All the poet can do today is warn. That is why true Poets must be truthful.

Those who, like the beasts, have no such Hope, pass their old age shrouded with an inward gloom.

The English say, Yours Truly, and mean it. The Italians say, I kiss your feet, and mean, I kick your head.

Was it for this the clay grew tall?

A Poem does not grow by jerks. As trees in Spring produce a new ring of tissue, so does every poet put forth a fresh outlay of stuff at the same season.

All theological lore is becoming distasteful to me.

Then, when much blood had clogged their chariot-wheels I would go up and wash them from sweet wells, Even with truths that lie too deep for taint. I would have poured my spirit without stint But not through wounds; not on the cess of war.