986 Poetry Quotes for You to Enjoy

In these days of our new materialistic Irish state, poetry will have a harder, less picturesque task. But the loss of Yeats and all that boundless activity, in a country where the mind is feared and avoided, leaves a silence which it is painful to contemplate. Austin Clarke

Silence Mind Will Country State Our Feared Poetry Boundless New Contemplate Days Picturesque Leaves Materialistic Loss Yeats Irish Task Where Which Painful Less Avoided Activity Harder

Reform and exchange in English poetry are as slow as in the British constitution itself. Austin Clarke

Constitution Slow Poetry Exchange Itself Reform English British

America was based on a poetic vision. What will happen when it loses its poetry? Azar Nafisi

Vision Will Poetic Poetry Loses America Happen Based

Cotton was a force of nature. There's a poetry to it, hoeing and growing cotton. B. B. King

Nature Poetry Cotton Force Growing

I read pretty eclectically - fiction, non-fiction, and poetry - and I've been inspired and influenced by a number of writers. Barry Eisler

Pretty Poetry Inspired Writers Read Non-Fiction Been Influenced Fiction Number

The mystic purchases a moment of exhilaration with a lifetime of confusion; and the confusion is infectious and destructive. It is confusing and destructive to try and explain anything in terms of anything else, poetry in terms of psychology. Basil Bunting

Try Confusion Else Destructive Purchases Poetry Mystic Lifetime Terms Exhilaration Infectious Anything Anything Else Psychology Explain Confusing Moment

I'm conscious of a series of circles working its way through my life. And at this particular moment I have come round to the beginning of my writing cycle. It begins with poetry. There's hardly a day that goes past on which I don't write poetry. Ben Okri

Life Day Writing My Life Past Beginning Circles Way Poetry Through Write Particular Come Begins Goes Which Working Cycle Moment Series Round Conscious Hardly

I was lucky to have read a lot of poetry when I was younger; it helped me to remember a way to write. Benjamin Clementine

Me Remember Way Poetry Write Read Lot Younger Helped Lucky

Don't call my lyrics poetry. It's an insult to real poets. Bernie Taupin

Lyrics Poetry Poets Call Insult Real

Marriage - a book of which the first chapter is written in poetry and the remaining chapters in prose. Beverley Nichols

Marriage Book Chapter First Chapters Poetry Remaining Written Prose Which

I'm pretty much all for poetry in public places - poetry on buses, poetry on subways, on billboards, on cereal boxes. Billy Collins

Pretty Poetry Boxes Places Public Buses Cereal Much Billboards

I'm all for poetry catching up with technology, and just as there are iTunes, I think we should have iPoems. I mean, people should be able to walk around with their earbuds in and listening to poems on their iPod. Billy Collins

Technology People Walk Listening Think Able Poems Poetry Catching Around iPod Up iTunes Just Mean Mean People Should

There are interesting forms of difficulty, and there are unprofitable forms of difficulty. I mean, I enjoy some difficult poetry, but some of it is impenetrable and I actually wouldn't want to penetrate it if I could, perhaps. Billy Collins

Enjoy Difficult Difficulty Penetrate Some Poetry Could Perhaps Want Forms Interesting Mean If I Could Actually

Listeners are kind of ambushed... if a poem just happens to be said when they're listening to the radio. The listener doesn't have time to deploy what I call their 'poetry deflector shields' that were installed in high school - there's little time to resist the poem. Billy Collins

I have my Poetry 180 project, which I've made my main project. We encourage high schools, because that's really where, for most people, poetry dies off and gets buried under other adolescent pursuits. Billy Collins

I know my voice has a limited range of motion; I don't write dramatic monologues and pretend to be other people. But so far, my voice is broad enough to accommodate most of what I want to put into my poetry. I like my persona; I often wish I were him and not me. Billy Collins

Me People Wish Other Enough Dramatic Broad Range Pretend Voice Poetry Write Put Like Know Most Him Limited Motion Accommodate Were Persona Often Want Far Monologues

When I was a young man, I understood that poetry was two things - it was difficult to understand, but you could understand that the poet was miserable. So for a while there, I wrote poems that were hard to understand, even by me, but gave off whiffs of misery. Billy Collins

One of the disadvantages of poetry over popular music is that if you write a pop song, it naturally gets into people's heads as they listen in the car. You don't have to memorize a Paul Simon song; it's just in your head, and you can sing along. With a poem, you have to will yourself to memorize it. Billy Collins

Music You Yourself People Song Car Will Memorize Poem Simon Poetry Write Disadvantages Head Over Along Heads Sing Gets Listen Just Paul Paul Simon Pop Your Pop Song Naturally Popular Popular Music

My persona is less miserable than a lot of contemporary poetry speakers are. Billy Collins

Miserable Poetry Contemporary Lot Than Persona Speakers Less

I find a lot of poetry very disappointing, but I do have poets that I go back to. One book of poetry that I'd like to mention is 'The Exchange' by Sophie Cabot Black. Her poems are difficult without being too difficult. Billy Collins

Some honor Cummings as the granddaddy of all American innovators in poetry and ascribe to him a diverse progeny that includes virtually any poet who considers the page a field and allows silence to be part of poetry's expressiveness. Billy Collins

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