#poe

It is not growing like a tree In bulk, doth make Man better be; Or standing long an oak, three hundred year, To fall a log at last, dry, bald, and sere: A lily of a day Is fairer far in May Although it fall and die that night; It was the plant and flower of Light. In small proportions we just beauties see; And in short measures life may perfect be (Ben Jonson) ↗

— Aidan Chambers

#beauty

We don't attempt to have any theme for a number of the anthology, or to have any particular sequence. We just put in things that we like, and then we try to alternate the prose and the poetry. ↗

— James Laughlin

#anthology #any #attempt #just #like

Concrete poets continue to turn out beautiful things, but to me they're more visual than oral, and they almost really belong on the wall rather than in a book. I haven't the least idea of where poetry is going. ↗

— James Laughlin

#beautiful #beautiful things #belong #book #concrete

I think that concrete poetry seems to have, as far as I can see, come to a kind of a dead end. It doesn't seem to be going any further than it went in its high period of about five or six years ago. ↗

— James Laughlin

#ago #any #as far as #come #concrete

I think that is where poetry reading becomes such an individual thing. I mean I have friend who like poets who just don't say anything to me at all, I mean they seem to me rather ordinary and pedestrian. ↗

— James Laughlin

#becomes #friend #i #i think #individual

I think there is a great difference, in that when the poet is reading you get the whole personality of the person, especially if he's a good reader. Whereas a person just sitting gets what he puts into it. ↗

— James Laughlin

#especially #get #gets #good #great

I think there's no excuse for the American poetry reader not knowing a good deal about what is going on in the rest of the world. ↗

— James Laughlin

#american #deal #excuse #going #good

I think we will always have the impulse towards visual poetry with us, and I wouldn't agree with Bly that it's a bad thing. It depends on the ability of the individual poet to do it well, and to make a shape which is interesting enough to hold your attention. ↗

— James Laughlin

#agree #always #attention #bad #bad thing

With me it's the whole thing, it's the conceit, the idea, what the poem is saying. And it goes on just as long as is necessary to say what needs to be said. ↗

— James Laughlin

#goes #idea #just #long #me

It is quite true, as some poets said, that the God who created man must have had a sinister sense of humor, creating him a reasonable being, yet forcing him to take this ridiculous posture, and driving him with blind craving for this ridiculous performance. ↗

— David Herbert Lawrence

#blind #craving #created #creating #driving