Close, close all night the lovers keep. They turn together in their sleep, Close as two pages in a book that read each other in the dark. Each knows all the other knows, learned by heart from head to toes.
Elizabeth BishopRead
If after I read a poem the world looks like that poem for 24 hours or so I'm sure it's a good one—and the same goes for paintings.
Interpretation
What this quote means
A good poem or painting profoundly alters one's perception of the world.
This quote by Elizabeth Bishop reflects the idea that impactful art, whether poetry or painting, has the ability to change our perspective and influence how we see the world around us. If a piece of art resonates deeply, it creates a lingering effect that can shape our thoughts and feelings for an extended period, enriching our experience of life.
Themes
ArtPoetryPerceptionExperienceInspiration
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion about the impact of art after a gallery visit.
More from Elizabeth Bishop
All quotes →I am overcome by my own amazing sloth...Can you please forgive me and believe that it is really because I want to do something well that I don't do it at all?
Elizabeth BishopRead
It was cold and windy, scarcely the day to take a walk on that long beach Everything was withdrawn as far as possible, indrawn: the tide far out, the ocean shrunken, seabirds in ones or twos. The rackety, icy, offshore wind numbed our faces on one side; disrupted the formation of a lone flight of Canada geese; and blew back the low, inaudible rollers in upright, steely mist.
Elizabeth BishopRead
Dreams were the worst. Of course I dreamed of food and love, but they were pleasant rather than otherwise. But then I'd dream of things like slitting a baby's throat, mistaking it for a baby goat. I'd have nightmares of other islands stretching away from mine, infinities of islands, islands spawning islands, like frogs' eggs turning into polliwogs of islands, knowing that I had to live on each and every one, eventually, for ages, registering their flora, their fauna, their geography.
Elizabeth BishopRead
Open the book. (The gilt rubs off the edges of the pages and pollinates the fingertips.)
Elizabeth BishopRead
It is like what we imagine knowledge to be: dark, salt, clear, moving, utterly free.
Elizabeth BishopRead
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Until I saw Chardin's painting, I never realized how much beauty lay around me in my parents' house, in the half-cleared table, in the corner of a tablecloth left awry, in the knife beside the empty oyster shell.
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I've been around long enough for people to know who I am and what my contributions are. They know me as more than just an artist. I think they know me as a woman as well.
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I really don't care that much about "Beauties." What I really like are Talkers. To me, good talkers are beautiful because good talk is what I love. The word itself shows why I like Talkers better than Beauties, why I tape more than I film. It's not "talkies." Talkers are doing something.
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