Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
Tis strange the miser should his cares employTo gain those riches he can ne'er enjoy;Is it less strange the prodigal should wasteHis wealth to purchase what he ne'er can taste?
Pretty! in amber to observe the forms Of hairs, of straws, or dirt, or grubs, or worms! The things, we know, are neither rich nor rare, But wonder how the devil they got there.
Praise is like ambergrease: a little whiff of it, and by snatches, is very agreeable; but when a man holds a whole lump of it to your nose, it is a stink, and strikes you down.
At length corruption, like a general flood (So long by watchful ministers withstood), Shall deluge all; and avarice, creeping on, Spread like a low-born mist, and blot the sun.
Who combats bravely is not therefore brave, He dreads a death-bed like the meanest slave: Who reasons wisely is not therefore wise,- His pride in reasoning, not in acting lies.
If the egotist is weak, his egotism is worthless. If the egotist is strong, acute, full of distinctive character, his egotism is precious, and remains a possession of the race.
Sweet were the days when I was all unknown, But when my name was lifted up, the storm Brake on the mountain and I cared not for it. Right well know I that fame is half disfame.
When I hear that a personal friend has fallen into matrimonial courses, I feel the same sorrow as if I had heard of his lapsing into theism — a holy sorrow, unmixed with anger.
And lo, between the sundawn and the sun His day's work and his night's work are undone: And lo, between the nightfall and the light, He is not, and none knoweth of such an one.
For when we quaff the gen'rous bowl, Then sleep the sorrows of our soul. Let us drink the juice divine, The gift of Bacchus, god of wine. When I take wine, my cares go to rest.
I mean, every thought starts over, so every expression of a thought has to do the same. every accuracy has to be invented... I feel I am blundering in concepts too fine for me.
I'm hunting for the truth. It might be a kind of poetic truth, and not just a factual one, because behind everything that happens to you, there is another truth, a secret life.
I am younger each year at the first snow. When I see it, suddenly, in the air, all little and white and moving; then I am in love again and very young and I believe everything.
Images are probably the most important part of the poem. First of all you want to tell a story, but images are what are going to shore it up and get to the heart of the matter.
Trump is the worst. I mean, he is like a shape shifter. You can't nail him down. It is like the last gasp, the last bastion of old white males, of white supremacy and hegemony.
If the heart has its reasons, perhaps the body Has its own lumbering sort of carnal spirit, Felt in the tingling bruises of collision, And known to captains as esprit de corps.
When you get a poem [in a public place], it happens to you so suddenly that you don't have time to deploy your anti-poetry deflector shields that were installed in high school.
And from this marvellous pan-Hellenic expedition, triumphant, brilliant in every way, celebrated on all sides, glorified incomparable, we emerged: the great new Hellenic world.
When I say that basically writing is a hard hustle, I don't mean that it is a bad life, if one can get away with it. It's the miracle of miracles to make a living by the typer.
Rejoice, the Lord is King! Your Lord and King adore; Mortals, give thanks and sing, And triumph evermore: Lift up your heart, lift up your voice; Rejoice, again, I say rejoice.
When a women speaks her truth, fires up her intention and feeling, stays tight with the instinctive nature, she is singing, she is living in the wild breath-stream of the soul.
Being a good parent will necessarily break our hearts as we watch a child grow and eventually choose their own way, even through many of the same heartbreaks we have traversed.
Jean Valentine and Jane Cooper were my professors at Sarah Lawrence College - and they were uncompromised in their art. They gave me models of how to live one's life as a poet.
I am interested in the confines of the page and busting through/off the page as well. A writer must let go of the line when writing prose poems, which brings its own pleasures.
I like best to have one book in my hand, and a stack of others on the floor beside me, so as to know the supply of poppy and mandragora will not run out before the small hours.
Humaneness and justice are the means by which to govern properly. When government is carried out properly, people feel close to the leadership and think little of dying for it.
Youth calls to age across the tired years: 'What have you found,' he cries, 'what have you sought?" 'What have you found,' age answers through his tears, 'What have you sought.
For when down on the knees The man (or god) stretches the arms In giving, It is no accident the hands Are curled like bowls or cups, For he offers self, yet Begs it back again.
For so, surely you will cast a light of gladness upon his onward journey, and contribute your part towards the building of that kingdom of love which links our earth to heaven.
The idea of a poem as a message in a bottle means that it's sent out towards some future reader and the reader who opens that bottle becomes the addressee of the literary text.
Poetry from the bottom up is an act of selection: you kind of feel your way through the crowds of poems. The good ones came forward a long time ago, and the bad ones fell away.
What you wouldn't have suspected lives & trembles in the air. Those treasures of the day you keep just out of reach. These come & go in truckloads but no one stops to see them.
Fear not. For fear itself is fed by fear, and all fears pass. Did no one tell you so? Come take my hand, my friend, and we will peer into this fear's abyss. And jump! And know.
We are all bound up together in one great bundle of humanity, and society cannot trample on the weakest and feeblest of its members without receiving the curse in its own soul.
Vanitas vanitatum has rung in the ears Of gentle and simple for thousands of years; The wail still is heard, yet its notes never scare Either simple or gentle from Vanity Fair.
In April the sweet showers fall And pierce the drought of March to the root, and all The veins are bathed in liquor of such power As brings about the engendering of the flower.
A great lie is like a great fish on dry land; it may fret and fling and make a frightful bother, but it cannot hurt you. You have only to keep still, and it will die of itself.
Shall I, to please another wine-sprung minde, Lose all mine own? God hath giv'n me a measure Short of His can and body; must I find A pain in that, wherein he finds a pleasure?
Even our recreation was scheduled. There was no time to look for birds or wander into the nearby woods. We were put into teams and sent into violent pursuit of a helpless ball.
The seed must move to the soil; the tree must turn to the sun. The river must leave its source to reach the sea. And man must forget man, the maker, in order to make the world.
Be not afraid to pray--to pray is right. Pray, if thou canst, with hope; but ever pray, Though hope be weak or sick with long delay; Pray in the darkness, if there be no light.
Then followed that beautiful season... Summer.... Filled was the air with a dreamy and magical light; and the landscape Lay as if new created in all the freshness of childhood.
Oh, what a glory doth this world put on, for him who with a fervent heart goes forth under the bright and glorious sky, and looks on duties well performed, and days well spent.
Think of your woods and orchards without birds! Of empty nests that cling to boughs and beams As in an idiot's brain remembered words Hang empty 'mid the cobwebs of his dreams!
But the nearer the dawn the darker the night, And by going wrong all things come right. Things have been mended that were worse, and the the worse, the nearer they are to mend.
Spake full well, in language quaint and olden, One who dwelleth by the castled Rhine, When he called the flowers, so blue and golden, Stars, that in earth's firmament do shine.
I believe that the struggle against death, the unconditional and self-willed determination to live, is the mode of power behind the lives and activities of all outstanding men.
What is the holding of breath? It is a flight from the Self, it is a temporary escape from the torment of Self. It is a temporary palliative against the pain and folly of life.
You may see me, fat and shining, with well-cared for hide, . . . a hog from Epicurus' herd. [Lat., Me pinguem et nitidum bene curata cute vises, . . . Epicuri de grege porcum.]
Too indolent to bear the toil of writing; I mean of writing well; I say nothing about quantity. [Lat., Piger scribendi ferre laborem; Scribendi recte, nam ut multum nil moror.]