The only realism in art is of the imagination..

The better work men do is always done under stress and at great personal cost..

But all art is sensual and poetry particularly so. It is directly, that is, of the senses, and since the senses do not exist without an object for th….

The job of the poet is to use language effectively, his own language, the only language which is to him authentic..

Sometimes I find myself thinking, rather wistfully, about Lao Tzu's famous dictum: 'Govern a great nation as you would cook a small fish.' All around….

We sit and talk quietly, with long lapses of silence, and I am aware of the stream that has no language, coursing beneath the quiet heaven of your ey….

There is nothing beginning nor end to the imagination but it delights in its own seasons reversing the usual order at will..

The weight of love Has buoyed me up Till my head Knocks against the sky..

A new world is only a new mind..

Unless there is a new mind there cannot be a new line, the old will go on repeating itself with recurring deadliness.

As birds' wings beat the solid air without which none could fly so words freed by the imagination affirm reality by their flight..

It is difficult to get the news from poems, yet men die miserably every day for lack of what is found there..

Compose. (No ideas but in things) Invent! Saxifrage is my flower that splits the rocks..

It is not fair to be old, to put on a brown sweater..

First we have to see. Or first we have to be taught to see. We have to be taught to see here, because here is everywhere, related to everywhere else,….

One thing I am convinced more and more is true, and that is this: The only way to be truly happy is to make others happy. When you realize that and ….

In summer, the song sings itself..

A poem is a small machine made out of words..

I think these days when there is so little to believe in——when the old loyalties——God, country, and the hope of Heaven——aren't very real, we are more….

It is not what you say that matters but the manner in which you say it; there lies the secret of the ages..

Dissonance / (if you are interested) / leads to discovery..