188 quotes
Madame Sosostris, famous clairvoyante,
Had a bad cold, nevertheless
Is known to be the wisest woman in Europe,
With a wicked pack of cards.
Arms that are braceleted and white and bare
[But in the lamplight, downed with light brown hair!]
Is it perfume from a dress
That makes me so digress?
The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock (1915)
His laughter tinkled among the teacups.
Prufrock and Other Observations (1917)
He laughed like an irresponsible fœtus.
Prufrock and Other Observations (1917)
The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes,
The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes,
Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening.
The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock (1915)
In this decayed hole among the mountains
In the faint moonlight, the grass is singing
Over the tumbled graves, about the chapel
There is the empty chapel, only the wind's home.
The Waste Land (1922)
But only in time can the moment in the rose-garden,
The moment in the arbour where the rain beat,
The moment in the draughty church at smokefall
Be remembered; involved with past and future.
Because I do not hope to turn again
Because I do not hope
Because I do not hope to turn
Desiring this man's gift and that man's scope
I no longer strive to strive towards such things
(Why should the agèd eagle stretch its wings?)
Why should I mourn
The vanished power of the usual reign?
Ash-Wednesday (1930)
Let these words answer
For what is done, not to be done again
May the judgement not be too heavy upon us
Ash-Wednesday (1930)
Light
Light
The visible reminder of Invisible Light.
Choruses from The Rock (1934)
For I have known them all already, known them all: —
Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,
I have measured out my life with coffee spoons.
The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock (1915)
A good half of the effort of understanding what the Indian philosophers were after and their subtleties make most of the great European philosophers look like school boys...
After Strange Gods (1934)
In our age, when men seem more than ever prone to confuse wisdom with knowledge, and knowledge with information, and to try to solve problems of life in terms of engineering, there is coming into existence a new kind of provincialism.
What Is a Classic? (1944)
Desire itself is movement
Not in itself desirable;
Love is itself unmoving,
Only the cause and end of movement,
Timeless, and undesiring
Except in the aspect of time
Caught in the form of limitation
Between un-being and being.
Because I cannot hope to turn again
Consequently I rejoice, having to construct something
Upon which to rejoice
Ash-Wednesday (1930)
Terminate torment
Of love unsatisfied
The greater torment
Of love satisfied.
Ash-Wednesday (1930)
To country people Cows are mild,
And flee from any stick they throw;
But I’m a timid town bred child,
And all the cattle seem to know.
Unreal city,
Under the brown fog of a winter dawn,
A crowd flowed over London Bridge, so many,
I had not thought death had undone so many.
The Waste Land (1922)
Teach us to care and not to care
Teach us to sit still. Pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death
Pray for us now and at the hour of our death.
Ash-Wednesday (1930)
We see the light but see not whence it comes.
O Light Invisible, we glorify Thee!
Choruses from The Rock (1934)