“You will love again, people say. Give it time. Me with time running out. Day after day of the everyday. What they call real life, made of eighth-inch gauge. Newness strutting around as if it were significant. Irony, neatness and rhyme pretending to be poetry. I want to go back to that time after Michiko's death when I cried every day among the trees. To the real. To the magnitude of pain, of being that much alive.” PeopleIfsWantGivingMadeRealRunningPainAliveTreeEverydaySignificantReal LifeIronyPretendingInchesCriedRhymeMagnitudeNewnessGaugesLove AgainNeatnessTime Running OutStrutting Book:The Great Fires: Poems, 1982-1992 Source: The Great Fires: Poems, 1982-1992
“I like ornament at the right time, but I don't want a poem to be made out of decoration ... When I read the poems that matter to me, it stuns me how much the presence of the heart-in all its forms-is endlessly available there. To experience ourselves in an important way just knocks me out. It puzzles me why people have given that up for cleverness. Some of them are ingenious, more ingenious than I am, but so many of them aren't any good at being alive.” PeopleWayWantHeartMadeImportantMatterFormGivenAliveAvailablePuzzlesRight TimeClevernessOrnamentsIngeniousDecoration Author:Jack Gilbert
“I'm vain enough to think that I've made a successful life. I've had everything I've ever wanted. You can't beat that.” ThinkingMadeEnoughWantedSuccessfulBeatsVainSuccessful Life Author:Jack Gilbert
