“حبيبتي, لا تخطئي فلن يبقى أحد سوايا إذا ما بكت السماء حبيبتي, لا تخطئي إن المطر بعض بكايا وإنني رجل الشتاء لا يصبح الياسمين ياسميناً ما لم يمر بين يديا فأنا أمنحه الكبرياء أي إمرأة عادية إذا ما رأت عينيا تصبح أجمل النساء كل الياسمين يموت شتاءً إلا ياسميني فإنه لا يمارس الانحناء”
“Already the people murmur that I am your enemy because they say that in verse I give the world your me. They lie, Julia de Burgos. They lie, Julia de Burgos. Who rises in my verses is not your voice. It is my voice because you are the dressing and the essence is me; and the most profound abyss is spread between us. You are the cold doll of social lies, and me, the virile starburst of the human truth. You, honey of courtesan hypocrisies; not me; in all my poems I undress my heart. You are like your world, selfish; not me who gambles everything betting on what I am. You are only the ponderous lady very lady; not me; I am life, strength, woman. You belong to your husband, your master; not me; I belong to nobody, or all, because to all, to all I give myself in my clean feeling and in my thought. You curl your hair and paint yourself; not me; the wind curls my hair, the sun paints me. You are a housewife, resigned, submissive, tied to the prejudices of men; not me; unbridled, I am a runaway Rocinante snorting horizons of God s justice. You in yourself have no say; everyone governs you; your husband, your parents, your family, the priest, the dressmaker, the theatre, the dance hall, the auto, the fine furnishings, the feast, champagne, heaven and hell, and the social, what will they say. Not in me, in me only my heart governs, only my thought; who governs in me is me. You, flower of aristocracy; and me, flower of the people. You in you have everything and you owe it to everyone, while me, my nothing I owe to nobody. You nailed to the static ancestral dividend, and me, a one in the numerical social divider, we are the duel to death who fatally approaches. When the multitudes run rioting leaving behind ashes of burned injustices, and with the torch of the seven virtues, the multitudes run after the seven sins, against you and against everything unjust and inhuman, I will be in their midst with the torch in my hand.”
“Why not fall in love with an artist? Otherwise there are no letters, pictures, paintings and songs for you when you wake up.”
“Gardens are poems Where you stroll with your hands in your pockets. (Les jardins sont des poemes Ou l on se promene les mains dans les poches.)”
“We are not what we might be; what we are / Outlaws all extrapolation / Beyond the interval of now and here: / White whales are gone with the white ocean.”
“Le cancre Il dit non avec la tête Mais il dit oui avec le coeur Il dit oui à ce qu il aime Il dit non au professeur Il est debout On le questionne Et tous les problèmes sont posés Soudain le fou rire le prend Et il efface tout Les chiffres et les mots Les dates et les noms Les phrases et les pièges Et malgré les menaces du maître Sous les huées des enfants prodiges Avec des craies de toutes les couleurs Sur le tableau noir du malheur Il dessine le visage du bonheur”
“No map to help us find the tranquil flat lands, clearings calm, fields without mean fences. Rolling down the other side of life our compass is the sureness of ourselves. Time may make us rugged, ragged round the edges, but know and understand that love is still the safest place to land.”
“[L]ife is a phenomenon in need of criticism, for we are, as fallen creatures, in permanent danger of worshipping false gods, of failing to understand ourselves and misinterpreting the behaviour of others, of growing unproductively anxious or desirous, and of losing ourselves to vanity and error. Surreptitiously and beguilingly, then, with humour or gravity, works of art--novels, poems, plays, paintings or films--can function as vehicles to explain our condition to us. They may act as guides to a truer, more judicious, more intelligent understanding of the world.”
“...you fantasize about me reading my poems to you - it doesn t work that way - I write down everything later - living is not an after-thought...”
“Chúng ta đã nhiều lần chết đi dù vẫn đang tồn tại giữa bao người khi nhìn thấy nhau nhưng không cách nào bước tới khi lướt qua nhau và nghe rõ nhịp tim của người kia đau nhói khi rời xa nhau mà ngay cả ánh mắt cũng không bước đi nổi xót xa nào hơn…”
“هذا صباحُ جميلْ الشمسُ ضاحكةٌ، كفسْتانِ أنْثى. وثمةَ مُوسيقى تنزلُ السّلالمْ. وعند الكُشُكْ.. صحُفٌ، ومجلاّتٌ، وهاتفُ عُمْلَةْ.”
“Robert Frost didn’t like to explain his poems—and for good reason: to explain a poem is to suck the air from its lungs. This does not mean, however, that poets shouldn’t talk about their poetry, or that one shouldn’t ask questions about it. Rather, it suggests that any discussion of poetry should celebrate its ultimate ineffability and in so doing lead one to further inquiry. I think of that wonderful scene from Elie Wiesel’s memoir, Night, where Mosche the Beadle of the local synagogue, in dialogue with the young, precocious author, explains: “Every question possesses a power that does not lie in the answer.”
“They are both spectacular, Life and death.”
“When I Read the Book When I read the book, the biography famous, And is this then (said I) what the author calls a man s life? And so will some one when I am dead and gone write my life? (As if any man really knew aught of my life, Why even I myself I often think know little or nothing of my real life, Only a few hints, a few diffused faint clews and indirections I seek for my own use to trace out here.)”
“[poems are] crystals deposited after the effervescent contact of the spirit with reality. (cristaux deposes apres l effervescent contact de l esprit avec la realite)”
“Horse [Man you will find here a new representation of the universe at its most poetic and most modern Man man man man man man Give yourself up to this art where the sublime does not exclude charm and brilliancy does not blur the nuance it is now or never the moment to be sensitive to poetry for it dominates all dreadfully Guillaume Apollinaire]”
“I have been so very, very fortunate in my life. I ve met or been in contact with several of my childhood heroes. I ve interacted with people all over this planet, and even though I couldn t possibly hope to remember all their names, I remember a photograph, a poem, a sound, a joke, kind words of encouragement. All is not lost.”