Poetry Quotes

Painted desert, ocean of colorsun's worshiper, moon's loverpicture of a coyote's voicesandbox of angels, another toy.

~ Trine Daely

Any hand can condem, but it takes a helping hand to build.

~ Nate Spears

Unless you are here: this garden refuses to exist.Pink dragonflies fall from the airand become scorpions scratching blood out of rocks.The rainbows that dangle upon this mist: shatter. Like the smile of a child separatedfrom his mother’s milk for the very first time.--from poem Blood and Blossoms

~ Aberjhani

In an age when nations and individuals routinely exchange murder for murder, when the healing grace of authentic spirituality is usurped by the divisive politics of religious organizations, and when broken hearts bleed pain in darkness without the relief of compassion, the voice of an exceptional poet producing exceptional work is not something the world can afford to dismiss.

~ Aberjhani

We have no quarrel with the German nation,One would not quarrel with a flock of sheep.But, generation after generation,They throw up leaders who disturb our sleep.

~ Alan Herbert

If it chance your eye offends you,Pluck it out lad, and be sound:'Twill hurt, but here are salves to friend you,And many a balsam grows on ground.And if your hand or foot offend you,Cut it off, lad, and be whole;But play the man, stand up and end you,When your sickness is your soul.

~ A.e. Housman

Hesitancy is the surest destroyer of talent. One cannot be timorous and reticent, one must be original and loud. New metaphors, new rhythms, new expressions of emotion can only spring from unhindered gall. Nothing should interfere with that intuition--not the fear of appearing stupid, nor of offending somebody, nor jeopardizing publication, nor being trivial. The intuition must be as unhindered as a karate chop.

~ Stephen Dobyns

…Perses, hear me out on justice, and take what I have to say to heart; cease thinking of violence. For the son of Kronos, Zeus, has ordained this law to men: that fishes and wild beasts and winged birds should devour one another, since there is no justice in them; but to mankind he gave justice which proves for the best.

~ Hesiod

To whom shall I offer this book, young and sprightly,Neat, polished, wide-margined, and finished politely?To you, my Cornelius, whose learning pedantic,Has dared to set forth in three volumes giganticThe history of ages—ye gods, what a labor!—And still to enjoy the small wit of a neighbor.A man who can be light and learned at once, sir,By life's subtle logic is far from a dunce, sir.So take my small book—if it meet with your favor.The passing of years cannot dull its sweet savor.

~ Catullus

Nobody reads poetry anymoreSo who the hell are youI see bent over this book?

~ Aleksandar Ristović

I don't tolerate politics that come from anger. I want a politics derived from beauty... I don't admire politicians, but poets. (Rubem Alves, p. 189)

~ Mev Puleo

Suddenly, I was stopped by a quiet song . .Somebody stood, swaying slowly on the road,In the darkest shadow by a puddle,And low above it a small tree grew . .It might’ve been a wild cherry tree . .He kept singing, watching the puddle fill . .I dragged the pine through the water,And with my other hand steadied my sack,Where a bottle of red vino dangled . .He didn’t move, but kept on singing . .Should I have stopped thereAnd joined his singing? . .Had he foundThe one happy tree? . .No one knows where it grows—Or what it looks like . .And who is allowed to recognize it? . .I never stood under it,Even to wait for rain to passOr watch between the dropsThe silent froth appear . .Swaying, he kept on singing . .Otherwise, he would have fallenAnd the rain stopped . .He danced his own rainUnder that tree . .I can’t do such things . .Perhaps it was a wolf? . .

~ Oleh Lysheha

Right words are born in courage, which results from our struggle to make sense of our various predicaments. Cheer is what words are trying to tell us/... It's native to the words/and what they want us always to know/even when it seems quite impossible to do.

~ William Meredith

Carry out your literary dream, no matter how unlikely it may seem...

~ Terry A. O'neal

It nods and curtseys and recoversWhen the wind blows above,The nettle on the graves of loversThat hanged themselves for love.The nettle nods, the wind blows over,The man, he does not move,The lover of the grave, the loverThat hanged himself for love.

~ A.e. Housman

EpitaphDen Tigern ertrann ichDie Wanzen nährte ichAufgefressen wurde ichVon den Mittelmäßigkeiten.

