We read poetry because the poets, like ourselves, have been haunted by the inescapable tyranny of time and death; have suffered the pain of loss, and the more wearing, continuous pain of frustration and failure; and have had moods of unlooked-for release and peace. They have known and watched in themselves and others.

The torment of human frustration, whatever its immediate cause, is the knowledge that the self is in prison, its vital force and "mangled mind" leaking away in lonely, wasteful self-conflict.

The world is not run by thought, nor by imagination, but by opinion.

Democracy, like any non-coercive relationship, rests on a shared understanding of limits.

The Republicans’ plan is that if they can’t buy the 2012 election they will steal it.

Language is like soil. However rich, it is subject to erosion, and its fertility is constantly threatened by uses that exhaust itsvitality. It needs constant re-invigoration if it is not to become arid and sterile.

Money buys access; access buys influence.