Kate Bush Quotes

Seth's quote from his book: "And if I only could I'd make a deal with God and I'd get Him to swap our places" -"Running up that Hill" by Kate Bush

I think quotes are very dangerous things.

 What Kate Bush is is simple: She is a classy and elegant Woman who offers us a chance to be more understanding of what might be happening in the mind of someone other than ourselves. Nurturing, insightful, graceful, and wise; you could do no better than listening to her perspective. If Modern Music has an aristocracy, Kate Bush is much more than The Queen. Kate Bush is the archetypal Mother.

I had friends but I was spending a great deal of my time alone and for me that was vital because there's an awful lot you learn about yourself when you're alone.

What made it special made it dangerous, so I bury it... and forget.

This song came on that sounded unlike anything I had ever heard: an aggressive drum machine pattern, unusual-sounding electronic noises, and of course, on top of it all, that voice. It struck me immediately, so warm and beautiful: The song was “Running Up that Hill (A Deal with God).” It was like a soundtrack to the evening. 

Is there so much hate for the ones we love? Tell me we both matter don't we?

I just know that something good is gonna happen. I don't know when, but just saying it could even make it happen . . ." ~Kate Bush

At the end of the day, the harsh reality is that if you’re a fan of Kate Bush, Charles Dickens, Scrabble, David Attenborough and University Challenge, then there’s not much out there for you in terms of a youth movement.

You don't want to hurt me, But see how deep the bullet lies.

She once said her songs were "mostly about myths, spirits, that kind of thing. Not fairies, stronger than that." Not fairies. Stronger than that: there's a fine phrase to bear in mind. Her lyrics are about the things that drive, or repulse, or empower the human spirit. Not escapism, in fact, but its exact opposite.

How could you leave me when I needed to possess you? I hated you, I loved you too

You don't wanna hurt me, but you see how deep the bullet lies

...it's the First Lady of disappointment, Kate Bush

A brisk wind wove through the bushes, twirling the leaves so that their pale undersides fluttered towards the sun. Like children thrust suddenly into the spotlight, flitting between nerves and self-importance.

In the half-century of his life, a tick on the Doomsday clock, he had borne witness to the most unbelievable technological advances. He had started off listening to an old Bush radio in the corner of the living room and now he had a phone in his hand on which he could pretend to throw a scrunched-up piece of paper into a waste bin. The world had waited a long time for that.

But most accounts agree that the residence workers’ devotion to President George H. W. Bush was more than customary—it was genuine, almost profound. The Bushes were generally easy to please, and the residence workers found themselves quickly at ease with them.

Watching the painter painting And all the time, the light is changing And he keeps painting That bit there, it was an accident But he's so pleased It's the best mistake, he could make And it's my favourite piece It's just great --- excerpt from the song "An Architect's Dream" from the album Aerial

* Many people think it should have been a hydrogen molecule, but this is against the observed facts. Everyone who has found a hitherto unknown egg-whisk jamming an innocent kitchen drawer knows that raw matter is continually flowing into the universe in fairly developed forms, popping into existence normally in ashtrays, vases and glove compartments. It chooses its shape to allay suspicion, and common manifestations are paperclips, the pins out of shirt packaging, the little keys for central heating radiators, marbles, bits of crayon, mysterious sections of herb-chopping devices and old Kate Bush albums. Why matter does this is unclear, but it is evident that matter has Plans. It is also apparent that creators sometimes favor the Big Bang method of universe construction, and at other times use the more gentle methods of Continuous Creation. This follows studies by cosmotherapists which have revealed that the violence of the Big Bang can give a universe serious psychological problems when it gets older.

Is there so much hate for the ones we love? Tell me, we both matter, don't we? You, it's you and me It's you and me, won't be unhappy

We were so loud against the sounds of the bush. It was fantastic.

Bush, Barbara. Barbara Bush: A Memoir. New York: Scribner, 1994. Bush, Laura. Spoken from the Heart. New York: Scribner,

Arsonist's Lullabye by Hozier – Chapter three Elastic Heart by Sia – Chapter Nine Paralyzed by NF – Chapter Seventeen Running Up That Hill by Kate Bush – Chapter Twenty You Broke Me First by Tate McRae – Chapter Twenty-three Let Me Down by Jorja Smith and Stormzy – Chapter Twenty-four I Can’t Make You Love Me by Teddie Swims – Chapter Thirty Dancing with a Stranger by Sam Smith – Chapter Thirty-one Demons by Jacob Lee – Chapter Thirty-Three Halo by Beyonce – Chapter Thirty-six Play with

