Poetry Quotes

There is the scent too. Wonder follows it; wonder about how a boy can smell like that when he probably has no idea. He smells like the woods in the winter or the rain when it first falls, or maybe it’s just the way he always smells and there is no way to define it.

~ Christy A. Campbell

There are some griefs so loudThey could bring down the sky,And there are griefs so stillNone knows how deep they lie,Endured, never expended.There are old griefs so proudThey never speak a word;They never can be mended.And these nourish the willAnd keep it iron-hard.

~ May Sarton

I can’t shake you.

~ Sina Queyras

I tell you hopeless grief is passionless,That only men incredulous of despair,Half-taught in anguish, through the midnight airBeat upward to God’s throne in loud accessOf shrieking and reproach. Full desertnessIn souls, as countries, lieth silent-bareUnder the blanching, vertical eye-glareOf the absolute heavens. Deep-hearted man, expressGrief for thy dead in silence like to death— Most like a monumental statue setIn everlasting watch and moveless woeTill itself crumble to the dust beneath.Touch it; the marble eyelids are not wet;If it could weep, it could arise and go.

~ Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Pruned my subconscious. Discovered new shoots.

~ Sally Jo Martine

I could simply kill you now, get it over with, who would know the difference? I could easily kick you in, stove you under, for all those times, mean on gin, you rammed words into my belly. (p. 52)

~ Barbara Blatner

oh. she heard it too-no waters coursing, canyon empty, sun soundless- and the beast your life nowhere hiding (p. 103)

~ Barbara Blatner

...gripping the rim of the sink you claw your way to stand and cling there, quaking with will, on heron legs, and still the hot muck pours out of you. (p. 27)

~ Barbara Blatner

...a passing face together with his grief turned you into a weeping Madonna...

~ John Geddes

blue-gold sky, fresh cloud, emerald-black mountain, trees on rocky ledges, on the summit, the tiny pin of a telephone tower-all brilliantly clear, in shadow and out. and on and through everything everywhere the sun shines without reservation (p. 97)

~ Barbara Blatner

The ocean-blue bowl won’t refuse to bruise, won’t hold it back from the gaping earth-wounds.There will still come water, chill wind and happy goosebumps, and in the utmost corners of oaks, leaves laughing.

~ Bryana Johnson

It was a very ordinary day, the day I realised that my becoming is my life and my home and that I don't have to do anything but trust the process, trust my story and enjoy the journey. It doesn't really matter who I've become by the finish line, the important things are the changes from this morning to when I fall asleep again, and how they happened, and who they happened with. An hour watching the stars, a coffee in the morning with someone beautiful, intelligent conversations at 5am while sharing the last cigarette. Taking trains to nowhere, walking hand in hand through foreign cities with someone you love. Oceans and poetry. It was all very ordinary until my identity appeared, until my body and mind became one being. The day I saw the flowers and learned how to turn my daily struggles into the most extraordinary moments. Moments worth writing about. For so long I let my life slip through my fingers, like water. I'm holding on to it now,and I'm not letting go.

~ Charlotte Eriksson

We weep,tears of blood,we weep,In despair, crying,we weep;the sun forever has stolenthe light from his eyes.No more his face do we see,no more his voice do we hear,nor will his affectionate gazewatch over his people.

~ Jane Bierhorst

I left smiles on your wordless lipsThe night roads- dismal and narrow,dream’s path remains shadowy wideas our lone hearts felt that arrowFrom the Poem 'My Tomorrow

~ Munia Khan

In that silence, I dream to be.

~ Khadija Rupa

It was quite a sad thing,the way I watched you sleep like nothing could go wrong and I did not want to harm it, I did not want to blur it, but how could I notwhen everything I’ve ever known has slowly gone away.

~ Charlotte Eriksson

Sometimesthe things that make you cryare more beautifulthan the thingsthat make you laugh.

~ Sanober Khan

I can’t sleep alone anymoreand I get used tocompanytoo quickly. You’re always gone too soon.

~ Charlotte Eriksson

And did with sighs their fate deplore,Since I must shelter them no more;And if before my joys were such,In having heard, and seen too much,My grief must be as great and high,When all abandoned I shall be,Doomed to a silent destiny.

~ Aphra Behn

I nodded, trying to imagine the very particular sadness of a vanished childhood yogurt now found only in France. It was a very special sort of sadness, individual, and in its inability to induce sympathy, in its tuneless spark, it bypassed poetry and entered science.

~ Lorrie Moore

There is somethingmystically sadand beautifulabouthowi will neversee youagainbut meet youagain and againin poetry.

