To you, is it movement, or is it action? Is it contact or just reaction? And you, revolution, just resistance? Is it living, or just existence? -- Th… - Neil Peart

Cast in this unlikely role
Ill-equipped to act
With insufficient tact
One must put up barriers
To keep oneself intact -- Limelight (1981)

I tend to write for a general reader — my ideal audience is someone curious and intelligent who doesn't know anything about my preoccupations — in the same way that songwriting is for an imaginary listener.

They say there are strangers who threaten us
In our immigrants and infidels
They say there is strangeness too dangerous
In our theaters and bookstore shelves
That those who know what's best for us
Must rise and save us from ourselves -- Witch Hunt (Part III of 'Fear') (1980)