Quotes about Expression

In high school I was very much involved in poetry. You cannot read a poem quickly. There's too much going on there. There are rhythms and alliterations. You have to read poetry slow, slow, slow to absorb it all.

We paint a slow picture. You can see the brushstrokes. We don't get to the point, and sometimes when we do, our readers don't notice, in fact. It's so couched in nuance, it can fly right over a person's head. 'What was that you said? I couldn't quite make it out.'

Expressing passion and gratitude will guide your life. Say it again and again. Say it until you believe it. Say it until you live it.

The art of life, of a poet's life, is, not having anything to do, to do something.

The music of life is in danger of being lost in the music of the voice.

Keeping a Diary all my life helped me to discover some basic elements essential to the vitality of writing.

I want a life that makes music - not just practices the piano.

The artist needs no religion beyond his work.

The reason that fiction is more interesting than any other form of literature, to those who really like to study people, is that in fiction the author can really tell the truth without humiliating himself.

The act of naming is the great and solemn consolation of mankind

I have no sounds that could serve to soothe me, no violoncello like him, no lament that anyone would recognize as a lament because it sounds subdued, in an inexpressibly tender language. I have only these lines on the yellowish paper and words that are never new, for they keep saying the same thing through an entire life.

What is being lost is the magic of the word. I am not an image person. Imagery belongs to another civilization: the caveman. Caveman couldn't express himself so he put images on walls.