Poetry is a fireplace in summer or a fan in winter.
There are moments when the body is as numinous as words, days that are the good flesh continuing. Such tenderness, those afternoons and evenings, saying blackberry, blackberry, blackberry.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote reflects on the beauty and significance of certain moments in life that evoke deep feelings and connections.
In this quote, Robert Hass captures the essence of moments in life where physical experiences and emotions intertwine, illustrating how everyday sensations, such as the taste of blackberries, can become profound reminders of tenderness and connection with the world around us. It emphasizes that within the routine of our days, there exist fleeting instances that hold tremendous beauty and emotional weight, transcending the ordinary.
Themes
In practice
Example use cases
During a poetry reading at a local café, one may use this quote to illustrate the emotional depth that art can convey.
More from Robert Hass
All quotes →Sometimes from this hillside just after sunset The rim of the sky takes on a tinge Of the palest green, like the flesh of a cucumber When you peel it carefully.
Take the time to write. You can do your life's work in half an hour a day.
I think that the job of poetry, its political job, is to refresh the idea of justice, which is going dead in us all the time.
When I was younger, I was so crazy about poetry that I didn't notice who was noticing. It seemed to me so tremendous and large.
Writing is an incessant process of discovery.
Similar quotes
Poetry should... should strike the reader as a wording of his own highest thoughts, and appear almost a remembrance.
I don't know what is better than the work that is given to the actor - to teach the human heart the knowledge of itself.
I got over the loss of his desk and chair, but never the desire to produce a string of words more precious than the emeralds of Cortés.
IN CINEMA IT IS NECESSARY NOT TO EXPLAIN, BUT TO ACT UPON THE VIEWER'S FEELINGS, AND THE EMOTION WHICH IS AWOKEN IS WHAT PROVOKES THOUGHT.
I think it's silly for anyone to think you could write under the influence, but if they'd like to think that, I'd like to keep the legend alive. Maybe I was under the influence when I wrote Jesus' Son and I just didn't know it.
It's not the note you play that's the wrong note - it's the note you play afterwards that makes it right or wrong.