Book detail: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993 is presented as a focused source page for quotations connected with this book, collection, transcript, or source record.
This book is a compilation of poetry showcasing the author's work from 1951 to 1993, offering a glimpse into their evolving artistic expression and thematic concerns throughout their career.
The quotes below use the same card format as the rest of the site, including topics, source notes, copy actions, image creation, and sharing controls.
Read more
“God is a lonely place without steak.”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“there is enough treachery, hatred violence absurdity in the average human being to supply any given army on any given day and the best at murder are those who preach against it and the best at hate are those who preach love and the best at war finally are those who preach peace”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“There's a bluebird in my heart that wants to get out but I'm too tough for him, I say, stay in there, I'm not going to let anybody see you.”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“they say that nothing is wasted: either that or it al is”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“The trouble with a mask is it never changes”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“there are worse things than being alone but it often takes decades to realize this and most often when you do it's too late and there's nothing worse than too late”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“what matters most is how well you walk through the fire”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“there is a loneliness in this world so great that you can see it in the slow movement of the hands of a clock”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“as the spirit wanes the form appears”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“there is moss on the walls and the stain of thought and failure and waiting”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“I suppose like others I have come through fire and sword, love gone wrong, head-on crashes, drunk at sea, and I have listened to the simple sound of water running in tubs and wished to drown”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“the psyche has been burned and left us senseless, the world has been darker than lights-out in a closet full of hungry bats, and the whiskey and wine entered our veins when blood was too weak to carry on”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“we only asked for leopards to guard our thinning dreams.”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“mercy, I think, doesn't the human race know anything about mercy?”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“I was only kidding about the hundred," she says. oh," I say, "what will it cost me?" she lights her cigarette with my lighter and looks at me through the flame: her eyes tell me. look," I say, "I don't think I can ever pay that price again.”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“the history of melancholia includes all of us.”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“It was like a church in there as only the truly lost sit in bars on Tuesday mornings at 8:00 a.m.”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“We are Born like this Into this Into these carefully mad wars Into the sight of broken factory windows of emptiness Into bars where people no longer speak to each other Into fist fights that end as shootings and knifings Born into this Into hospitals which are so expensive that it’s cheaper to die Into lawyers who charge so much it’s cheaper to plead guilty Into a country where the jails are full and the madhouses closed Into a place where the masses elevate fools into rich heroes”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“beware the average man the average woman beware their love, their love is average seeks average but there is genius in their hatred there is enough genius in their hatred to kill you to kill anybody not wanting solitude not understanding solitude they will attempt to destroy anything that differs from their own not being able to create art they will not understand art they will consider their failure as creators only as a failure of the world”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“Beware Those Who Are ALWAYS READING BOOKS”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“and I laugh, I can still laugh, who can't laugh when the whole thing is so ridiculous that only the insane, the clowns, the half-wits, the cheaters, the whores, the horseplayers, the bankrobbers, the poets ... are interesting?”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“and getting dressed we talk about what else there might be to do, but being together solves most of it, in fact, solves all of it”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“and our few good times will be rare because we have the critical sense and are not easy to fool with laughter”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“my greatest problem was stamps, envelopes, paper and wine, with the world on the edge of World War II.”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“pain is absurd because it exists, nothing more.”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“my mother, poor fish, wanting to be happy, beaten two or three times a week, telling me to be happy: "Henry, smile! why don't you ever smile?" and then she would smile, to show me how, and it was the saddest smile I ever saw”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“there is enough treachery , hatred violence absurdity in the average human being to supply any given army on any given day”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“Those who preach god, need god Those who preach peace do not have peace Those who preach love do not have love”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“places to hunt places to hide are getting harder to find, and pet canaries and goldfish too, did you notice that?”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“yes, Wagner and the storm intermix with the wine as nights like this run up my wrists and up into my head and back down into the gut”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“I sit on the couch watching her arrange her long red hair before my bedroom mirror. she pulls her hair up and piles it on top of her head- she lets her eyes look at my eyes- then she drops her hair and lets it fall down in front of her face. we go to bed and I hold her speechlessly from the back my arm around her neck I touch her wrists and hands feel up to her elbows no further.”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“Where some god pissed a rain of reason to make things grow only to die.”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“one more creature dizzy with love”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“it's better to be happy...if you can..!!”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“It’s the order of things: each one gets a taste of honey then the knife.”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“some men never die and some men never live but we're all alive tonight.”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“like the fox I run with the hunted and if I’m not the happiest man on earth I’m surely the luckiest man alive.”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“people are not good to each other. perhaps if they were our deaths would not be so sad.”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“Now something so sad has hold of us that the breath leaves and we can't even cry.”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“Long ago, among other lies they were taught that silence was bravery.”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“magic persists without us no matter what we may do to try to spoil it”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“the grace is being able to like rock music, symphony music, jazz … anything that contains the original energy of joy.”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“I have gotten so used to melancholia that I greet it like an old friend.”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“and the color in my eyes has gone back into the sea.”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“I am too sick to lay down the sidewalks frighten me the whole damned city frightens me, what I will become what I have become frightens me.”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“we sat there smoking cigarettes at 5 in the morning.”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“Beware of those who seek constant crowds; they are nothing alone.”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“There's a bluebird in my heart that wants to get out.”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“The worst men have the best jobs
the best men have the worst jobs or are
unemployed or locked in
madhouses.”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993
“I would give anything for a female's hand on me tonight. they soften a man and then leave him listening to the rain.”
Source: The Pleasures of the Damned: Selected Poems 1951-1993