Quotessence
Home / Authors / Jack Spicer Books
Jack Spicer

Jack Spicer Books

Poet

Related Quotes

“Most of my friends like words too well. They set them under the blinding light of the poem and try to extract every possible connotation from each of them, every temporary pun, every direct or indirect connection - as if a word could become an object by mere addition of consequences. Others pick up words from the streets, from their bars, from their offices and display them proudly in their poems as if they were shouting, "See what I have collected from the American language. Look at my butterflies, my stamps, my old shoes!" What does one do with all this crap?”

PoetryWordsLetters To Lorca
Author:Jack Spicer
Create image

“At least we both know how shitty the world is. You wearing a beard as a mask to disguise it. I wearing my tired smile. I don't see how you do it. One hundred thousand university students marching with you. Toward A necessity which is not love but is a name.”

KnowsWorldNamesKnow HowStudentsThousandHundredTiredUniversityMaskDisguiseBeardUniversity Students
Book:My Vocabulary Did this to Me: The Collected Poetry of Jack Spicer
Create image

“And I think that it is certainly possible that the objective universe can be affected by the poet. I mean, you recall Orpheus made the trees and the stones dance and so forth, and this is something which is in almost all primitive cultures. I think it has some definite basis to it. I'm not sure what. It's like telekinesis, which I know very well on a pinball machine is perfectly possible.”

ThinkingKnowsWellsMeanMadeCultureUniverseTreePoetStonesMachinesBasesObjectivesNot SureAffectedPrimitiveRecallsDefiniteOrpheusPinball
Book:The House That Jack Built: The Collected Lectures of Jack Spicer
Create image

“Loneliness is necessary for pure poetry. When someone intrudes into the poet's life (and any sudden personal contact, whether in the bed or in the heart, is an intrusion) the poet loses his or her balance for a moment, slips into being what he or she is, uses his or her poetry as one would use money or sympathy. The person who writes the poetry emerges, tentatively, like a hermit crab from a conch shell. The poet, for that instant, ceases to be a dead person.”

WritingHeartPersonsMomentsUsePoetryLosesLonelinessPoetBalancePureBedCeaseContactInstantSlipsShellsIntrusionHermitsCrabsHermit Crabs
Author:Jack Spicer
Create image