Poetry Quotes

If I had my life to live over again, I would have made a rule to read some poetry and listen to some music at least once a week.

The loss of these tastes [for poetry and music] is a loss of happiness, and may possibly be injurious to the intellect, and more probably to the moral character, by enfeebling the emotional part of our nature.

The social revolution...cannot draw its poetry from the past, but only from the future. It cannot begin with itself before it has stripped itself of all superstitions concerning the past.

I read poetry to save time.

The same stream of life that runs through the world runs through my veins night and day.

The echo mocks her origin to prove she is the original.

In the world's audience hall, the simple blade of grass sits on the same carpet with the sunbeams, and the stars of midnight.

My day is done, and I am like a boat drawn on the beach, listening to the dance-music of the tide in the evening.

Days are coloured bubbles that float upon the surface of fathomless nights.

Leave out my name from the gift if it be a burden, but keep my song.

In the drowsy dark cave of the mind dreams build their nest with fragments dropped from day's caravan.

Oh my only friend, my best beloved, the gates are open in my house-do not pass by like a dream.

Not hammer-strokes, but dance of the water, sings the pebbles into perfection.

I have spent many days stringing and unstringing my instrument while the song I came to sing remains unsung.

I sit at my window gazing The world passes by, nods to me And is gone.

To the guests that must go, bid God's speed and brush away all traces of their steps.

My debts are large, my failures great, my shame secret and heavy; yet I come to ask for my good, I quake in fear lest my prayer be granted.

By touching you may kill, by keeping away you may possess.

Alas, why are my nights all thus lost? Ah, why do I ever miss his sight whose breath touches my sleep?

The music of the far-away summer flutters around the Autumn seeking its former nest.