Most Like an Arch This MarriageMost like an arch–an entrance which upholds and shores the stone-crush up the air like lace. Mass made idea, and idea held in place. A lock in time. Inside half-heaven unfolds. Most like an arch–two weaknesses that lean into a strength. Two fallings become firm. Two joined abeyances become a term naming the fact that teaches fact to mean. Not quite that? Not much less. World as it is, what’s strong and separate falters. All I do at piling stone on stone apart from you is roofless around nothing. Till we kiss I am no more than upright and unset. It is by falling in and in we makethe all-bearing point, for one another’s sake, in faultless failing, raised by our own weight. John Ciardi
Was not writing poetry a secret transaction, a voice answering a voice?
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Virginia Woolf
Remembrance and reflection how allied! What thin partitions Sense from Thought divide!
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Alexander Pope
Don't be afraid of poetry.
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Clifton Fadiman
No one could say the stories were uselessfor as the tongue clackedfive or forty fingers stitchedcorn was grated from the huskpathwork was piecedor the darning was done...(from 'The Storyteller Poems')
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Liz Lochhead
You bear a sword and shield, remind meof her labor, her stoning gaze. What beastwill your blade free next? What call will you loosefrom another woman's throat?
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Donika Kelly
More Quotes By John Ciardi
And the time sundials tell May be minutes and hours. But it may just as well Be seconds and sparkles, or seasons and flowers. No, I don't think of time as just minutes and hours. Time can be heartbeats, or bird songs, or miles, Or...
Modern art is what happens when painters stop looking at girls and persuade themselves that they have a better idea.
Tell me how much a nation knows about its own language, and I will tell you how much that nation knows about its own identity.
I have one head that wants to be good, And one that wants to be bad. And always, as soon as I get up, One of my heads is sad.
