#poe

The American bards shall be marked for generosity and affection and for encouraging competitors… . The great poets are also to be known by the absence in them of tricks and by the justification of perfect personal candor… . How beautiful is candor! All faults may be forgiven of him who has perfect candor. ↗

— Walt Whitman

#beauty

The most important tribute any human being can pay to a poem or a piece of prose he or she really loves is to learn it by heart. Not by brain, by heart; the expression is vital. ↗

— George Steiner

#being #brain #expression #heart #human

A paranoiac like a poet, is born, not made. ↗

— Luis Bunuel

#like #made #poet

I have not only labored solely for the benefit of others (receiving for myself a miserable pittance), but have been forced to model my thoughts at the will of men whose imbecility was evident to all but themselves" — Edgar Allan Poe ↗

— Daniel Stashower

#beauty

I believe that the short story is as different a form from the novel as poetry is, and the best stories seem to me to be perhaps closer in spirit to poetry than to novels. ↗

— Tobias Wolff

#best #closer #different #form #i

Why should poetry have to make sense? ↗

— Charlie Chaplin

#poetry #sense #should #why

A poet must leave traces of his passage, not proof. ↗

— Rene Char

#leave #must #passage #poet #proof

Still, language is resilient, and poetry when it is pressured simply goes underground. ↗

— Diane Wakoski

#language #poetry #pressured #resilient #simply

A poem can have an impact, but you can't expect an audience to understand all the nuances. ↗