Quotes by Poets - Page 212

Things, events, that occupy space yet come to an end when someone dies make us stop in wonder - and yet one thing, or an infinite number of things, dies with every man's or woman's death, unless the universe itself has a memory, as theosophists have suggested. In the course of time there was one day that closed the last eyes that had looked on Christ; the battle of Junín and the love of Helen died with the death of one man. What will die with me the day I die? What pathetic or frail image will be lost to the world? The voice of Macedonio Fernández, the image of a bay horse in a vacant lot on the corner of Sarrano and Charcas, a bar of sulfur in the drawer of a mahogany desk?
Jorge Luis Borges
But I am not allowed to forgetThe taste of the tears of yesterday.
Anna Akhmatova
An odd thing souvenir-hunting: now becomes then even while it is still now.
Margaret Atwood
Suddenly, no one, including me, was in Guescheste anymore; they weren't in Miami or Cuba; they weren't in the present, or the future, but floating somewhre in the formless, timeless space of memory.
Richard Blanco
It disturbs me that he can remember some of these things about himself, but not others; that the things he's lost or misplaced exist now only for me. If he's forgotten so much, what have I forgotten?
Margaret Atwood
Memories remain a part of one's life, whether that arise, and pass in a bitter or a sweet way.
Ehsan Sehgal
I need to remember what they look like. I try to hold them still behind my eyes, their faces, like pictures in an album. But they won't stay still for me, they move, there's a smile and it's gone, their features curl and bend as if the paper's burning, blackness eats them. A glimpse, a pale shimmer on the air; a glow, aurora, dance of electrons, then a face again, faces. But they fade, though I stretch out my arms towards them, they slip away from me, ghosts at daybreak. Back to wherever they are. Stay with me, I want to say. But they won't.
Margaret Atwood
Childhood memories surge back more vividly midway through life – like some palimpsest whose original text suddenly reappears after the manuscript has been chemically treated.
Gérard de Nerval
Moments always blossom more beautifully in memories.
Richelle E. Goodrich
A boy from Brooklyn used to cruise on summer nights.As soon as he’d hit sixty he’d hold his hand out the window,cupping it around the wind. He’d been assuredthis is exactly how a woman’s breast feels when you putyour hand around it and apply a little pressure. Now he knew,and he loved it. Night after night, again and again, untilthe weather grew cold and he had to roll the window up.For many years afterwards he was perpetually attemptingto soar. One winter’s night, holding his wife’s breastin his hand, he closed his eyes and wanted to weep.He loved her, but it was the wind he imagined now.As he grew older, he loved the word etcetera and refusedto abbreviate it. He loved sweet white butter. He oftenpretended to be playing the organ. On one of his last mornings,he noticed the shape of his face molded in the pillow.He shook it out, but the next morning it reappeared.
Mary Ruefle
So, we skipped Annabel, and discussed condoms. I said I liked the orange ones, and we ended our talk in laughter.
Steven Herrick
We were hereAnd our memories are as dear to us as every slow motion moment or held breathSo remember every instance before deathEvery first kiss, first dance, near miss, last chance, yes, no, maybe soLet us go the distance once moreLet us remember all the moments that were and were notLike the point is something we can get and what we can get is what we gotBecause all we have are the times between the moments we connect each dotSo live and rememberBurn like an ember capable of starting firesLike each moment inspires the nextLike memories are the context we put ourselves inSo that life becomes the next of kin we need to notify in case of a big bang or Extinction level eventLet now be our adventLet us live like we meant itLet us burn like we mean itBecause this world doesn't give a shit if we end in a train wreck or a car crashIf our story ends with a dot or dashIf we were dust or ashBecause all we were is all we’ll beAnd all we are is the in-between of so far, so goodSo forget every would, could, or should notForget remembering how we forgotLive like a plot twist exists now and in memoryBecause we burn brightOur light leaves scars on the sunLet no one say we will be undone by time's passingThe memories we are amassing will stand as testamentThat somehow we bent minds around the conceptThat we see others within ourselvesThat self-knowledge can't be found on bookshelvesSo who we are has no bearing on how we appearLook directly into every mirrorRealize our reflection is the first sentence to a storyAnd our story starts:"We were here."
Shane L. Koyczan
Heroes in fact die with one's youth. They are pinned like butterflies to the setting board of early memories—the time when skies were always blue, the sun shone and the air was filled with the sounds and scents of grass being cut. I find myself still as desperate to read the Sussex score in the stop-press as ever I was; but I no longer worship heroes, beings for whom the ordinary scales of human values are inadequate. One learns that as one grows up, so do the gods grow down. It is in many ways a pity: for one had thought that heroes had no problems of their own. Now one knows different!
