Poetry Quotes

I think there's no excuse for the American poetry reader not knowing a good deal about what is going on in the rest of the world.

James Laughlin

I certainly can't speak for all cultures or all societies, but it's clear that in America, poetry serves a very marginal purpose. It's not part of the cultural mainstream.

Mark Strand

Poetry, even when apparently most fantastic, is always a revolt against artifice, a revolt, in a sense, against actuality.

James Joyce

From reading a previous answer, you know that I consider all those aspects to be part of American cultural myth and thus they figure into good American poetry, whether the poet is aware of what he is doing or not.

Diane Wakoski

I've written for every medium except poetry, at which I suck.

J. Michael Straczynski

We are looking to brands for poetry and for spirituality, because we're not getting those things from our communities or from each other.

Naomi Klein

Poetry should... should strike the reader as a wording of his own highest thoughts, and appear almost a remembrance.

John Keats

For awhile after you quit Keats all other poetry seems to be only whistling or humming.

F. Scott Fitzgerald

I like poems that are little games.

Peter Davison

Reality only reveals itself when it is illuminated by a ray of poetry.

Georges Braque

For me, poetry is a situation - a state of being, a way of facing life and facing history.

Tahar Ben Jelloun

And inasmuch as the bridge is a symbol of all such poetry as I am interested in writing it is my present fancy that a year from now I'll be more contented working in an office than ever before.

Hart Crane

Bad, quirky poetry might be better than some of the good stuff, because it really comes from the heart.

Cheryl Hines

But poetry is my life. Poetry is what matters to me.

Peter Davison

And New York is the most beautiful city in the world? It is not far from it. No urban night is like the night there... Squares after squares of flame, set up and cut into the aether. Here is our poetry, for we have pulled down the stars to our will.

Ezra Pound

victor hugo, Les Contemplations, MorsJe vis cette faucheuse. Elle était dans son champ. Elle allait ? grands pas moissonnant et fauchant, Noir squelette laissant passer le crépuscule. Dans l'ombre où l'on dirait que tout tremble et recule, L'homme suivait des yeux les lueurs de la faulx.Et les triomphateurs sous les arcs triomphaux Tombaient ; elle changeait en désert Babylone, Le trône en échafaud et l'échafaud en trône, Les roses en fumier, les enfants en oiseaux,L'or en cendre, et les yeux des mères en ruisseaux. Et les femmes criaient : - Rends-nous ce petit être. Pour le faire mourir, pourquoi l'avoir fait naître ? -Ce n'était qu'un sanglot sur terre, en haut, en bas ; Des mains aux doigts osseux sortaient des noirs grabats ; Un vent froid bruissait dans les linceuls sans nombre ; Les peuples éperdus semblaient sous la faulx sombre Un troupeau frissonnant qui dans l'ombre s'enfuit ; Tout était sous ses pieds deuil, épouvante et nuit.Derrière elle, le front baigné de douces flammes, Un ange souriant portait la gerbe d'âmes.

Victor Hugo

Cruel with guilt, and daring with despair, the midnight murderer bursts the faithless bar; invades the sacred hour of silent rest and leaves, unseen, a dagger in your breast.

Samuel Johnson

If the object of poetry is, to make men, then poetry is the heir of prophecy.

Muhammad Iqbal

Pain is filtered in a poem so that it becomes finally, in the end, pleasure.

Mark Strand

Dealing with poetry is a daunting task, simply because the reason one does it as an editor at all is because one is constantly coming to terms with one's own understanding of how to understand the world.

Peter Davison