Skip to content

The swarm of thoughts, the swarm of dreams
Of inaccessible Utopia.
A mountainous music always seemed
To be falling and to be passing away.

— Wallace Stevens The Man With the Blue Guitar (1937)

Another quote →

Topics

More quotes by Wallace Stevens

Everything is complicated; if that were not so, life and poetry and everything else would be a bore.

Beauty is momentary in the mind —
The fitful tracing of a portal;
But in the flesh it is immortal.
The body dies; the body's beauty lives.

Harmonium (1923)

One ought not to hoard culture. It should be adapted and infused into society as a leaven. Liberality of culture does not mean illiberality of its benefits.

To be young is all there is in the world.

A few things for themselves,
Florida, venereal soil,
Disclose to the lover.

Harmonium (1923)

All Wallace Stevens quotes →

You may also like

Political leaders are never leaders. For leaders we have to look to the Awakeners! Lao Tse, Buddha, Socrates, Jesus, Milarepa, Gurdjiev, Krishnamurti.

Henry Miller My Bike & Other Friends (1977)

Utu, shepherd of the land, father of the black-headed, when you go to sleep, the people go to sleep with you; youth Utu, when you rise, the people rise with you.

Lugalbanda

Some of my youthful readers are developing wonderful imaginations. This pleases me.

L. Frank Baum Introduction to The Lost Princess of Oz (1917)

Religion in so far as it is a source of consolation is a hindrance to true faith; and in this sense atheism is a purification.

Simone Weil

Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Wallace Stevens (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.