~ Bertolt Brecht

But usually not. Usually she thinks of the path to his house, whether deer had eaten the tops of the fiddleheads, why they don't eat the peppermint saprophytes sprouting along the creek; or she visualizes the approach to the cabin, its large windows, the fuchsias in front of it where Anna's hummingbirds always hover with dirty green plumage and jeweled throats. Sometimes she thinks about her dream, the one in which her mother wakes up with no hands. The cabin smells of oil paint, but also of pine. The painter's touch is sexual and not sexual, as she herself is....When the memory of that time came to her, it was touched by strangeness because it formed no pattern with the other events in her life. It lay in her memory like one piece of broken tile, salmon-coloured or the deep green of wet leaves, beautiful in itself but unusable in the design she was making

~ Robert Hass

Plût au ciel que le lecteur, enhardi et devenu momentanément féroce comme ce qu’il lit, trouve, sans se désorienter, son chemin abrupt et sauvage, à travers les marécages désolés de ces pages sombres et pleines de poison ; car, à moins qu'il n’apporte dans sa lecture une logique rigoureuse et une tension d’esprit égale au moins à sa défiance, les émanations mortelles de ce livre imbiberont son âme comme l’eau le sucre. Il n’est pas bon que tout le monde lise les pages qui vont suivre ; quelques-uns seuls savoureront ce fruit amer sans danger. Par conséquent, âme timide, avant de pénétrer plus loin dans de pareilles landes inexplorées, dirige tes talons en arrière et non en avant. Écoute bien ce que je te dis : dirige tes talons en arrière et non en avant.

~ Comte De Lautréamont

See--two who dreamed that dream, and you were one.

~ Caris Brooke

If I could sum up my poetry in a few well-chosen words, the result might be a poem. Several years ago, when I was asked to say something on this topic, I came up with the notion that for me the making of poems is both a commemoration (a moment captured) and an evocation (the archaeologist manqué side of me digging into something buried and bringing it to light). But I also said that I find the processes that bring poems into being mysterious, and I wouldn't really wish to know them; the thread that links the first unwilled impulse to the object I acknowledge as the completed poem is a tenuous one, easily broken. If I knew the answers to these riddles, I would write more poems, and better ones. Simple Poem is as close as I can get to a credo':Simple PoemI shall make it simple so you understand.Making it simple will make it clear for me.When you have read it, take me by the handAs children do, loving simplicity.This is the simple poem I have made.Tell me you understand. But when you doDon't ask me in return if I have saidAll that I meant, or whether it is true.

~ Anthony Thwaite

The poetry of love is the greatest gift God gave us.

~ Sorin Cerin

So it's off with the shellsuit and on with the Armanis,Bring out the champagne and the caviar sarnies

~ Roger Mcgough

unless you're the lead dog the view never changes...mercy out does justice every time:always find your way back home/

~ Bob Mitchley

Contemporary poets got so obscure that poetry kind of fell out of favor

~ Paul Ruffin

Neither pathway is correct.

~ Azaam Yahoo

To the knights of faith nobody believes.

~ Dejan Stojanovic

Faith is a question of eyesight, even the blind can see that.

~ Dejan Stojanovic

I lose faith in mathematics, logical and rigid. What with those that even zero doesn’t accept?

~ Dejan Stojanovic

Writing poems is simply an excuse to remember You.

~ Kamand Kojouri

God doesn't listen to me too, but people have their suspicions. सुनता तो रब हमारी भी नहीं,पर लोगों को अल्लाह पे शक बेशक है

~ Vineet Raj Kapoor

People tell you to believe in yourself for your whole life, then call you arrogant when you begin taking their advice.

~ Curtis Tyrone Jones

I am nothing but a ripped fabric stitched together by God's grace.

~ J.a. Anum

She walks,on the streets,with a face that,doesn't belong.It smiles more than,many put together,whole day long.Her heart misfit,a little chipped.And she likes to,call it once broken,but now stitched.

~ Jasleen Kaur Gumber

When you are here, God is near.

~ Kamand Kojouri

A word only writes Its night and ridesIts dream.

~ Dejan Stojanovic

No poem ever bought a hamburger, or not too many.

~ Thomas Lux

I wanted to write the most beautiful poem but that is impossible the world has written its own.

~ Dejan Stojanovic

To write good poems is the secret of brevity.

~ Dejan Stojanovic

If we were to understand how important it is to say something and say it well, maybe we wouldn’t write a single word, but that would be tragic.

~ Dejan Stojanovic

Poetry is the wailing of a broken heart―the etched sorrows of despairing souls.  These artful words are an exclamation in rare colors expressed noiselessly on parchment.  Poetry is the unheard cry of a flower, wilting.  It is a humble, lucent tear shed with meaning.  It is the lovely portrayal of ugliness and the bitter edge of sweet.  Poetry speaks to the spirit by piercing understanding. It interprets all senseless truths―beauty, love, emotion―into sensible scrawl.  Poetry is vague affirmation and bewildering clarification. Like the most poignant of emotions, we understand the essence but cannot adequately do it verbal justice, crippled by inherently weak tongues.  A spiritual soothsayer, poetry is the closest thing to expression of feelings unutterable.

~ Richelle E. Goodrich