On Poetry Quotes
Poetry relishes ripe fruit - but ripe is one thing and overripe quite another. That's something poetry doesn't like, so it couldn't care less if I were to fall overripe to the ground.
And all poets love dust and mist because all the last answers. Go running back to dust and mist.
When I really want to be soothed and reminded of why people bother to fiddle with sentences, I often read poetry.
Most anthologists of poetry or quotations are like those who eat cherries or oysters, first picking the best and ending by eating everything.
My mother carried on and supported us; her ambition had been to write poetry and songs.
Poetry and imagination begin life. A child will fall on its knees on the gravel walk at the sight of a pink hawthorn in full flower, when it is by itself, to praise God for it.
The poet is a pretender. / He pretends so completely, / that he even pretends that it is pain / the pain he really feels.
One cannot simply decide to write apolitical poetry, in the way one decides to drink lemonade instead of tea, it's far more subliminal than that.
One of the most important differences I see between prose and poetry is the music of the language.
My poetry is not lyric. The epigrams are lyric because they come from my youthful period of lyricism, but my other poetry is not lyric.
I'm a poet. I'm just a renaissance man in my heart. I can build shelves and I can write poetry.
Poetry does need a bit of ferocity. The only way to attend to the fractured world is to write a ferocious kind of music, to sing that volatility.
I do think poetry needs to invite the reader, especially when there are so many other distractions while reading.
Poetry is the first and last of all knowledge - it is as immortal as the heart of man.
What is poetry? The suggestion, by the imagination, of noble grounds for the noble emotions.
An English poet writes, I think, just for people who are interested in poetry. An American poet writes, and feels that everyone ought to appreciate this. Then he has a deep sense of grievance . . .
The other day, when my 4-year-old saw a flowering tree and said, "Daddy, it's raining petals," that was poetry that just melted my heart into a mushy, yummy Fudgsicle.
I once broke up with a boy because he wrote me an awful poem.
Then others for breath of words respect, Me for my dumb thoughts, speaking in effect.
The poet knows that he speaks adequately, then, only when he speaks somewhat wildly.
I often stood in front of the mirror alone, wondering how ugly a person could get.
To wake the soul by tender strokes of art, To raise the genius, and to mend the heart
A lover goes toward his beloved as enthusiastically as a schoolboy leaving his books, but when he leaves his girlfriend, he feels as miserable as the schoolboy on his way to school. (Act 2, scene 2)
I swear the earth shall surely be complete to him or her who shall be complete, The earth remains jagged and broken only to him or her who remains jagged and broken.
My hope, my heaven, my trust must be, My gentle guide, in following thee.
I act as the tongue of you, ... tied in your mouth . . . . in mine it begins to be loosened.
Poems have ideas. The ideas of poems come out of their emotions and their emotions are carried on images.
