Quotes from John Ciardi

A man is what he does with his attention and mine is not for sale.

Nothing goes further toward a man's liberation than the act of surviving his need for character.

Patience is the art of caring slowly.

To read a poem with no thought in mind but to paraphrase it into a single, simple and usually high-minded prose statement is the destruction of poetry.

Tell me how much a nation knows about its own language, and I will tell you how much that nation knows about its own identity.

You don't have to suffer to be a poet; adolescence is enough suffering for anyone.

A university is what a college becomes when the faculty loses interest in the students.

It is easy enough to praise men for the courage of their conviction. I wish I could teach the sad young of this mealy generation the courage of their convictions.

The day will happen whether or not you get up.

The success of the poem is determined not by how much the poet felt in writing it, but by how much the reader feels in reading it.

A neighborhood is a residential area that is changing for the worse.

Poetry lies its way to the truth.

A university is what a college becomes when the faculty loses interest in the students.

Every parent is at some time the father of the unreturned prodigal, with nothing to do but keep his house open to hope.

It is easy enough to praise men for the courage of their convictions. I wish I could teach the sad young of this mealy generation the courage of their confusions.

Intelligence recognizes what has happened. Genius recognizes what will happen.

What has any poet to trust more than the feel of the thing? Theory concerns him only until he picks up his pen, and it begins to concern him again as soon as he lays it down.

A dollar saved is a quarter earned.

Gentility is what is left over from rich ancestors after the money is gone.

There is nothing wrong with sobriety in moderation.

You don't have to suffer to be a poet adolescence is enough suffering for anyone.

I'm smiled out, talked out, quipped out, socialized so far from any being, I need the weight of mortal silences to get realized back into myself.

Modern art is what happens when painters stop looking at girls and persuade themselves that they have a better idea.

I have one head that wants to be good, And one that wants to be bad. And always, as soon as I get up, One of my heads is sad.