The government, the state, they're just objects of jokes rather than serious consideration. I can't possibly take them seriously.

I am losing my Soviet citizenship, I do not cease to be a Russian poet. I believe that I will return. Poets always return in flesh or on paper.

Boredom is your window on the properties of time that one tends to ignore to the likely peril of one's mental equilibrium. It is your window on time's infinity. Once this window opens, don't try to shut it; on the contrary, throw it wide open.

I'm neither Catholic not Protestant. Protestant sounds good but I don't think I am.

The moment that you place blame somewhere, you undermine your resolve to change anything.

The fact that we are living does not mean we are not sick.

I was quite happy in Arkhangelsk.Subsequently, I was sent to a village. I liked it in its own way because it sounded to me very much like the tradition of a hired man in any world-class poem. That's what I was, a hired man. I was working for a collective farm.