It took a lot of blood, sweat and tears to get to where we are today, but we have just begun. Today we begin in earnest the work of making sure that the world we leave our children is just a little bit better than the one we inhabit today.

This land, which we have watered with our tears and our blood, is now our mother country, and we are well satisfied to stay where wisdom abounds and gospel is free.

Dealing with wedding stuff is a bit of a double-edged sword - it seems that divorcees are expected to either burn it all on the front lawn, tears silently coursing down their faces, or keep the stuff, shrine-like, concealed somewhere in their homes.

Recently, I was preparing to sing Springsteen's 'If I Should Fall Behind' for a wedding and was unable to get through it without tears. My wife handed me 'Love You Forever.' I read it. I cried. But that cry somehow cured me of crying while singing the song. Go figure.

Christmas carols always brought tears to my eyes. I also cry at weddings. I should have cried at a couple of my own.

The busy have no time for tears.

I made my drama teacher cry. I only took drama to get out of writing papers in English and the teacher was this thespian Broadway geek and here I was this Italian guy from Staten Island and I would put her in tears.

When you're successful, people have no sympathy. Nobody wants to catch the tears of a millionaire.

Tears are the silent language of grief.

When I first started playing team sports, I was a little too sweet for my own good. I'd be in tears because I wasn't doing well. But the healthy competition really toughened me up.

On the second verse of 'Tears to Snow,' I talk about rappers and the way they view me now, rappers in the underground world who I might've know for a little bit, or they might've opened a show for me. A lot of them talk crap about me behind my back, and they'll smile in my face.

A game one of my sisters will play with me in my first year of being alive is called Good Baby, Bad Baby. This consists of being told I am a good baby until I smile and laugh, then being told I am a bad baby until I burst into tears. This training will stand me in good stead all through my life.

When onstage, I always try to take my audience through as many emotions as I possibly can. I want them to go from laughter to tears, be shocked and surprised and walk out the door with a renewed sense of themselves - and maybe a smile.

Joy's smile is much closer to tears than laughter.

If the world's a veil of tears, Smile till rainbows span it.

I honestly think I was an Indian living in the time of the Trail of Tears. Something like that. Every time I read books about back then, I get so devastatingly sad, so, so... I feel such a deep connection to it.

They're not willing to admit that I've also shed blood and tears and often paid dearly for my success. This makes me feel extremely sad.

You left and I cried tears of blood. My sorrow grows. Its not just that You left. But when You left my eyes went with You. Now, how will I cry?

Delicious tears! The heart's own dew.

Tears come from the heart and not from the brain.

Tears are the summer showers to the soul.

Oh, I am very weary, Though tears no longer flow; My eyes are tired of weeping, My heart is sick of woe.

There is a sacredness in tears. They are not the mark of weakness, but of power. They speak more eloquently than ten thousand tongues. They are the messengers of overwhelming grief, of deep contrition, and of unspeakable love.

All good poetry is forged slowly and patiently, link by link, with sweat and blood and tears.