A poet dares be just so clear and no clearer…. He unzips the veil from beauty, but does not remove it. A poet utterly clear is a trifle glaring. – E.B. White
Poetry may make us from time to time a little more aware of the deeper, unnamed feelings which form the substratum of our being, to which we rarely penetrate for our lives are mostly a constant evasion of ourselves. – T. S. Eliot
I grew up in this town, my poetry was born between the hill and the river, it took its voice from the rain, and like the timber, it steeped itself in the forests. – Pablo Neruda, quoted in Wall Street Journal,, 14 November 1985
Not being able to govern events, I govern myself, and apply myself to them, if they will not apply themselves to me. – Michel de Montaigne, Essays, 1588
We prefer to think that the absence of inverted commas guarantees the originality of a thought, whereas it may be merely that the utterer has forgotten its source. – Clifton Fadiman, The American Treasury, 1455-1955, 1955
