There's nothing half so real in life as the things you've done... inexorably, unalterably done.

My theory is that poems are written because of a state of emotional irritation. It may be present for some time before the poet is conscious of what is tormenting him. The emotional irritation springs, probably, from subconscious combinations of partly forgotten thoughts and feelings. Coming together, like electrical currents in a thunder storm, they produce a poem. ... the poem is written to free the poet from an emotional burden.

Into my heart's treasury I slipped a coin That Time cannot take Nor a thief purloin- O better than the minting Of a gold-crowned king Is the safe-kept memory Of a lovely thing.

Take love when love is given, But never think to find it A sure escape from sorrow Or a complete repose.

Spend all you have for loveliness, Buy it and never count the cost; For one white singing hour of peace Count many a year of strife well lost, And for a breath of ecstasy Give all you have been, or could be.

This is the spot where I will lie When life has had enough of me, These are the grasses that will blow Above me like a living sea. These gay old lilies will not shrink To draw their life from death of mine, And I will give my body's fire To make blue flowers on this vine. "O Soul," I said, "have you no tears? Was not the body dear to you?" I heard my soul say carelessly, "The myrtle flowers will grow more blue.

With my singing I can make, a refuge for my spirit's sake; a house of shining words, to be my fragile immortality.