12 Quotes & Sayings By Marina Tsvetaeva

Marina Tsvetaeva (1892-1941) was one of the leading Russian poets of her time. She was famously associated with the Russian Futurists, but her work encompased a wide range of styles. Her early poems, written in her native tongue, are marked by a mood of loathing for the suffering world around her, while her later work is expressive of a more spiritual nature. Both types are presented in the following selection.

One should write only those books from whose absence one...
1
One should write only those books from whose absence one suffers. In short: the ones you want on your own desk. Marina Tsvetaeva
Don't you know no one can escapethe power of creatures...
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Don't you know no one can escapethe power of creatures reaching outwith breath alone? Marina Tsvetaeva
3
I opened my veins. Unstoppablylife spurts out with no remedy. Now I set out bowls and plates. Every bowl will be shallow. Every plate will be small. And overflowing their rims, into the black earth, to nourishthe rushes unstoppablywithout cure, gushespoetry ... Marina Tsvetaeva
4
There are books so alive that you're always afraid that while you weren't reading, the book has gone and changed, has shifted like a river; while you went on living, it went on living too, and like a river moved on and moved away. No one has stepped twice into the same river. But did anyone ever step twice into the same book? Marina Tsvetaeva
Wings are freedom only when they are wide open in...
5
Wings are freedom only when they are wide open in flight. On one's back they are a heavy weight. Marina Tsvetaeva
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(Everyday life is like a sack: with holes. And you carry it anyway.) Marina Tsvetaeva
7
I want to sleep with you, fall asleep and sleep. That magnificent folk word, how deep, how true, how unequivocal, how exactly what it says. Just — sleep. And nothing more. No, another thing: and know right into the deepest sleep that it is you. And more: how your heart sounds. And — kiss your heart. Marina Tsvetaeva
8
Somewhere in the night ahuman being is drowning. Marina Tsvetaeva
9
The eclipses ofpoets are not foretold in the calender. Marina Tsvetaeva
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For the way of the comets is the poet's way. Marina Tsvetaeva
11
I am a moonbeam free to go whenever I choose. Marina Tsvetaeva