Packing is chiefly planning -- if it is

To be deeply in love is, of course, a great liberating force.

The signs that presage growth, so similar, it seems to me, to those in early adolescence: discontent, restlessness, doubt, despair, longing, are interpreted falsely as signs of decay. In youth one does not as often misinterpret the signs; one accepts them, quite rightly, as growing pains. One takes them seriously, listens to them, follows where they lead. ... But in the middle age, because of the false assumption that it is a period of decline, one interprets these life-signs, paradoxically, as signs of approaching death.

You can’t just write and write and put things in a drawer. They wither without the warm sun of someone else’s appreciation.

Why is it that you can sometimes feel the reality of people more keenly through a letter than face to face?

The collector walks with blinders on; he sees nothing but the prize. In fact, the acquisitive instinct is incompatible with true appreciation of beauty.

When I cannot write a poem, I bake biscuits and feel just as pleased.