favorite quotes about writing or poetry.

[WriterDom]

"No tears in the writer, no tears in the reader. "
Robert Frost

"Writing is like hunting. There are brutally cold afternoons with nothing in sight, only the wind and your breaking heart. Then the moment when you bag something big. The entire process is beyond intoxicating."
Kate Braverman

 

[daughter]

Donald Hall

"A successful poem is impulse validated by attention"

 

[daughter]

William Stafford

"A poem is anything said in such a way, or put on the page in
such a way, or put on the page in such a way, as to invite from the hearer or the reader a certain kind of attention."

 

[daughter]

Robert Bly

"It's important that the words in your poems
be those you could speak to your friends."

 

[Guest]

"Critics are like eunuchs in a harem: they know how it's done, they've seen it done every day, but they're unable to do it themselves."
Brendan Francis Behan

 

[Unmasked Poet]

Very true.

"Yet they can still tell you what you're doing wrong."

Unmasked Poet

 

[Whispersecret]

Sorry to go off topic, writerdom, but I have to address U.P.'s troll.

Troll, you believe that the only people allowed to criticize are those who have mastered what they are criticizing, which is, of course, a load of crap.

I may not be able to act my way out a paper bag, but I can certainly tell that Gene Hackman is a wonderful actor and the governor of Minnesota is most definitely NOT.

And if you disagree with my opinion about Gene and the Governor, that's fine! That's the nature of opinons. However, one does not have to be adept at something in order to have a valid opinion about it.

The problem is that U.P. has an educated opinion which he backs up with specifics. That's what makes his opinion more difficult to refute, which is why you won't (or can't) come out into the open to make a stand.

All right. Here's my quote to get the thread back on track:

The way of the mystic and the way of the artist are related, except that the mystic doesn't have the craft.
--Jean Erdman

 

[Maid of Marvels]

"A poet is a bird of unearthly excellence, who escapes from his celestial realm arrives in this world warbling. If we do not cherish him, he spreads his wings and flies back into his homeland."
~Kahlil Gibran, "The Poet of Baalbek"


Poetry is an echo, asking a shadow to dance.
~Carl Sandburg