Quotes About Poetry

I think my poems mean what they say, and whatever might be implicit within a particular passage, but there is no message, nothing I want to tell the world particularly except what I am thinking when I am writing.

There is no last page to the poetry of John Ashbery. You will have had the experience; you can always have it again.

Something Ought to be written about how this affects Something Ought to be written about how this affects You when you write poetry: The extreme austerity of an almost empty mind Colliding with the lush, Rousseau-like foliage of its desire to communicate Something between breaths, if only for the sake Of others and their desire to understand you and desert you For other centers of communication, so that understanding May begin, and in doing so be undone.

Are ye the ghosts of fallen leaves, O flakes of snow, For which, through naked trees, the winds A-mourning go? Or are ye angels, bearing home The host unseen Of truant spirits, to be clad Again in green?

In the past, poetry came in the form of spells and chants used to effect change.

Poetry is but another form of inquiry into the nature of phenomena, using with its own unique procedures and tools.

If poetry alters the way in which the reader views the world, then it has had its desired effect.

No poem is easily grasped so why should any reader expect fast results?

An experienced reader uses the poem as an agent of inquiry. This makes poetry very exciting, unstable, and interactive.

My obsession with time informs my poetry so completely it is hard for me to summarize it. We want time to pass, for new things to happen to us, we want to hold on to certain moments, we don't want our lives to end.

Sometimes poetry is inspired by the conversation entered into by reading other poems.

Poetry can repair no loss, but it defies the space which separates. And it does this by its continual labor of reassembling what has been scattered.

Do you know the legend about cicadas? They say they are the souls of poets who cannot keep quiet because, when they were alive, they never wrote the poems they wanted to.

Every authentic poem contributes to the labor of poetry… to bring together what life has separated or violence has torn apart… Poetry can repair no loss, but it defies the space which separates. And it does this by its continual labor of reassembling what has been scattered.

the very basic theme of poetry is that of time passing, the very basic theme of painting is that of the moment made permanent.

My heart born naked was swaddled in lullabies. Later alone it wore poems for clothes. Like a shirt I carried on my back the poetry I had read. So I lived for half a century until wordlessly we met. From my shirt on the back of the chair I learn tonight how many years of learning by heart I waited for you.

The serious poet should seek to explore the 'sources' of these global nightmares-and to explore them not just in poetry, but in person. Poetry is a terminal activity, taking place out near the end of things.

The only happy people in the world are those who do not have to write long poems

Too many people in the modern world view poetry as a luxury, not a necessity like petrol. But to me it's the oil of life.

No poem lovely as a tree, she said (though I'd never once thought to compare)

And how can poetry stand up against its new conditions? Its position is perfectly precarious.

The arts generally have had to recognize Modernism - how should poetry escape?

I have nothing to say, and I am saying it, and that is poetry.

I have nothing to say and I am saying it and that is poetry as I need it.