The Man With the Child in His Eyes’ – Kate Bush ‘Go Your Own Way’ – Fleetwood Mac ‘Sex and Drugs and Rock ‘n’ Roll’ – Ian Dury ‘David Watts’ – The Jam ‘Until the Night’ – Billy Joel ‘Rikki, Don’t Lose That Number’ – Steely Dan ‘Watching the Detectives’ – Elvis Costello ‘(I Am Always Touched by Your) Presence, Dear’ – Blondie ‘I Will Survive’ – Gloria Gaynor ‘Goodbye Girl’ – Squeeze ‘Make Me Smile (Come up and See Me)’ – Steve Harley ‘Girls Talk’ – Dave Edmunds ‘I Fought the Law’ – The Clash ‘Life in a Day’ – Simple Minds

Daniel murmured something like yes, he wouldn't miss it,but he was clearly distracted. He kept looking away from the woman. His eyes darted around the lawn, as if he sensed Luce behind the roses. When his gaze swept over the bushes where she crouched,they flashed the most intense shade of violet.

And he has tried to swim that stream, And he swam on both strong and steady, But the river was wide and strength did fail, And never more he'll see his Annie. And woe betide the willow wan, And woe betide the bush and briar, For they broke beneath her true love's hand, When strength did fail and limbs did tire.

You You are a person of unknown reasons, Reacting with movements and noises. You may be bold, wear glasses, or have freckles, Yet inside you there may be great feelings Of beauty and love, fighting to appear On the pimpled surface. It reaches out - "I love you." A laugh, a jeer. The feelings are trapped and you, You - disappear.

What would you like for your own life, Kate, if you could choose?” “Anything?” “Of course anything.” “That’s really easy, Aunty Ivy.” “Go on then.” “A straw hat...with a bright scarlet ribbon tied around the top and a bow at the back. A tea-dress like girls used to wear, with big red poppies all over the fabric. A pair of flat, white pumps, comfortable but really pretty. A bicycle with a basket on the front. In the basket is a loaf of fresh bread, cheese, fruit oh...and a bottle of sparkly wine, you know, like posh people drink. “I’m cycling down a lane. There are no lorries or cars or bicycles. No people – just me. The sun is shining through the trees, making patterns on the ground. At the end of the lane is a gate, sort of hidden between the bushes and trees. I stop at the gate, get off the bike and wheel it into the garden. “In the garden there are flowers of all kinds, especially roses. They’re my favourite. I walk down the little path to a cottage. It’s not big, just big enough. The front door needs painting and has a little stained glass window at the top. I take the food out of the basket and go through the door. “Inside, everything is clean, pretty and bright. There are vases of flowers on every surface and it smells sweet, like lemon cake. At the end of the room are French windows. They need painting too, but it doesn’t matter. I go through the French windows into a beautiful garden. Even more flowers there...and a veranda. On the veranda is an old rocking chair with patchwork cushions and next to it a little table that has an oriental tablecloth with gold tassels. I put the food on the table and pour the wine into a glass. I’d sit in the rocking chair and close my eyes and think to myself... this is my place.” From A DISH OF STONES

There was a strong but not unpleasant smell- moist earth, decomposing leaf matter, new flowers beginning to catch the day's sun- and great fat bumblebees were busy already collecting pollen from a profusion of small pink and white blooms. Blackberries: Sadie surprised herself by dredging up the knowledge. They were blackberry flowers, and in a few months' time the bushes would be heavy with fruit.

He felt like a character in a book. He thought of Mary Lennox as she discovered her secret garden. The blackberry bushes had become too thick to ride through and Percy dismounted, leaving Prince beneath the shade of a thick-trunked oak tree. He chose a strong whip of wood and started carving his way through the knotted vines. He was no longer a boy whose legs didn't always do as he wished; he was Sir Gawain on the lookout for the Green Knight, Lord Byron on his way to fight a duel, Beowulf leading an army upon Grendel. So keen was his focus on his swordplay that he didn't realize at first that he'd emerged from the forested area and was standing now on what must have been the top of a gravel driveway. Looming above him was not so much a house as a castle. Two enormous floors, with mammoth rectangular windows along each face and an elaborate stone balustrade of Corinthian columns running around all four sides of its flat roof. He thought at once of Pemberley, and half expected to see Mr. Darcy come striding through the big double doors, riding crop tucked beneath his arm as he jogged down the stone steps that widened in an elegant sweep as they reached the turning circle where he stood.

