There is a time in every man’s education when he arrives at the conviction that envy is ignorance; that imitation is suicide; that he must take himself for better, for worse, as his portion; that though the wide universe is full of good, no kernel of nourishing corn can come to him but through his… Continue reading Ralph Waldo Emerson
A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. — Percy Bysshe Shelley, from “A Defence of Poetry,” 1820, Toward the Open Field: Poets on the Art of Poetry 1800-1950, ed. Melissa Kwasny (Wesleyan University Press, 2004)
I call on Fate to give me back my soul. — Friedrich Hölderlin, from “Hypernion,” Hyperion and Selected PI call on Fate to give me back my soul. — Friedrich Hölderlin, from “Hypernion,” Hyperion and Selected Poems: Friedrich Hlderlin. (Continuum, August 1, 1990) Originally published 1797.oems: Friedrich Hlderlin. (Continuum, August 1, 1990) Originally published 1797.
Music, when soft voices die, Vibrates in the memory— Odours, when sweet violets sicken, Live within the sense they quicken. Rose leaves, when the rose is dead, Are heaped for the belovèd’s bed; And so thy thoughts, when thou art gone, Love itself shall slumber on. — Percy Bysshe Shelley, “Music when Soft Voices Die… Continue reading Percy Bysshe Shelley
kiss me a little: the air darkens and is alive – o live with me in the fewness of these colours; — E. E. Cummings, from “XLVIII,” ViVa. (Liveright; 2nd ed. Edition, October 17, 1997) Originally published 1931.
Be like the bird, who Halting in his flight On limb too slight Feels it give way beneath him, Yet sings Knowing he hath wings. — Victor Hugo, “The Bird,” Twilight Songs (Les Chants du crépuscule), published in 1835.
A Woman Waits For Me A WOMAN waits for me—she contains all, nothing is lacking, Yet all were lacking, if sex were lacking, or if the moisture of the right man were lacking. Sex contains all, Bodies, Souls, meanings, proofs, purities, delicacies, results, promulgations, Songs, commands, health, pride, the maternal mystery, the seminal milk; All… Continue reading Walt Whitman
