A true poet does not bother to be poetical. Nor does a nursery gardener scent his roses.

Take a commonplace, clean it and polish it, light it so that it produces the same effect of youth and freshness and originality and spontaneity as it did origi…

Victor Hugo was a madman who thought he was Victor Hugo.

Such is the role of poetry. It unveils, in the strict sense of the word. It lays bare, under a light which shakes off torpor, the surprising things which surro…

Mother, though my song's measure is like your surf-beat's ancient rhythm I never learned it of you. Before there was any water there were tides of fire, both o…

I never give my work to somebody else and say, 'What do you think about that?' I just don't trust anybody. If I think it's funny, or if I think it's silly, I s…

A mere copier of nature can never produce any thing great, can never raise and enlarge the conceptions, or warm the heart of the spectator.