We would rather be ruined than changed. We would rather die in our dread than climb the cross of the moment and let our illusions die.

There's always another story. There's more than meets the eye.

In the eyes of others a man is a poet if he has written one good poem. In his own he is only a poet at the moment when he is making his last revision to a new poem. The moment before, he was still only a potential poet; the moment after, he is a man who has ceased to write poetry, perhaps forever.

Money cannot buy the fuel of love but is excellent kindling.

It is a sad fact about our culture that a poet can earn much more money writing or talking about his art than he can by practicing it.

To save your world you asked this man to die; would this man, could he see you now, ask why?

The definition of prayer is paying careful and concentrated attention to something other than your own constructions.