You were outside?” I said. “Making reindeer tracks.” I lifted my brows. “Did you hear the kids earlier, talking about reindeer?” Kate had been concerned that the chalet roof was too steep for the reindeer to touch down on, and Logan insisted they didn’t really fly. [...] “So you made reindeer tracks?” I said. “I did. Not on the roof, of course. That wouldn’t work. But they landed in the middle of the yard, then walked over to the house. I figured that should do the trick. I considered adding deer droppings, but Logan would figure out the size differential, so I settled for tracks. Plus a few tufts of deer hair caught in the bushes.” “And you gave our kids flying reindeer.” “I did.” I put my arms around his neck, and wrapped my hands in his damp hair and kissed him. “God, I love you.

That trip was epic. Every day was an adventure. Bindi sat down for her formal schooling at a little table under the big trees by the river, with the kookaburras singing and the occasional lizard or snake cruising through camp. She had the best scientists from the University of Queensland around to answer her questions. I could tell Steve didn’t want it to end. We had been in bush camp for five weeks. Bindi, Robert, and I were now scheduled for a trip to Tasmania. Along with us would be their teacher, Emma (the kids called her “Miss Emma”), and Kate, her sister, who also worked at the zoo. It was a trip I had planned for a long time. Emma would celebrate her thirtieth birthday, and Kate would see her first snow. Steve and I would go our separate ways. He would leave Lakefield on Croc One and go directly to rendezvous with Philippe Cousteau for the filming of Ocean’s Deadliest. We tried to figure out how we could all be together for the shoot, but there just wasn’t enough room on the boat. Still, Steve came to me one morning while I was dressing Robert. “Why don’t you stay for two more days?” he said. “We could change your flight out. It would be worth it.” When I first met Steve, I made a deal with myself. Whenever Steve suggested a trip, activity, or project, I would go for it. I found it all too easy to come up with an excuse not to do something. “Oh, gee, Steve, I don’t feel like climbing that mountain, or fording that river,” I could have said. “I’m a bit tired, and it’s a bit cold, or it’s a bit hot and I’m a bit warm.” There always could be some reason. Instead I decided to be game for whatever Steve proposed. Inevitably, I found myself on the best adventures of my life. For some reason, this time I didn’t say yes. I fell silent. I thought about how it would work and the logistics of it all. A thousand concerns flitted through my mind. While I was mulling it over, I realized Steve had already walked off. It was the first time I hadn’t said, “Yeah, great, let’s go for it.” And I didn’t really know why.

This will work,” he said with great authority. “You’ll see.” She looked doubtful, but she nodded. Of course, there was little else she could do. She’d just been caught by the biggest gossip in London with a man’s mouth on her chest. If he hadn’t offered to marry her, she’d have been ruined forever. And if she’d refused to marry him . . . well, then she’d be branded a fallen woman and an idiot. Anthony suddenly stood. “Mother!” he barked, leaving Kate on the bench as he strode over to her. “My fiancée and I desire a bit of privacy here in the garden.” “Of course,” Lady Bridgerton murmured. “Do you think that’s wise?” Mrs. Featherington asked. Anthony leaned forward, placed his mouth very close to his mother’s ear, and whispered, “If you do not remove her from my presence within the next ten seconds, I shall murder her on the spot.” Lady Bridgerton choked on a laugh, nodded, and managed to say, “Of course.” In under a minute, Anthony and Kate were alone in the garden. He turned to face her; she’d stood and taken a few steps toward him. “I think,” he murmured, slipping his arm through hers, “that we ought to consider moving out of sight of the house.” His steps were long and purposeful, and she stumbled to keep up with him until she found her stride. “My lord,” she asked, hurrying along, “do you think this is wise?” “You sound like Mrs. Featherington,” he pointed out, not breaking his pace, even for a second. “Heaven forbid,” Kate muttered, “but the question still stands.” “Yes, I do think it’s very wise,” he replied, pulling her into a gazebo. Its walls were partially open to the air, but it was surrounded by lilac bushes and afforded them considerable privacy. “But—” He smiled. Slowly. “Did you know you argue too much?” “You brought me here to tell me that?” “No,” he drawled, “I brought you here to do this.” And then, before she had a chance to utter a word, before she even had a chance to draw breath, his mouth swooped down and captured hers in a hungry, searing kiss.

