Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
The 'open text' often emphasizes or foregrounds process, either the process of the original composition or of subsequent compositions by readers.
The truth, it seems, is not just what you find when you open a door: it is itself a door, which the poet is always on the verge of going through.
I have a fork and a spoon, but never a knife… as if I’m lacking manual skills or teeth. I have both, however. That’s why I’m not allowed a knife.
But I began then to think of time as having a shape, something you could see, like a series of liquid transparencies, one laid on top of another.
The objects I chose were designed to hold something, but I didn't fill them up. They remained empty. They were little symbolic shrines to thirst.
He’d developed a strangely tender feeling towards such words, as if they were children abandoned in the woods and it was his duty to rescue them.
A writer needs certain conditions in which to work and create art. She needs a piece of time; a peace of mind; a quiet place; and a private life.
The politics of the exile are fever, revenge, daydream, theater of the aging convalescent. You wait in the wings and rehearse. You wait and wait.
If you understand hallucination and illusion, you don't blindly follow any leader. You must know if the person is sane or insane, over the abyss.
Grief can be a slow ache that never seems to stop rising, yet as we grieve, those we love mysteriously become more and more a part of who we are.
Meditation, in all its forms and traditions, is an invitation to listen, to open, to quietly enlist the courage to be touched and formed by life.
He who thinks that the lives of Priam and of Nestor were long is much deceived and mistaken. Life consists not in living, but in enjoying health.
You praise, in three hundred verses, Sabellus, the baths of Ponticus, who gives such excellent dinners. You wish to dine, Sabellus, not to bathe.
Unquiet souls. In the dark fermentation of earth, in the never idle workshop of nature, in the eternal movement, yea shall find yourselves again.
I see sad crushed plastic everywhere and put some thoughts composed of words that do not belong together together and feel a little digital hope.
My theory is this: Women falter when they're called on to be highly self-conscious about their talents. Not when they're called on to enact them.
My house was filled with music. We had a piano, and my brothers and sisters played instruments. Even though I was around it, I played basketball.
However confused the scene of our life appears, however torn we may be who now do face that scene, it can be faced, and we can go on to be whole.
I am looking for the human who admits his flaws Who shocks the adversary By being kinder not stronger What would that be like? We don't even know
It is the Revolution, the magical word, the word that is going to change everything, that is going to bring us immense delight and a quick death.
Futurists wanted to suggest movement by means of a dynamic painting; Duchamp applies the notion of delay - or, rather, or analysis - to movement.
Eighty years old! No eyes left, no ears, no teeth, no legs, no wind! And when all is said and done, how astonishingly well one does without them.
Low gurgling laughter, as sweet As the swallow's song i' the South, And a ripple of dimples that, dancing, meet By the curves of a perfect mouth.
How can we expect novelists to be moral, when their trade forces them to treat every end they meet as no more than an imperfect means to a novel?
A kid under a tablecloth insists he’s a ghost. A table underneath a tablecloth is, I guess, like the rest of us, only pretending to be invisible.
Courage has nothing to do with our determination to be great. It has to do with what we decide in that moment when we are called upon to be more.
The way a crow Shook down on me The dust of snow From a hemlock tree Has given my heart A change of mood And saved some part Of a day I had rued.
Evolution is like walking on a rolling barrel. The walker isn't so much interested in where the barrel is going as he is in keeping on top of it.
Ane bow that is ay bent Worthis ay unsmart and dullis on the string; Sa dois the mynd that is ay diligent In ernistfull thochtis and in studying.
I saw the spiders marching through the air, Swimming from tree to tree that mildewed day In latter August when the hay Came creaking to the barn.
Never let a man imagine that he can pursue a good end by evil means, without sinning against his own soul. The evil effect on himself is certain.
Knowledge is power. Information is power. The secreting or hoarding of knowledge or information may be an act of tyranny camouflaged as humility.
It’s ever been the way of the man of science or philosophy. Most folks stay in the dark and then complain they can’t see nothing.” – Snipes (185)
The poem is not only the point of origin for all the language and narrative arts, the poem returns us to the very social function of art as such.
It would be a real failure if agreeing that it [abortion] was not an electoral issue provided an alibi for taking it seriously as a public issue.
Fish love the ocean. Snakes move like earth-fish inside a mountain,well away from seawater. Certain sunfish,though,turn snakes into ocean lovers.
Soul, if you want to learn secrets, your heart must forget about shame and dignity. You are God's lover, yet you worry what people are saying.
This place is a dream. Only a sleeper considers it real. Then death comes like dawn, and you wake up laughing at what you thought was your grief.
Plagiarists are always suspicious of being stolen from, as pickpockets are observed commonly to walk with their hands in their breeches' pockets.
In Shakespeare one sentence begets the next naturally; the meaning is all inwoven. He goes on kindling like a meteor through the dark atmosphere.
The aim of poetry and the poet is finally to be of service, to ply the effort of the individual into the larger work of the community as a whole.
I step naked into the shower of truth - whole-hearted, bloody-minded, utterly selfish, no longer even pretending to enjoy or understand anything.
An audience sabotages my freedom, devastates my innocence, corrupts my integrity, inhibits my great joy - and of course gives me further to fall.
Who wants to put together something that will bear some relationship to the vision or memory or experience or story or idea or dream or whatever.
Once i spoke the language of the flowers,Once i undrestand each word the caterpillar said,Once i smiled in secret at the gossip of the starlings.
You want the good life? You live where white people live, you go to school where white people go to school, and you shop where white people shop.
What if someone picks on me?" I asked Then I'll pick on them". What if someone picks my nose?" I asked. The I'll pick your nose, too" Rowdy said.
A soul trembling to sit by a hearth so bright, To exist again, it’s enough if I borrow from Your lips the breath of my name you murmur all night.
Getting better from depression demands a lifelong commitment. I've made that commitment for my life's sake and for the sake of those who love me.
Yes, there is joy, fulfillment and companionship but the loneliness of the soul in its appalling self-consciousness is horrible and overpowering.