Alan Ross
The little house is not too smallTo shelter friends who come to call.Though low the roof and small its spaceIt holds the Lord's abounding grace,And every simple room may beEndowed with happy memory.The little house, severly plain,A wealth of beauty may contain.Within it those who dwell may findHigh faith which makes for peace of mind,And that sweet understanding whichCan make the poorest cottage rich.The little house can hold all thingsFrom which the soul's contentment springs.'Tis not too small for love to grow,For all the joys that mortals know,For mirth and song and that delightWhich make the humblest dwelling bright.
Edgar A. Guest
Ah God! to see the branches stirtAcross the moon at Grantchester!tTo smell the thrilling-sweet and rottentUnforgettable, unforgottentRiver-smell, and hear the breezet Sobbing in the little trees.tSay, do the elm-clumps greatly standtStill guardians of that holy land?tThe chestnuts shade, in reverend dream,tThe yet unacademic streamIs dawn a secret shy and coldtAnadyomene, silver-gold?tAnd sunset still a golden seatFrom Haslingfield to Madingley?tAnd after, ere the night is born,Do hares come out about the corn?tOh, is the water sweet and cool,tGentle and brown, above the pool?tAnd laughs the immortal river stilltUnder the mill, under the mill?Say, is there Beauty yet to find?tAnd Certainty? and Quiet kind?tDeep meadows yet, for to forgettThe lies, and truths, and pain?… oh! yettStands the Church clock at ten to three?tAnd is there honey still for tea?
Rupert Brooke
We tend to think of memories as monuments we once forged and may find intact beneath the weedy growth of years. But, in a real sense, memories are tied to and describe the present. Formed in an idiosyncratic way when they happened, they're also true to the moment of recall, including how you feel, all you've experienced, and new values, passions, and vulnerability. One never steps into the same stream of consciousness twice.
Diane Ackerman
I take you and pile high the memories. Death will break her claws on some I keep.
Carl Sandburg
And I never started to plow in my lifeThat some one did not stop in the roadAnd take me away to a dance or picnic.t I ended up with forty acres;t I ended up with a broken fiddle—And a broken laugh, and a thousand memories,And not a single regret.
Edgar Lee Masters
and I'm thinking as our bodies meet that I'll remember this forever, and i just hope it's for all the right reasons.
Steven Herrick
What you remember saves you.
W.S. Merwin
...I stir in bed and the memories rise out of me like a buzz of flies from a carcass. I crave to be rid of them...
Barbara Kingsolver
Thought he, it's a wicked world in all meridians; I'll die a pagan.
Herman Melville
When the prophet, a complacent fat man,Arrived at the mountain-topHe cried: "Woe to my knowledge!I intended to see good white landsAnd bad black lands—But the scene is grey.
Stephen Crane
He traced a line in the dirt with his toe. ‘This is a battlefield. Has been since Cain killed Abel. And don’t let it get complicated. Gray it ain’t. It’s black and white. Good versus evil. You might as well choose sides right now.
Charles Martin
Gratitude is not a virtue I believe in, and to me it seems hypocritical to expect it from a child.
Hermann Hesse
Genius in general is poetic. Where genius has been active it has been poetically active. The truly moral person is a poet.
Novalis
Man has his being in truth--if he sacrifices truth he sacrifices himself. Whoever betrays truth betrays himself. It is not a question of lying--but of acting against one's conviction.
Novalis
I have done many impious things--no great ruler can do otherwise. I have put the good of the Empire before all human considerations. To keep the Empire free from factions I have had to commit many crimes.
Robert Graves
Willmore: There is no sinner like a young saint.
Aphra Behn
Once you decide to do right, life is easy, there are no distractions.
William Stafford
And what does God ask of you?” “To fly without wings. To do what seems impossible. To cling to our loves through the rapids of our hates. To know that God charges us with the task of making these miracles. They exist between person and person, as flame goes from candle to candle. To know that all we can know of right or wrong is through the way our acts are revealed in the lives of other people. There is no other way to see God. It is not given to us.
Patricia Storace
I had as lief have the foppery of freedom as the morality of imprisonment.
William Shakespeare
it is better to be strong and cruel than to be fair. At least, one eats better that way. And morality is more dependent on the state of one's stomach than of one's nation
Catherynne M. Valente
The only crime is pride.
Sophocles
Most men—it is my experience—are neither virtuous nor scoundrels, good-hearted nor bad-hearted. They are a little of one thing and a little of the other and nothing for any length of time: ignoble mediocrities.
Robert Graves
Why do people fear hell so much? With so much hatred and division amongst mankind, we are already in it.
Suzy Kassem
We become responsible for the actions of others the instant we become conscious of what they are doing wrong and fail to remind them of what is right.
Suzy Kassem
Rights can be considered wrongs, depending on who is judging.
Suzy Kassem
Everything in this world is primarily a matter of morals, and only very much later one of politics.
