poetry

"I discover myself on the verge of a usual mistake."

"Sometimes with one I love, I fill myself with rage, for fear I effuse unreturn'd love; But now I think there is no unreturn'd love—the pay is certain, one way or another; (I loved a certain person ardently, and my love was not return'd; Yet out of that, I have written these songs.)"

"I was an adventurer, but she was not an adventuress. She was a 'wanderess.' Thus, she didn’t care about money, only experiences - whether they came from wealth or from poverty, it was all the same to her."

"Love is a clash of lightnings"

"Poetry is a rich, full-bodied whistle, cracked ice crunching in pails, the night that numbs the leaf, the duel of two nightingales, the sweet pea that has run wild, Creation's tears in shoulder blades."

"All I know is a door into the dark"

"I believe in the flesh and the appetites; Seeing, hearing, feeling, are miracles, and each part and tag of me is a miracle. Divine am I inside and out, and I make holy whatever I touch or am touch’d from;The scent of these arm-pits, aroma finer than prayer; This head more than churches, bibles, and all the creeds."

"Where music thundered let the mind be still,Where the will triumphed let there be no will,What light revealed, now let the dark fulfill."

"Rem tene, verba sequentur: grasp the subject, and the words will follow. This, I believe, is the opposite of what happens with poetry, which is more a case of verba tene, res sequenter: grasp the words, and the subject will follow."

"خضراء أكتبها على نثر السنابل في كتاب الحقل ، قوّسها امتلاءٌ شاحبٌ فيها وفي. وكلما صادقت أو آخيت سنبلةً تعلّمت البقاء من الفناء وضده. أنا حبة القمح التي ماتت لكي تخضرّ ثانية وفي موتي حياةٌ ما"

"The characters in my novels are my own unrealised possibilities. That is why I am equally fond of them all and equally horrified by them. Each one has crossed a border that I myself have circumvented."

"If you are a dreamer come inIf you are a dreamer a wisher a liarA hoper a pray-er a magic-bean-buyerIf youre a pretender com sit by my fireFor we have some flax golden tales to spinCome in! Come in!"

"The darkness has ink eyes, and if you stare long enough, you’re going to see it blink black. That’s the moment to start writing."

"You see how I tryTo reach with wordsWhat matters mostAnd how I fail."

"And would it have been worth it, after all,Would it have been worth while,After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets, After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor - And this, and so much more? -"

"There is a time for reciting poems and a time for fists."

"Words dazzle and deceive because they are mimed by the face. But black words on a white page are the soul laid bare."

"You might as well ask an artist to explain his art, or ask a poet to explain his poem. It defeats the purpose. The meaning is only clear thorough the search."

"Some say the world will end in fire,Some say in ice.From what I've tasted of desire,I hold with those who favor fire. But if it had to perish twiceI think I know enough of hateTo say that for destruction iceIs also greatAnd would suffice."

"She wasn't broken. She was just bent, over the chance of being ignored by the one she loved."