Writing poetry is the only form of literary labour which gives me entire satisfaction.
Poetry is either language lit up by life or life lit up by language
I have no fondness for pure form at all.
It is Australian innocence to love The naturally excessive and be proud Of a thoroughbred gelding who ran fast.
Auden is an accomplished rhymer and Shakespeare is not.
I started off in England and very few people knew I was Australian. I mean, the clues were in the poems, but they didn't read them very carefully, and so for years and years I was considered completely part of the English poetry scene.