Patti Smith

Vissi d’arte.” I have lived for love, I have lived for Art

It was my entrance into the radiance of imagination.

But the urge to express myself was my strongest desire, and my siblings were my first eager coconspirators in the harvesting of my imagination.

I also would never receive Stephanie’s forgiveness

Patricia,” my mother scolded, “put a shirt on!”
“It’s too hot,” I moaned. “No one else has one on.”
“Hot or not, it’s time you started wearing a shirt. You’re about to become a young lady.” I protested vehemently and announced that I was never going to become anything but myself, that I was of the clan of Peter Pan and we did not grow up

My mother won the argument and I put on a shirt, but I cannot exaggerate the betrayal I felt at that moment.

I had no proof that I had the stuff to be an artist, though I hungered to be one

I also knew I was incapable of tending to an infant

Joan of Arc statue near the Museum of

Reims and struggled to free her country, only to be betrayed and burned at the stake on this day