It was not the purpose of poetry to record anything and everything, to merely describe either the outer world or some subjective mood, but to speak from the imagination of the poet to the imagination of the reader.

I couldn't claim that I have never felt the urge to explore evil, but when you descend into hell you have to be very careful.

... the poem reminds us of what we ourselves know, but did not know we knew; reminds us, above all, of what we are.

It was not the purpose of poetry to record anything and everything, to merely describe either the outer world or some subjective mood, but to speak from the imagination of the poet to the imagination of the reader.

Meanings, moods, the whole scale of our inner experience, finds in nature the 'correspondences' through which we may know our boundless selves.

Of all the arts the living of a life is perhaps the greatest; to live every moment of life with the same imaginative commitment as the poet brings to a special field.

Sensing us, the trees tremble in their sleep, The living leaves recoil before our fires, Baring to us war-charred and broken branches, And seeing theirs, we for our own destruction weep.