My grief and my smile begin in your face, my son.

I write poetry because I can’t disobey the impulse; it would be like blocking a spring that surges up in my throat. For a long time I’ve been the servant of the song that comes, that appears and can’t be buried away. How to seal myself up now?…It no longer matters to me who receives what I submit. What I carry out is, in that respect, greater and deeper than I, I am merely the channel.

Now I am nothing but a veil; all my body is a veil beneath which a child sleeps.

I have a faithful joy and a joy that is lost. One is like a rose, the other, a thorn. The one that was stolen I have not lost.

For me, religiosity is ... the constant remembrance of the presence of the soul.

Let the radiance of my enthusiasms envelop the poor courtyard and the bare classroom. Let my heart be a stronger column and my goodwill purer gold than the columns and gold of rich schools.

Let the earth look at me, and bless me, for now I am fecund and sacred, like the palms and the furrows.