More on Poetry
Poetry must be new as foam, and as old as the rock.
Poetry surrounds us everywhere, but putting it on paper is, alas, not so easy as looking at it.
Science has as many competing styles as painting or poetry. The diversity of science also finds a parallel in the diversity of religion.
Terrible times in which priests no longer merit the praise of poets and in which poets have not yet begun to be priests.
José Martí On El Poema de Niágara of Pérez Bonalde (1883)
My poems are like a dagger
Sprouting flowers from the hilt;
My poetry is like a fountain
Sprinkling streams of coral water.
Poetry is poetry, and one’s objective as a poet is to achieve poetry precisely as one’s objective in music is to achieve music.
His poetry, so wonderful when it is really flying, isn’t trying to tell you how much he knows. It’s giving thanks for how much there is to be known.
The best poetry will be found to have a power of forming, sustaining, and delighting us, as nothing else can.
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