"You shall love your crooked neighbour, with your crooked heart."
- W.H. Auden
"A poet is, before anything else, a person who is passionately in love with language."
"We would rather be ruined than changedWe would rather die in our dreadThan climb the cross of the momentAnd let our illusions die."
"SEPTEMBER 1, 1939I sit in one of the divesOn Fifty-second StreetUncertain and afraidAs the clever hopes expireOf a low dishonest decade:Waves of anger and fearCirculate over the brightAnd darkened lan..."
"Follow, poet, follow rightTo the bottom of the night,With your unconstraining voiceStill persuade us to rejoice;With the farming of a verseMake a vineyard of the curse,Sing of human unsuccessIn a rapt..."
"I will love you forever" swears the poet. I find this easy to swear too. "I will love you at 4:15 pm next Tuesday" - Is that still as easy?"
"O stand, stand at the window As the tears scald and start;You shall love your crooked neighbour With your crooked heart."
"Mad Ireland hurt you into poetry."
"And each in the cell of himself is almost convinced of his freedom."
"Poetry makes nothing happen."