In time of crisis, we summon ...

In time of crisis, we summon up our strength. Then, if we are lucky, we are able to call every resource, every forgotten image that can leap to our quickening, every memory that can make us know our power. And this luck is more than it seems to be: it depends on the long preparation of the self to be used.
 Muriel Rukeyser

Quotes from the same author

The universe is made of stories, not atoms.
 Muriel Rukeyser
I remember mother saying   :    Inventors are like poets, a trashy lot
 Muriel Rukeyser
A work of art is one through which the consciousness of the artist is able to give its emotions to anyone who is prepared to receive them.
 Muriel Rukeyser
I am haunted by interrupted acts, introspective as a leper, enchanted by a repulsive clew, a gross and fugitive movement of the limbs. Is this the love that shook the lights to flame?
 Muriel Rukeyser
Punctuation is biological. It is the physical indication of the body-rhythms which the reader is to acknowledge.
 Muriel Rukeyser