“The young student sits with his head bent over his books, and his mind straying in youth’s dreamland; where prose is prowling on the desk and poetry hiding in the heart.”

“They all tell you not to fight fire with fire,but that is only because they are afraid of your flames.”

“It is time to float on the waters of the night. Time to wrap my arms around this book and press it to my chest, life preserver in a sea of unremarkable men and women, anonymous faces on the street, a hundred thousand unalphabetized things, a million forgotten hours.”

“Il pleure dans mon coeurComme il pleut sur la ville.Tears are shed in my heart like the rain on the town.”

“I often repeat repeat myself,I often repeat repeat.I don’t don’t know why know why,I simply know that I I Iam am inclined to say to saya lot a lot this way this way-I often repeat repeat myself,I often repeat repeat.I often repeat repeat myself,I often repeat repeat.My mom my mom gets mad gets mad,it irritates my dad my dad,it drives them up a tree a tree,that’s what they tell they tell me me-I often repeat repeat myself,I often repeat repeat.I often repeat repeat myself,I often repeat repeat.It gets me in a jam a jam,but that’s the way I am I am,in fact I think it’s neat it’s neatto to to to repeat repeat-I often repeat repeat myself,I often repeat repeat.”

“Does something which exists on the edge have no true relevance to the stable center, or does it, by being on the edge, become a part of the edge and thus a part of the boundary, the definition which gives the whole its shape?”

“But often, in the world’s most crowded streets,But often, in the din of strife,There rises an unspeakable desireAfter the knowledge of our buried life;A thirst to spend our fire and restless forceIn tracking out our true, original course;A longing to inquireInto the mystery of this heart which beatsSo wild, so deep in us—to knowWhence our lives come and where they go.”

“I shall have peace, as leafy trees are peaceful When rain bends down the bough; And I shall be more silent and cold-hearted Than you are now.”

“EldoradoGaily bedight, A gallant knight, In sunshine and in shadow, Had journeyed long, Singing a song, In search of Eldorado. But he grew old— This knight so bold— And o’er his heart a shadow— Fell as he found No spot of ground That looked like Eldorado. And, as his strength Failed him at length, He met a pilgrim shadow— ‘Shadow,’ said he, ‘Where can it be— This land of Eldorado?’ ‘Over the Mountains Of the Moon, Down the Valley of the Shadow, Ride, boldly ride,’ The shade replied,— ‘If you seek for Eldorado!”

“Haiku is not a shriek, a howl, a sigh, or a yawn; rather, it is the deep breath of life.”

“I felt a Cleaving in my Mind—As if my Brain had split—I tried to match it—Seam by Seam—But could not make it fit.”

“They are not long, the days of wine and roses:Out of a misty dreamOur path emerges for awhile, then closesWithin a dream.”

“When I heard the learn’d astronomer; When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me; When I was shown the charts and the diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them; When I, sitting, heard the astronomer, where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room, How soon, unaccountable, I became tired and sick;Till rising and gliding out, I wander’d off by myself, In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time, Look’d up in perfect silence at the stars.”

“Ego TrippingI was born in the congoI walked to the fertile crescent and built the sphinxI designed a pyramid so tough that a star that only glows every one hundred years falls into the center giving divine perfect lightI am badI sat on the throne drinking nectar with allahI got hot and sent an ice age to europe to cool my thirstMy oldest daughter is nefertiti the tears from my birth pains created the nileI am a beautiful womanI gazed on the forest and burned out the sahara desert with a packet of goat’s meat and a change of clothesI crossed it in two hoursI am a gazelle so swift so swift you can’t catch me For a birthday present when he was threeI gave my son hannibal an elephant He gave me rome for mother’s dayMy strength flows ever onMy son noah built new/ark andI stood proudly at the helm as we sailed on a soft summer dayI turned myself into myself and was jesus men intone my loving name All praises All praisesI am the one who would saveI sowed diamonds in my back yardMy bowels deliver uranium the filings from my fingernails are semi-precious jewels On a trip northI caught a cold and blewMy nose giving oil to the arab worldI am so hip even my errors are correctI sailed west to reach east and had to round off the earth as I went The hair from my head thinned and gold was laid across three continentsI am so perfect so divine so ethereal so surrealI cannot be comprehended except by my permissionI mean…I…can fly like a bird in the sky…”

“You’re trying not to tell him you love him, and you’re trying to choke down the feeling, and you’re trembling, but he reaches over and he touches you, like a prayer for which no words exist, and you feel your heart taking root in your body, like you’ve discovered something you don’t even have a name for.”