Speed of light and limb, her father used to say, and although her head throbbed, although she had to clutch the railings sometimes to stop from falling, Vivien was a good runner, and she refused to stop. She imagined herself a wallaby, scooting through the bush; a dingo, slinking in the shadows; a lizard, sneaking in the dark...

Whipbirds cheered overhead, insects burred, the waterfall in Dead Man's Gully chipped and chattered. Fragments of light and color jittered as she ran, kaleidoscopic. The bush was alive: the trees spoke to one another in parched old voices; thousands of unseen eyes blinked from branches and fallen logs, and Vivien knew if she were to stop and press her ear to the hard ground she'd hear the earth calling to her, singing sounds from ancient times. She didn't stop, though; she was desperate to reach the creek that snaked through the gorge.

At her ninetieth birthday party, as her three great-granddaughters wove necklaces from daisies, and her grandson tied a hanky around his own son's bleeding knee, and her daughters made sure everyone had cake and tea enough, and someone shouted, "Speech! Speech!," Dorothy Nicolson had smiled beatifically. The late-flowering roses blushed on the bushes behind her, and she clasped her hands together, idly rolling the rings that fell now loosely around her knuckles. And then she sighed. "I'm so fortunate," she said, in a slow, rickety voice. "Look at all of you, look at my children. I'm so thankful, so lucky to have..." Her old lips had trembled then, and her eyelids fluttered shut, and the others had rushed around her with kisses and cries of "Dearest, darling Mummy!" so they'd missed it when she said, "... a second chance." But Laurel had heard it. And she'd stared harder at Ma's lovely, tired, familiar secretive face. Scouring it for answers. Answers she knew were there to be found. Because people who'd led dull and blameless lives did not give thanks for second chances.

The Japanese Samurai sword had one master, I thought so, by Sandokan.

Oberlin being a liberal haven where opposition was king, the coolest clique at school was a group of rugby-playing, neon-wearing lesbians. They dominated every party with their Kate Bush-heavy mix tapes, abstract face paint, and pansexual energy.

adroitly jumped to the back of the chair, where it perched with its tail bushed out in annoyance

My leg hair reminds me of wildflower meadows. My head hair is long pond grass. My armpit hair is a hawthorn bush. My pubic hair is wet moss and lichen on a rock.

People used to say Evie was weird, but she didn't care. She said she liked weird things." This professed love of the weird might go some way to explaining Evie's particular interests in the world of fauna and flora. Not for her the "obvious" choices like koalas and kangaroos; her favorite animals were monotremes. And while she loved the smells and sights of gums and banksias and wattles, it was the primeval expanse of the forest floor that excited her. Evie was mystified when her classmates spoke of magic and make-believe, and by the stories Reverend Lawson told in church on Sundays of water turning to wine and angels appearing to men. Why, she puzzled, did people seek refuge in such fantasies, when the natural world offered endless wonder? She delighted in entering the cool, dark realm of the bush after rain, searching through sopping leaf muck to discover that a whole new variety of fungi had sprouted overnight, an array of unimaginable shapes and sizes and colors waiting to be explored and catalogued.

She was studying a nearby bush covered with vibrant yellow pompom flowers. "Wattle," he said. "Golden wattle," she corrected. "You're right." "Did you know," she began, "that the seedlings from a golden wattle can live for up to fifty years?" "That so?" "That's a long time." "It is." "How old are you?" "Younger than fifty." He was thirty-six, in fact. "Wattle seeds are germinated by bushfires." Evie Turner nodded with vague disdain toward her parents, still engaged in heated discussion in the distance. "She's frightened of bushfires. That's because she's English. But I'm not. I'm Australian and golden wattles are my favorite flower and I'm not going to live in England no matter what she thinks." With that, before Percy had a chance to tell her that golden wattles were his favorite, too, she'd run off to join the adults, sun-browned legs leaping over fallen logs with the expertise of one who seemed more familiar with this lonely place than she ought to be.

