QuoteProject
I write poetry because I can’t disobey the impulse; it would be like blocking a spring that surges up in my throat. For a long time I’ve been the servant of the song that comes, that appears and can’t be buried away. How to seal myself up now?…It no longer matters to me who receives what I submit. What I carry out is, in that respect, greater and deeper than I, I am merely the channel.
Gabriela Mistral
ShareWTF𝕏

Interpretation

What this quote means

The quote expresses the necessity of creating poetry as an uncontrollable impulse and emphasizes the role of the poet as a channel for deeper emotions.

In this quote, Gabriela Mistral reflects on the intrinsic drive to write poetry, describing it as a powerful and inevitable force that must be expressed. She conveys the idea that the act of creation transcends her own identity, revealing that the essence of the poetry she writes is more profound than her own self, as she sees herself merely as a vessel through which the song of emotion flows.

Themes

PoetryCreationExpressionEmotionChannel

In practice

Example use cases

In a speech about the importance of art, I would say, 'As Gabriela Mistral beautifully stated, I write poetry because I can’t disobey the impulse.'

More from Gabriela Mistral

You shall create beauty not to excite the senses but to give sustenance to the soul.
Gabriela MistralRead
Now my belly is as noble as my heart.
Gabriela MistralRead
Many things can wait. Children cannot. Today their bones are being formed, their blood is being made, their senses are being developed. To them we cannot say "tomorrow." Their name is today.
Gabriela MistralRead
Many things we need can wait. The child cannot. Now is the time his bones are formed, his mind developed. To him we cannot say tomorrow, his name is today.
Gabriela MistralRead

Similar quotes

As naturally as the oak bears an acorn and the vine a gourd, man bears a poem, either spoken or done.
Henry David ThoreauRead
I can write with authority only about what I know well, which means that I end up using surface details of my own life in my fiction.
Chimamanda Ngozi AdichieRead
After the last line of a poem, nothing follows except literary criticism.
Joseph BrodskyRead
Listen to them, the children of the night. What music they make!
Bram StokerRead
In HEATHEN, R. Flowers Rivera remixes the classical and the Biblical, the usual and the typical until what we thought we knew of ourselves and others is new again. The mythic becomes particular; the particular becomes mythic in these fascinating poems of personalities and personas. Rivera’s work is rich in empathy and invention. Heathen is a book of psalms for the present day.
Terrance HayesRead
I always give the example, if you turn on the radio today, black radio, Lenny Kravitz is not black. Bob Marley wasn't black: in the beginning, only white college stations played Bob Marley.
Spike LeeRead

A little wisdom, now and then

Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.