“The novel is born of disillusionment the poem, of despair.”
Topic
poetry
850 quotes
Quotes, most loved first
“Everyone thinks they're going to write one book of poems or one novel.”
“Sometimes poetry is inspired by the conversation entered into by reading other poems.”
“I still read Donne, particularly his love poems.”
“I like poems that are little games.”
“Poetry is the revelation of a feeling that the poet believes to be interior and personal which the reader recognizes as his own.”
“Usually a life turned into a poem is misrepresented.”
“Pain is filtered in a poem so that it becomes finally, in the end, pleasure.”
“Poets are soldiers that liberate words from the steadfast possession of definition.”
“You don't make a poem with ideas, but with words.”
“A poem might be defined as thinking about feelings - about human feelings and frailties.”
“Each word bears its weight, so you have to read my poems quite slowly.”
“We all write poems it is simply that poets are the ones who write in words.”
“There'll always be working people in my poems because I grew up with them, and I am a poet of memory.”
“You don't help people in your poems. I've been trying to help people all my life - that's my trouble.”
“Wanted: a needle swift enough to sew this poem into a blanket.”
“A poem conveys not a message so much as the provenance of a message, an advent of sense.”
“However, if a poem can be reduced to a prose sentence, there can't be much to it.”
“How do poems grow? They grow out of your life.”
“The poem is the point at which our strength gave out.”
“Poetry is an orphan of silence. The words never quite equal the experience behind them.”
“Poetry is plucking at the heartstrings, and making music with them.”
“Listen, real poetry doesn't say anything it just ticks off the possibilities. Opens all doors. You can walk through anyone that suits you.”
“If my poetry aims to achieve anything, it's to deliver people from the limited ways in which they see and feel.”