It sometimes seems to me (it is an error, I confess, but one into which I am for ever falling) that poetry is no longer anything more than an imitation of poetry… – Alexandre Vinet (1797–1847)

The flowery Path of Poetry but ill accords with the thorny Mazes of the Law; in the one I have wandered with rapture from Infancy, and I have endeavoured to grace the other with a simple but lasting Ornament—Integrity of Heart. – Charles Snart, “Dedication, to Robert Lowe, Esq. Oxton,” 1807 January 1st, Newar

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