I don't think that's appropriate. — Rachel Notley

The climate change plan set out a few days ago by federal NDP leader Tom Mulcair will get us there, which is why I strongly support it. — Rachel Notley

And maybe you can't know me now.
Maybe I'm just blood. Whatever that's for. — Alice Notley

Who do you serve? Do you serve somebody?
I serve the poem, no one. — Alice Notley

Jack of diamonds is a hard card, why should there be a story? It's too hard a card to please, and it isn't the no earth I know. I got hepatitis C from shooting speed thirty-three years ago. — Alice Notley

No way. You won't catch Notley working weekends. Calls it the American disease, working all the hours God sends you. — Richard K. Morgan

What's really important to remember is that this type of legislation exists in one form or another in every other province in the country. The right to refuse unsafe work is a right that is enjoyed by every other farm worker, paid farm worker, in the country and every other paid worker in Alberta. — Rachel Notley

Writing poetry is what I am. I wouldn't know what else to be. — Alice Notley

I think that the climate change policy and strategy that we have developed and that we have rolled out thus far is an example of incredibly high-quality work, incredible collaboration by an exceptionally large number of well-informed people. — Rachel Notley

oh each poet's a beautiful human girl who must die. — Alice Notley

Gee whiz, it's all fucking heart-
breaking — Alice Notley

It's necessary to maintain a state of disobedience against ... everything. — Alice Notley

I think Albertans are progressive and forward-looking and are very optimistic, and I think they've always embraced change. Now with the economy being the way it is, I think we need to acknowledge people are a bit nervous too. — Rachel Notley

Beachy Head brims with electrical currents flying backwards and forwards, with the force of poems that have been well fought out and felt. I hear the currents of Alice Notley, of Bernadette Mayer, of Eileen Myles, and Sylvia Plath — Dorothea Lasky

I'm not an expert in the deck at all. My interest lies somewhere near a sense that words are like tarot cards, and that a poem manipulates unpredictable depths with its words ... I like the tarot because it works like poetry and because you don't really have to 'believe in' anything. It's there to be used. The symbols are remarkably durable and beautiful; they float out to encompass all kinds of meanings. — Alice Notley

Political debate is political debate and that's fine. That's healthy. — Rachel Notley

I do utterly despise dailiness as it stands. I can't abide what the world has become, the frozen-ness of our product this evil thing that we kiss the ass of every hour. I want a dailiness that is free and beautiful — Alice Notley

Our budget also reflects key components of our campaign. It's very much focused on stabilizing public services, restoring stability to public services and investing in job creation and economic diversification and, generally speaking, acting as a cushion during this economy, something fundamentally different than what the other parties proposed in the last election. — Rachel Notley