Finally, got to this long anticipated memoir and it's even more beautifully written than I imagined. It's a tale of life that reads like a beautiful prose poem. I've never been a big fan of Patti Smith's music, although I appreciate it, but her writing style is so lyrical that it's easy to get lost in its magic. Here's a sample:"When I was very young, my mother took me for walks in Humboldt Park, along the edge of the Prairie River. I have vague memories, like impressions on glass plates, of an old boathouse, a circular band shell, an arched stone bridge. The narrows of the river emptied into a wide lagoon and I saw upon its surface a singular miracle. A long curving neck rose from a dress of white plumage.
"Swan, my mother said, sensing my excitement. It pattered the bright water, flapping its great wings, and lifted into the sky.
"The word alone hardly attested to its magnificence nor conveyed the emotion it produced. The sight of it generated an urge I had no words for, a desire to speak of the swan, say something of its whiteness, the explosive nature of its movement, and the slow beating of its wings.
"The swan became one with the sky. I struggled to find words to describe my own sense of it. Swan, I repeated, not entirely satisfied, and I felt a twinge, a curious yearning, imperceptible to passersby, my mother, the trees, or the clouds."
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