Franz Werfel
Thou shalt have one God only; whoWould be at the expense of two?No graven images may beWorshipped, except the currency:Swear not at all; for, for thy curseThine enemy is none the worse:At church on Sunday to attendWill serve to keep the world thy friend:Honour thy parents; that is allFrom whom advancement may befall:Thou shalt not kill; but need'st not striveOfficiously to keep alive:Do not adultery commit;Advantage rarely comes of it:Thou shalt not steal; an empty feat,When it's so lucrative to cheat:Bear not false witness; let the lieHave time on its own wings to fly:Thou shalt not covet, but traditionApproves all forms of competition.
Arthur Hugh Clough
By gaming we lose both our time and treasure:two things most precious to the life of man.
Owen Feltham
It's not respectable,' she said. And when people say that, it's no useanyone's saying anything.
E Nesbit
We haven't really got anything worth having for our wishes.''We've had things happening,' said Robert; 'that's always something.''It's not enough, unless they're the right things,' said Cyril firmly.
E Nesbit
The world is going to turn upside down in a way that the honest man will live uncomfortably -- while the dishonest man will live very comfortably. Pay attention to the windows of the Four Seasons next time you stroll by their dining room. You will find thugs and hustlers of every creed living like true kings and queens.
Suzy Kassem
There was, I think, a prevailingimpression common to the provincial mind, that his misfortune wasthe result of the defective moral quality of his being a stranger.
Bret Harte
That's why the firm foundation of every land must be morality untarnished which, if destroyed, Rome will fall and founder.
Dániel Berzsenyi
Certainly nothing is unnatural that is not physically impossible.
Richard Brinsley Sheridan
There may not be a hell, but those who judge may create one. I think people are over-taught. They are over-taught everything. You have to find out by what happens to you, how you will react. I’ll have to use a strange term here… “good.” I don’t know where it comes from, but I feel that there’s an ultimate strain of goodness born in each of us. I don’t believe in God, but I believe in this “goodness” like a tube running through our bodies. It can be nurtured. It’s always magic, when on a freeway packed with traffic, a stranger makes room for you to change lanes… it gives you hope.
Charles Bukowski
She tried to argue, and tell him that he had mixed in his dull brain two matters, theology and morals, which in the primitive days of mankind had been quite distinct.
Thomas Hardy
He's only harming himself who's bent upon harming another
Hesiod
Not only to myself or before the mirror or at the hour of my death, which I hope will be long in coming, but in the presence of my children and my wife and in the face of the peaceful life I’m building, I must acknowledge: (1) That under Stalin I wouldn’t have wasted my youth in the gulag or ended up with a bullet in the back of my head. (2) That in the McCarthy era I wouldn’t have lost my job or had to pump gas at a gas station. (3) That under Hitler, however, I would have been one of those who chose the path of exile, and that under Franco I wouldn’t have composed sonnets to the caudillo or the Holy Virgin like so many lifelong democrats. One thing is as true as the other. My bravery has its limits, certainly, but so does what I’m willing to swallow. Everything that begins as comedy ends as tragicomedy.
Roberto Bolaño
Each man must grant himself the emotions that he needs and the morality that suits him.
Rémy de Gourmont
This is my real bed-rock objection to the eastern systems. They decry all manly virtue as dangerous and wicked, and they look upon Nature as evil. True enough, everything is evil relatively to Adonai; for all stain is impurity. A bee's swarm is evil — inside one's clothes. "Dirt is matter in the wrong place." It is dirt to connect sex with statuary, morals with art.Only Adonai, who is in a sense the True Meaning of everything, cannot defile any idea. This is a hard saying, though true, for nothing of course is dirtier than to try and use Adonai as a fig-leaf for one's shame.To seduce women under the pretense of religion is unutterable foulness; though both adultery and religion are themselves clean. To mix jam and mustard is a messy mistake.
Aleister Crowley
Moral maxims are surprisingly useful on occasions when we can invent little else to justify our actions.
Alexander Pushkin
I have a different idea of elegance. I don't dress like a fop, it's true, but my moral grooming is impeccable. I never appear in public with a soiled conscience, a tarnished honor, threadbare scruples, or an insult that I haven't washed away. I'm always immaculately clean, adorned with independence and frankness. I may not cut a stylish figure, but I hold my soul erect. I wear my deeds as ribbons, my wit is sharper then the finest mustache, and when I walk among men I make truths ring like spurs.
Edmond Rostand
Hate will only eat the truth, then spit out a lie.
Anthony Liccione
The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who, in times of great moral crisis, maintain their neutrality.
Dante Alighieri
Love is my sin, and thy dear virtue hate,Hate of my sin, grounded on sinful loving,
William Shakespeare
One hates a person for the same reason one loves him 
Russell Banks
I hate her." Merlin laughed, tossing the stick down. "Not so. You have forgotten how to love. That's a different sorrow.
Catherine Fisher