Top 472 Poetry Quotes

Poetry is fascinating. As soon as it begins the poetry has changed the thing into something extra, and somehow prose can go over into poetry.

When truth has no burning, then it is philosophy, when it gets burning from the heart, it becomes poetry.

Perhaps no person can be a poet, or even enjoy poetry, without a certain unsoundness of mind.

Too many people in the modern world view poetry as a luxury, not a necessity like petrol. But to me it's the oil of life.

I was influenced by surrealist poetry and painting as were thousands of other people, and it seems to me to have become a part of the way I write, but it's not.

I've always used poetry to explain myself to myself. These things just sat in my psyche and then came out.

Writing criticism is to writing fiction and poetry as hugging the shore is to sailing in the open sea.

When I am writing fiction, I believe I am much better organized, more methodical - one has to be when writing a novel. Writing poetry is a state of free float.

Poetry operates by hints and dark suggestions. It is full of secrets and hidden formulae, like a witch's brew.

Women who are inclined to write poetry at all are inspired by being mad at something.