~ Sanober Khan

If love and beauty were easy to find, they would not exist.Chaos and sadness exist in order for you to find the love and beauty in them. So that love and beauty mean something.It's meant to be hard.

~ Pleasefindthis

I measure every Grief I meetWith narrow, probing, Eyes;I wonder if It weighs like Mine,Or has an Easier size.

~ Emily Dickinson

In past wars only homes burnt, but this timeDon't be surprised if even loneliness ignites.In past wars only bodys burnt, but this timeDon't be surprised if even shadows ignite.

~ Sahir Ludhianvi

And at the closing of the dayShe loosed the chain, and down she lay;The broad stream bore her far away,The Lady of Shallot.

~ Alfred Tennyson

My Serinity,Thee, my serenity, one can not bear, Seeing thee befuddled, bereaved,Dimmed like the midnight, secluded, darkened,Thee, my serenity,A window to my eyes, A window to laughter, and peace of mind,Thee, my serenity, one can not bear,Seeing thee wail, whine, cry,Like a gloomy, mourning brume,Thee, my serenity,Soared through fervor and delight,To the crown of heavens, the Almighty Myth,One can not bear, Seeing thee prostrate, razed, demure,Upon the dimmed streets, crawling, for a sight of the lune,Thee, my birdy in love, What befall to thy song, The very chant of my life, Cut short, stopped, along with all I gasp,Thee, my serenity, one can not bear,Seeing thee, caged in thy own night, Encumbered, through thy own heart,Lean on my shoulders now,My beautiful, wonderful Lily,That thee shall not fear, the sorrow of,Of being lonely, apart, not having a peer,As I promise, to my most dear,The girl to my heart, always near,Come what may, don’t age a year,That I will be, forever here

~ Hamidreza Bagheri

there’s nothing todiscussthere’s nothing torememberthere’s nothing toforgetit’s sadand it’s notsadseems themost sensiblethinga person can doissitwith drink inhandas the wallswavetheir goodbyesmilesone comes throughit allwith a certain amount ofefficiency andbraverythenleavessome acceptthe possibility ofGodto help themgetthroughotherstake itstaight onand to theseI drink tonight.

~ Charles Bukowski

I have emotions
that are like newspapers that
read themselves.I go for days at a time
trapped in the want ads.I feel as if I am an ad
for the sale of a haunted house:18 rooms
$37,000
I'm yours
ghosts and all.

~ Richard Brautigan

Birds shouldn't be able to find tearsThey are the definition of freedom

~ Maddy Kobar

I'm pretty lost in becoming all this frost. Bitter, like Winter. Strung-out like a string of pearls.

~ Ashly Lorenzana

...in my dream the shadings of your soul are the dark tincture of rain...

~ John Geddes

Sadness is the ambrosia of all art.

~ Frances Fong

The parts of me that hurt the worst want me to write something for them, but I can't. I don't know what to say. I'm lost in all this sadness, and so are they.

~ Ashly Lorenzana

Sonnet: Political GreatnessNor happiness, nor majesty, nor fame,Nor peace, nor strength, nor skill in arms or arts,Shepherd those herds whom tyranny makes tame;Verse echoes not one beating of their hearts,History is but the shadow of their shame,Art veils her glass, or from the pageant startsAs to oblivion their blind millions fleet,Staining that Heaven with obscene imageryOf their own likeness. What are numbers knitBy force or custom? Man who man would be,Must rule the empire of himself; in itMust be supreme, establishing his throneOn vanquished will, quelling the anarchyOf hopes and fears, being himself alone.

~ Percy Bysshe Shelley

After I was caught returning at dawn from one such late-night escapade, my worried mother thoroughly interrogated me regarding every drug teenagers take, never suspecting that the most intoxicating thing I’d experienced, by far, was the volume of romantic poetry she’d handed me the previous week. Books became my closest confidants, finely ground lenses providing new views of the world.

~ Paul Kalanithi

each morning we’re born againof yesterday nothing remainswhat’s left began today

~ Anselm Hollo

I don’t believe we should carry backupplans in life’s suitcase—they’re too easy to unpack like living a life in yoga pants, so comfortable our hips spreadinto new timezones...

~ Kelli Russell Agodon

Life is like facing two mirrors at each other: There is no beginning, no end. Just the beauty within the reflected infinity

~ Michael Biondi

It is not death that allows us to understand each other, but poetry.

~ Ursula K. Le Guin

My favorite words in the world are t

~ Richelle E. Goodrich