All Quotes By Tag: Poetry

“Where are you hiding my love?Each day without you will never come again.Even today you missed a sunset on the ocean,A silver shadow on yellow rocks I saved for you,A squirrel that ran across the road,A duck diving for dinner.My God! There may be nothing left to show youSave wounds and wearinessAnd hopes grown dead,And wilted flowers I picked for you a lifetime ago,Or feeble steps that cannot run to hold you,Arms too tired to offer you to a roaring wind,A face too wrinkled to feel the ocean’s spray.”

“I sent my Soul through the Invisible, Some letter of that After-life to spell: And by and by my Soul return’d to me, And answer’d: ‘I Myself am Heav’n and Hell”

“How to be a Poet (to remind myself)iMake a place to sit down. Sit down. Be quiet. You must depend upon affection, reading, knowledge, skill—more of each than you have—inspiration work, growing older, patience, for patience joins time to eternity… iiBreathe with unconditional breath the unconditioned air. Shun electric wire. Communicate slowly. Live a three-dimensional life; stay away from screens. Stay away from anything that obscures the place it is in. There are no unsacred places; there are only sacred places and desecrated places. iiiAccept what comes from silence. Make the best you can of it. Of the little words that come out of the silence, like prayers prayed back to the one who prays, make a poem that does not disturb the silence from which it came.”

“Deprivation is the mother of poetry.”

“My friend, you thought you lost Him;that all your life you’ve been separated from Him.Filled with wonder, you’ve always looked outside for Him,and haven’t searched within your own house.”

“Poetry is finer and more philosophical than history; for poetry expresses the universal, and history only the particular.”

“When We Two PartedWhen we two partedIn silence and tears,Half broken-heartedTo sever for years,Pale grew thy cheek and cold,Colder thy kiss;Truly that hour foretoldSorrow to this.The dew of the morningSunk chill on my brow—It felt like the warningOf what I feel now.Thy vows are all broken,And light is thy fame:I hear thy name spoken,And share in its shame.They name thee before me,A knell to mine ear;A shudder comes o’er me—Why wert thou so dear?They know not I knew thee,Who knew thee too well:Long, long shall I rue thee,Too deeply to tell.In secret we met—In silence I grieve,That thy heart could forget,Thy spirit deceive.If I should meet theeAfter long years,How should I greet thee?With silence and tears.”

“But some nights, I must tell you,I go down there after everyone has fallen asleep.I swim back and forth in the echoing blackness.I sing a love song as well as I can,lost for a while in the home of the rain. ”

“Here’s another poem,like all others before and after,dedicated to you.There isn’t anything left to be saidbut I will spend my lifetrying to put you into words.You who is every goodness,every optimismand hope.Your love is a better fate for methan anything I could wish for.If you are a part of me, then you’re the best part.And if you’re separate from me, then you are my destination.But I’ve become a weary traveller,so please,let us never be apart.”

“won’t you celebrate with mewhat i have shaped intoa kind of life? i had no model.born in babylonboth nonwhite and womanwhat did i see to be except myself?i made it uphere on this bridge betweenstarshine and clay,my one hand holding tightmy other hand; come celebratewith me that everydaysomething has tried to kill meand has failed.”

“I had welcomed the feeling of love, only for it to show that i was not ready.”

“A million poems, all written in the loss and seeking of love that deludes us.”

“To Those Without PityCruel of heart, lay down my song.Your reading eyes have done me wrong.Not for you was the pen bitten,And the mind wrung, and the song written.”

“And the Spring arose on the garden fair,Like the Spirit of Love felt everywhere;And each flower and herb on Earth’s dark breastRose from the dreams of its wintry rest.”

“And death shall have no dominion.Under the windings of the seaThey lying long shall not die windily;Twisting on racks when sinews give way,Strapped to a wheel, yet they shall not break;Faith in their hands shall snap in two,And the unicorn evils run them through;Split all ends up they shan’t crack;And death shall have no dominion.”