I was a competitive swimmer from the time I was ten till I was sixteen. When I started growing hair down there—around age thirteen—I suddenly noticed that the older girls shaved their bikini lines. So, I bought some shaving cream and a razor and shaved it off enough so it wouldn’t show. I don’t recall ever having a conversation with my mother about it, it was just something I learned from watching all the other girls. Glynnis I remember I was going to the bathroom when I noticed that my vagina—actually my vulva—had hair on it. And that it felt really weird. Over the next few months, it gradually grew in and got fuller and fuller. Then I had fifth-grade health, and someone finally explained that this is pubic hair, and I remember thinking “Been there done that!” Kate I can vividly remember taking a shower with my mom when I was probably six or seven and wondering what was up with all that hair! So, I asked her why she had it, and she told me that it was something that women get, and that I’d start growing hair when I was in middle school. That was the only conversation I ever had with my mom about pubic hair, but she was right. I started noticing my own pubic hair when I was about twelve. It went from a couple of strands to a full bush, so to speak, overnight. I didn’t really know what to do with it, or if I had to do anything at all. Kara CHAPTER 4

After so long worrying and being fearful, living by the sea and running is giving me the mental space to think creatively again for the first time in years. With the salty wind on my face, feet pounding on the shingle, Kate Bush, The Hounds of Love , on my iPod, new thoughts enter my head. What do I think about that architecture? as I run past a white modernist house: ‘I like the shape of the house but the windows are too small.’ What do I think of the asymmetrical stairs, the sculptures in the garden?

Thanksgiving party at Sandra & Michael Kamen’s. All I wanted was an autograph book—Kate Bush, Bryan Adams, David Bowie, Stevie Winwood.

RULE NO. 3: AVOID CRITICIZING THE SITTING PRESIDENT AT ALL COSTS Stay the hell out of Dodge. —George H. W. Bush

RULE NO. 9: FAMILY COMES FIRST Nothing can ever be written that will drive a wedge between us—nothing at all. —George H. W. Bush, in a 1998 letter to his sons George W. and Jeb

RULE NO. 6: COME TOGETHER FOR CELEBRATIONS Though we hail from different backgrounds and ideologies, we’re singularly unique, even eternally bound, by our common devotion and service to this wonderful country. —George H. W. Bush

Lionhearts One very cold night in Ann Arbor I went to a party where “Kate Bush” was the password. I put on my Uggs & trudged through the slush. I climbed the fire escape to an attic apartment where five other writers & I sat around a Crosley turntable & a box of Bordeaux Blend & a stale bâtard with expensive butter & listened to Lionheart & talked about line breaks & grew increasingly drunk & complimentary & eager —for aesthetics’ sake— to investigate each other up close. Some of us kissed. Kate stalked us from the cover—crimped mane & lion-skin suit—as two people with silk scarves tied someone to the radiator & danced madly, leaping on chairs, licking paws! Leo rising, downward dog! Candles sputtering their last magic into the rafters as we sank straight through the secondhand loveseat: floral flickering, ticking undone. This is one of my fondest memories. The whole room a gold & rolling ship of girl flame! But there— in the dark, catholic corners where I can’t quite see—a stowaway sometimes darts. Imagine such a creature: subsisting all this time on the dusty crusts & vinegars of someone else’s slight & misplaced shame.

Cal froze in his steps. He was suspended in time, barely breathing. Then he began a practice he had learned when he was very young. He observed and catalogued details outside his main object. He noticed how the wind from the south bent over the new little leaves of the tall privet bush. He saw the muddy path beaten to black mush by many feet, and Kate’s feet standing far to the side out of the mud. He heard a switch engine in the Southern Pacific yards discharging steam in shrill dry spurts. He felt the chill air on the growing fuzz on his cheeks. And all the time he was staring at Kate and she was staring back at him. And he saw in the set and color of her eyes and hair, even in the way she held her shoulders—high in a kind of semi-shrug—that Aron looked very like her. He did not know his own face well enough to recognize her mouth and little teeth and wide cheekbones as his own. They stood thus for the moment, between two gusts of the southern wind.

Off the road, we were increasingly conscious that life existed outside the band. All of us were working with other musicians either as performers or producers. Amongst the mass of demo tapes musicians sent, David had received one from a schoolgirl whose songwriting and voice stood out above the rest. He encouraged her career over a period of time, and was rewarded by seeing her achieve great success with her first single ‘Wuthering Heights’ and album The Kick Inside: it was Kate Bush.

fifteen-year-old from Shepherd’s Bush, West London, who had poisoned himself with carbolic acid. His father had given him a ‘good hiding’, the paper reported, because he had been out of work for a month. The boy left a note reading ‘I wish you to know the reason I did it is because I could not work’, but the judge none the less ascribed his death to his consumption of ‘literary offal’.

The worst moments are when I've lost people that have meant something to me, when people have died. They're definitely the worst moments. It's probably just the selfish feelings of why you miss a person. You want them to be with you again, you want them more and they're not there. Because probably where they've gone, they're really having a good time. It you want to look at it, death, in a way, should be looked on as the greatest thing that's ever going to happen to you.