A sip of wine, a cigarette, And then it’s time to go. I tidied up the kitchenette; I tuned the old banjo. I’m wanted at the traffic-jam. They’re saving me a seat.
When you’re not feeling holy, your loneliness says that you’ve sinned.
It doesn’t matter what you do because it’s going to happen anyway.
From bitter searching of the heart, quickened with passion and with pain, we rise to play a greater part. This is the faith from which we start.
Most of the time one is discouraged by the work, but now and again by some grace something stands out and invites you to work on it, to elaborate it or animate it in some way. It’s a mysterious process.
As a young man, Yeats spoke to me in a way I could understand. Shakespeare I couldn’t understand, but Yeats I could. It was his subject matter and also I really admired the way he put his personal life on the line.
Journalists, especially English journalists, were very cruel to me. They said I only knew three chords when I knew five!
I don’t think you can write novels on the road. You need a certain stability.
The troubles came and I saved what I could save. A thread of light, a particle, a wave.
Pay attention to the cracks, because that’s where the light gets in.
I was 15 when I first became deeply touched by the rhythm and structure of words.
My sense of proprietorship has been so weak that actually I didn’t pay attention and I lost the copyrights on a lot of the songs.
I always thought that poetry is the verdict that others give to a certain kind of writing. So to call yourself a poet is a kind of dangerous description. It’s for others; it’s for others to use.
Your servant here, he has been told to say it clear, to say it cold: It’s over, it ain’t going any further And now the wheels of heaven stop you feel the devil’s riding crop Get ready for the future: it is murder.
History is a needle for putting men asleep anointed with the poison Of all they want to keep.
To the men and women who own men and women those of us meant to be lovers we will not pardon you for wasting our bodies and time.
The dreamers ride against the men of action. Oh see the men of action falling back.
Although only one man may be receiving the favors of a woman, all men in her presence are warmed.
I want to be paid for my work, not work for my pay.
I think the term poet is a very exalted term and should be applied to a man at the end of his work. When he looks back over the body of his work and he’s written poetry then let the verdict be that he’s a poet.