Quotes About Poetry

En poésie nous avons des droits sur les paroles qui forment et défont l'Univers.

In the medieval tradition, Beksinski seems to believe art to be a forewarning about the fragility of the flesh– whatever pleasures we know are doomed to perish– thus, his paintings manage to evoke at once the process of decay and the ongoing struggle for life. They hold within them a secret poetry, stained with blood and rust.

And this, I believe, is where my third grade teacher had it wrong: Answers can only aspire to be important. Questions remain forever relevant, forever eloquent. Answers are science, questions are poetry.

It is literature,' said Kafka smiling. 'Flight from reality.' 'So poetry is lies?' 'No. Poetry is a condensate, an essence. Literature, on the other hand, is a relaxation, a means of pleasure which alleviates the unconscious life, a narcotic.' 'And poetry?' 'Poetry is exactly the opposite. Poetry is an awakening.' 'So poetry tends towards religion.' 'I would not say that. But certainly to prayer.

All one's inventions are true, you can be sure of that. Poetry is as exact a science as geometry.

Everything one invents is true, you may be perfectly sure of that. Poetry is as precise as geometry.

There is not a particle of life which does not bear poetry within it

Se a cullare le azzurre campanule del tuo balcone credi che sospirando passi il vento mormoratore sappi che, occulto fra le verdi foglie, sono io respirare. Se mentre risuona confuso alle tue spalle vago rumore, credi che per nome ti abbia chiamato lontana voce, sappi che, fra le ombre che ti cercano, sono io a chiamare. Se a notte fonda si turba timoroso il tuo cuore mentre senti sulle labbra un alito ardente, sappi che, sebbene invisibile, accanto a te sono io a respirare.

Mientras sintamos que se alegra el alma, sin que los labios rían; mientras se llore que el llanto acuda a nublar la pupila; mientras el corazón y la cabeza batallando prosigan; mientras haya esperanza y recuerdos; ¡habrá poesía! Mientras haya unos ojos que reflejen los ojos que lo miran; mientras responda el labio suspirando al labio que suspira; mientras sentirse puedan en un beso dos almas confundidas;

podrá no haber poetas; pero siempre habrá poesía

As long as science fails to discover the sources of life, as long as, on sea or in the sky, there is an abyss that is resistant to mathematical reckoning, as long as mankind in its steady progress is ignorant of where it's heading, as long as a mystery exists for man, there will be poetry!

What is poetry? you ask, while fixing your blue pupil on mine. What is poetry! And you are asking me? Poetry...is you.

No digáis que, agotado su tesoro, de asuntos falta, enmudeció la lira; podrá no haber poetas; pero siempre habrá poesía.

Para hacerte gozar con mi alegría, para que sufras tú con mi dolor, para que sientas palpitar mi vida, hice mis versos yo.

Tú sabes y yo sé que en esta vida con genio es muy contado el que la escribe, y con oro cualquiera hace poesía.

Mientras la humanidad siempre avanzando, No sepa a do camina; Mientras haya un misterio para el hombre, ¡Habrá poesía!

Edwin tells us that he became an atheist in college; but as he grew to know the limits of science and then began seeing what he called "too many coincidences" in the universe, his atheism slipped to agnosticism. Then, he recalls, a professor showed him that you could find truth in poetry and once said to him that "an agnostic is an atheist with no courage." That clearly shook Edwin's easy agnosticism.

The poet and poetess have always had a rough time of it in the Republic. It has ever been their endemic luck to starve, become a Harvard professor, commit suicide, lose their reading glasses before an audience of sophomores, go upon the people a la Barnum, and serve as homework in state universities, where they could in nowise get a position and where their presence usually scatters the English faculty like a truant officer among the Amish.

Olson's Maximus and Zukofsky's 'A' are too symbolically and verbally complex, respectively, to command large audiences especially in an age when a college degree is becoming a certificate of illiteracy.

Lazy poets try to elicit a reader's response with words designed to tug at the heart.

My mother asked me what I wanted for my birthday, so I said I wanted to read poetry with her.

He opened us—who was a key,who was a man.

Wherever life can grow, it will. It will sprout out, and do the best it can. I give you what I have. You don't get all your questions answered in this world. How many answers shall be found in the developing world of my Poem? I don't know. Nevertheless I put my Poem, which is my life, into your hands, where it will do the best it can.

My Poem is life, and not finished. It shall never be finished. My Poem is life, and can grow.