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Poet Quotes

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Poet Quotes

“All Art is a gift of the Holy Spirit. When this light shines through the mind of a musician, it manifests itself in beautiful harmonies. Again, shining through the mind of a poet, it is seen in fine poetry and poetic prose. When the Light of the Sun of Truth inspires the mind of a painter, he produces marvellous pictures. These gifts are fulfilling their highest purpose, when showing forth the praise of God.”

“What it 't to us, if taxes rise or fall, Thanks to our fortune, we pay none at all. Let muckworms who in dirty acres deal, Lament those hardships which we cannot feel, His grace who smarts, may bellow if he please, But must I bellow too, who sit at ease? By custom safe, the poets' numbers flow, Free as the light and air some years ago. No statesman e'er will find it worth his pains To tax our labours, and excise our brains. Burthens like these with earthly buildings bear, No tributes laid on castles in the air.”

“One more royal trait properly belongs to the poet. I mean his cheerfulness, without which no man can be a poet,--for beauty is his aim. He loves virtue, not for its obligation, but for its grace; he delights in the world, in man, in woman, for the lovely light that sparkles from them. Beauty, the spirit of joy and hilarity, he sheds over the universe.”

“Plato found fault that the poets of his time filled the world with wrong opinions of the gods, making light tales of that unspotted essence, and therefore would not have the youth depraved with such opinions.”

“For the poets tell us, don't they, that the melodies they bring us are gathered from rills that run with honey, out of glens and gardens of the Muses, and they bring them as bees do honey, flying like the bees? And what they say is true, for a poet is a light and winged thing, and holy, and never able to compose until he has become inspired, and is beside himself, and reason is no longer in him. So long as he has this in his possession, no man is able to make poetry or to chant in prophecy.”

“At birth we begin to discover that shapes, sounds, lights, and textures have meaning. Long before we learn to talk, sounds and images form the world we live in. All our lives, that world is more immediate than words and difficult to articulate. Photography, reflecting those images with uncanny accuracy, evokes their associations and our instant conviction. The art of the photographer lies in using those connotations, as a poet uses the connotations of words and a musician the tonal connotations of sounds.”

“We're talking about an extremely prolific poet and songwriter and lyricist. That stuff comes off the top of her head. She [Joni Mitchell] will write exactly what she lives. If she puts some money in the soda machine, she'll write about putting money in the soda machine. "Dry Cleaner from Des Moines," on the Shadows & Light album, was about sitting next to a dry cleaner from Des Moines, playing a slot machine.”

“Love is like a friendship caught on fire. In the beginning a flame, very pretty, often hot and fierce, but still only light and flickering. As love grows older, our hearts mature and our love becomes as coals, deep-burning and unquenchable.”