Books are good company, in sad times and happy times, for books are people-- people who have managed to stay alive by hiding between the covers of a book.

As long as there is one upright man, as long as there is one compassionate woman, the contagion may spread and the scene is not desolate. Hope is the thing that is left us in a bad time.

Once in everyone's life there is apt to be a period when he is fully awake, instead of half-asleep.

A poet's pleasure is to withhold a little of his meaning, to intensify by mystification. He unzips the veil from beauty, but does not remove it.

When snow accumulates week after week, month after month, it works curious miracles.

The time not to become a father is eighteen years before a war.

It is Sunday, mid-morning-Sunday in the living room, Sunday in the kitchen, Sunday in the woodshed, Sunday down the road in the village: I hear the bells, calling me to share God's grace.