Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
I had hoped, at my departure, I would feel sure and knowledgeable about everything that lay ahead -- after all, I had been "analyzed." Instead, all I could see were question marks.
We learned in the university to consider Wordsworth and Keats as Romantics. They were only a generation apart, but Wordsworth didn't even read Keats's book when he gave him a copy.
To walk abroad is, not with eyes, But thoughts, the fields to see and prize; Else may the silent feet, Like logs of wood, Move up and down, and see no good, Nor Jor nor glory meet.
Wishes, like painted landscapes, best delight, Whilst distance recommends them to the sight. Plac'd afar off, they beautiful appear: But show their coarse and nauseous colors near.
The writer in me can look as far as an African-American woman and stop. Often that writer looks through the African-American woman. Race is a layer of being, but not a culmination.
These are the stories of travelers on a spiritual quest between worlds. Part mythmaker, part poet, Omar Castaeda is an original, and these stories are unlike any in our literature.
Unfortunately, in the north and the south of Ireland, intolerant habits are part of the fabric of emotion, part of the identity crisis which afflicts the population of the country.
What I thought was an end turned out to be a middle. What I thought was a brick wall turned out to be a tunnel. What I thought was an injustice turned out to be a color of the sky.
Nothing is so stifling as symmetry. Symmetry is boredom, the quintessence of mourning. Despair yawns. There is something more terrible than a hell of suffering - a hell of boredom.
The peasants of the Asturias believe that in every litter of wolves there is one pup that is killed by the mother for fear that on growing up it would devour the other little ones.
Who then understands the reciprocal flux and reflux of the infinitely great and the infinitely small, the echoing of causes in the abysses of being, and the avalanches of creation?
I've always felt alone and isolated, and living on the West Coast, there's no poetry community out here, and if there is, it's really spread out - because it's LA, it's spread out.
Young people, who are still uncertain of their identity, often try on a succession of masks in the hope of finding the one which suits them - the one, in fact, which is not a mask.
All works of art are commissioned in the sense that no artist can create one by a simple act of will but must wait until what he believes to be a good idea for a work comes to him.
All poets adore explosions, thunderstorms, tornadoes, conflagrations, ruins, scenes of spectacular carnage. The poetic imagination is not at all a desirable quality in a statesman.
Fat girl, terrestrial, my summer, my night, How is it I find you in difference, see you there In a moving contour, a change not quite completed? You are familiar yet an aberration.
I say to mankind, Be not curious about God. For I, who am curious about each, am not curious about God - I hear and behold God in every object, yet understand God not in the least.
And I will show that there is no imperfection in the present, and can be none in the future, And I will show that whatever happens to anybody it may be turned to beautiful results.
A new home by a gap in the Meng wall; Of the old trees, a few gnarled willows are left. Those who come in the future, who will they be, Grieving in vain for what others had before?
Modern Existentialism... is a total European creation, perhaps the last philosophic legacy of Europe to America or whatever other civilization is now on its way to supplant Europe.
For such, Being made beautiful overmuch, Consider beauty a sufficient end, Lose natural kindness and maybe The heart-revealing intimacy That chooses right, and never find a friend.
When you are old and gray and full of sleep, and nodding by the fire, take down this book and slowly read, and dream of the soft look your eyes had once, and of their shadows deep.
The hare grows old as she plays in the sun And gazes around her with eyes of brightness; Before the swift things that she dreamed of were done She limps along in an aged whiteness.
Be it a weakness, it deserves some praise, We love the play-place of our early days; The scene is touching, and the heart is stone, That feels not at that sight, and feels at none.
When one that holds communion with the skies Has fill'd his urn where these pure waters rise, And once more mingles with us meaner things, 'Tis e'en as if an angel shook his wings.
We must calculate not on the weather, nor on fortune, but upon God and ourselves. He may fail us in the gratification of our wishes, but never in the encounter with our exigencies.
Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried, Grapple them to thy soul with hoops of steel; But do not dull thy palm with entertainment Of each new-hatch'd, unfledg'd comrade.
Beshrew that heart that makes my heart to groan For that deep wound it gives my friend and me; Is't not enough to torture me alone, But slave to slavery my sweet'st friend must be?
In me thou see'st the twilight of such day As after sunset fadeth in the west, Which by and by black night doth take away Death's second self, that seals up all in rest. -Sonnet 73
Ingratitude is monstrous; and for the multitude to be ingrateful were to make a monster of the multitude; of which we being members, should bring ourselves to be monstrous members.
And gentlemen in England now-a-bed Shall think themselves accurs'd they were not here, And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day.
What should we speak of When we are old as you? when we shall hear The rain and wind beat dark December? how, In this our pinching cave, shall we discourse The freezing hours away?
Silence is the perfectest herald of joy: I were but little happy, if I could say how much. Lady, as you are mine, I am yours: I give away myself for you and dote upon the exchange.
O! she doth teach the torches to burn bright It seems she hangs upon the cheek of night Like a rich jewel in an Ethiop's ear; Beauty too rich for use, for earth too dear. - Romeo -
Mine eyes Were not in fault, for she was beautiful; Mine ears, that heard her flattery; nor my heart, That thought her like her seeming. It had been vicious To have mistrusted her.
So holy and so perfect is my love, And I in such a poverty of grace, That I shall think it a most plenteous crop To glean the broken ears after the man That the main harvest reaps.
Keep a journal, and don't assume that your work has to accomplish anything worthy: artists and peace-workers are in it for the long haul, and not to be judged by immediate results.
I’d be glad to go out on a limb with those Who want nothing beyond what the wind bestows, Were I not bound to roots, dug in deep to bear Never being done grasping for light and air
I like what Oliver Lakes does on the saxophone. The saxophone comes pretty close to the sound of the human voice and when Oliver plays with other sax players, it's like a dialogue.
I turn to history not for lessons but to confront my experience with the experience of others and to win for myself a sense of responsibility for the state of the human conscience.
No one has imagined us. We want to live like trees, sycamores blazing through the sulfuric air, dappled with scars, still exuberantly budding, our animal passion rooted in the city.
Some to conceit alone their taste confine, And glittering thoughts struck out at ev'ry line; Pleas'd with a work where nothing's just or fit; One glaring chaos and wild heap of wit.
Hope humbly then; with trembling pinions soar; Wait the great teacher, Death, and God adore; What future bliss He gives not thee to know, But gives that hope to be thy blessing now.
What are men better than sheep or goats That nourish a blind life within the brain, If knowing God, they lift not hands of prayer Both for themselves and those who call them friend?
Good manners, Madam, are had these days not For your asking, nor mine, nor what-we-used-to-be's. The day is a loud grenade that bursts a smile Of serious weeds in a comic lily plot.
I'm of the opinion that poetry is always political, and cannot help but be so, regardless of the poet's intent, given that refusing to deal in politics is in itself a political act.
And time brings down what is both strong and tall. But plants new set to be eradicate, And buds new blown, to have so short a date, Is by his hand alone that guides nature and fate.
I suffer for birds and fireflies but not frogs, she said, and threw him across the room. Kaboom! Like a genie out of a samovar, a handsome prince arose in the corner of the bedroom.
Be brave, my heart. Plant your feet and square your shoulders to the enemy. Meet him among the man-killing spears. Hold your ground. In victory, do not brag; in defeat, do not weep.
Some difficulty is warranted and other difficulty I think is gratuitous. And I think I can tell the difference. There are certainly very difficult poets that I really enjoy reading.