You that would judge me, do not judge alone this book or that, come to this hallowed place where my friends' portraits hang and look thereon; Ireland's history in their lineaments trace; think where man's glory most begins and ends and say my glory was I had such friends.

We poets would die of loneliness but for women, and we choose our men friends that we may have somebody to talk about women with. Letter to Olivia Shakespeare, 1936

It seems to me that love, if it is fine, is essentially a discipline.

Neither Christ nor Buddha nor Socrates wrote a book, for to do so is to exchange life for a logical process.

Wine enters through the mouth, Love, the eyes. I raise the glass to my mouth, I look at you, I sigh.

And a softness came from the starlight and filled me full to the bone.

I think all happiness depends on the energy to assume the mask of some other life, on a re-birth as something not one's self.