I was working on the proof of one of my poems all the morning, and took out a comma. In the afternoon I put it back again.
Poetry: the best words in the best order.
Poetry is the journal of the sea animal living on land, wanting to fly in the air.
Poetry is what makes my toenails twinkle.
A poem is never a put-up job so to speak. It begins as a lump in the throat, a sense of wrong, a homesickness, a love sickness. It is never a thought to begin with.
Don't let your work and hope be other than great.
Man reading should be man intensely alive. The book should be a ball of light in one's hand.
I must go in. The fog is rising.
The glacier knocks in the cupboard, The desert sighs in the bed, And the crack in the teacup opens A lane to the land of the dead.
Success is counted sweetest By those who ne'er succeed. To comprehend a nectar Requires sorest need.