poem quotes

A poem begins in delight and ends in wisdom.

My favourite poem is the one that starts ‚Thirty days hath September‘ because it actually tells you something.

A poem begins as a lump in the throat, a sense of wrong, a homesickness, a lovesickness.

I was reading the dictionary. I thought it was a poem about everything.

Our moments of inspiration are not lost though we have no particular poem to show for them; for those experiences have left an indelible impression, and we are ever and anon reminded of them.

Prepare for death, if here at night you roam, and sign your will before you sup from home.

‚Two Voices,‘ from my album with Peter Schwalm, is an intact dream-poem. I awoke one night with an image of a piece of paper and all the words of the poem written on it, so I just blundered down to the kitchen table and ‚copied it out.‘

I need scarcely observe that a poem deserves its title only inasmuch as it excites, by elevating the soul. The value of the poem is in the ratio of this elevating excitement.