Poet Quotes

The poet is one who is able to keep
the fresh vision of the child alive.
- Anais Nin

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Thank you for joining me on this journey we call life,
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

My role in society, or any artist's or poet's role,
is to try and express what we all feel.
Not to tell people how to feel.
Not as a preacher, not as a leader,
but as a reflection of us all.
- John Lennon

There is another old poet whose name I do not now remember
who said, "Truth is the daughter of Time."
- Abraham Lincoln

The poet ranks far below the painter
in the representation of visible things,
and far below the musician in that of invisible things.
- Leonardo da Vinci

Every great architect is - necessarily - a great poet.
He must be a great original interpreter
of his time, his day, his age.
- Frank Lloyd Wright

I decided that it was not wisdom that
enabled poets to write their poetry,
but a kind of instinct or inspiration,
such as you find in seers and prophets
who deliver all their sublime messages
without knowing in the least what they mean.
- Socrates

Sucking the marrow out of life
doesn't mean choking on the bone.
- Robin Williams as John Keating
in the 1989 movie Dead Poets Society

If a man is called to be a street sweeper,
he should sweep streets even as Michelangelo painted,
or Beethoven composed music, or Shakespeare wrote poetry.
He should sweep streets so well that all the hosts
of heaven and earth will pause to say,
here lived a great street sweeper who did his job well.
- Martin Luther King, Jr.

Youth, large, lusty, loving -
Youth, full of grace, force, fascination.
Do you know that Old Age may come after you
with equal grace, force, fascination?
- Walt Whitman

The River of Life flows without emotion.
The River surges. The River quiets.
The River overflows its banks. The River dries to a trickle.
The River swirls and storms. The River becomes calm.
The River runs clear. The River runs dark with silt.
The River is indifferent to what benefit
or what harm is caused by its water.
The River is the River, and that is all there is to it.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

The River of Life has no meaning, no good, no bad,
no better, no worse, no love, no hate, no fear, no anger, no joy.
The River of Life has no judgment, no expectation.
The River of Life just IS. There is nothing to do.
There is nothing to say.
There is nothing to think.
There is nothing to feel.
The River just flows. The River is the source of all nourishment -
the source of all obstacles.
The River is the source of all life - the source of all death.
The River is the source of all joy - and the source of all sorrow.
Yet the River has no joy - and the River has no sorrow.
The River is just the River.
One can flow harmoniously with the River -
or one can struggle fearfully against the River -
and the River just flows.
One can accept the River - or one can deny the River -
and the River just flows.
One can worship the River of Life - or one can curse the River of Life -
and the River just flows. There is nothing to do - and the River flows.
There is nothing to say - and the River flows.
There is nothing to think - and the River flows.
There is nothing to feel - and the River flows.
The River flows - and all else is our drama.
The River flows - and all else is our invention.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

The River of Life has no judgments.
The River flows with no concept of good and bad - right and wrong.
The fields and dreams of men may be nourished by the River of Life,
or flooded and covered with silt, and the River just flows.
Men may catch fish and live on the River of Life,
or they may founder in a storm and drown, and the River just flows.
The River of Life is timeless.
It is not unchanging, but it is timeless,
and it changes in its own time.
The River of Life knows no obstacles.
The River can cut through solid rock - in its own time.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

I've always had a love for poetry,
and when I got signed to a record label I thought,
"How odd that I'm doing a record before a book of poetry."
- Jewel

I think that there is nothing, not even crime,
more opposed to poetry, to philosophy, ay, to life itself
than this incessant business.
- Henry David Thoreau

On His Blindness:
When I consider how my light is spent
Ere half my days in this dark world and wide,
And that one Talent which is death to hide
Lodged with me useless, though my soul more bent
To serve therewith my Maker, and present
My true account, lest He returning chide,
"Doth God exact day-labour, light denied?"
I fondly ask. But Patience, to prevent
That murmur, soon replies, "God doth not need
Either man's work or his own gifts. Who best
Bear his mild yoke, they serve him best. His state
Is kingly: thousands at his bidding speed,
And post o'er land and ocean without rest;
They also serve who only stand and wait.
- John Milton (1608-1674)

When power leads man toward arrogance,
poetry reminds him of his limitations.
When power narrows the area of man's concern,
poetry reminds him of the richness and diversity of existence.
When power corrupts, poetry cleanses.
- John F. Kennedy

Nearly all men can stand adversity,
but if you want to test a man's character, give him power.
- Abraham Lincoln

No man stands so tall as when he stoops to help a child.
- Anonymous (often attributed to Abraham Lincoln)

Talent is God-given; be humble.
Fame is man-given; be thankful.
Conceit is self-given; be careful.
- John Wooden

Man is least himself when he talks in his own person.
Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.
- Oscar Wilde

We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men
who walked through the huts comforting others,
giving away their last piece of bread...
They offer sufficient proof that everything
can be taken from a man but one thing:
to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances,
to choose one's own way.
- Viktor E. Frankl

Every child comes with the message
that God is not yet discouraged of man.
- Rabindranath Tagore

Two things a man should never be angry at:
what he can help,
and what he cannot help.
- Thomas Fuller

Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day,
teach a man to fish and he will eat for a lifetime.
- Chinese Proverb

No man who is occupied in doing a very difficult thing,
and doing it very well, ever loses his self-respect.
- George Bernard Shaw

A man should look for what is,
and not for what he thinks should be.
- Albert Einstein

If a man does not keep pace with his companions,
perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer.
- Henry David Thoreau

One man with courage makes a majority.
- old saying probably repeated by Andrew Jackson
(falsely attributed to Jefferson)

There are other measures of self-respect for a man,
than the number of clean shirts he puts on every day.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

All this worldly wisdom was once
the unamiable heresy of some wise man.
- Henry David Thoreau

If a man speaks or acts with a pure thought,
happiness follows him, like a shadow that never leaves him.
- The Buddha

All the works of man have their origin in creative fantasy.
What right have we then to depreciate imagination.
- Carl Jung

Whatever your life's work is, do it well.
A man should do his job so well that the living,
the dead, and the unborn could do it no better.
- Martin Luther King, Jr.

Many a man curses the rain that falls upon his head,
and knows not that it brings abundance
to drive away the hunger.
- Saint Basil

The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands
in moments of comfort and convenience,
but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.
- Martin Luther King, Jr.

Non-violence requires a double faith,
faith in God and also faith in man.
- Mohandas (Mahatma) Gandhi

You can tell whether a man is clever by his answers.
You can tell whether a man is wise by his questions.
- Naguib Mahfouz

Is the babe young? When I behold it,
it seems more venerable than the oldest man.
- Henry David Thoreau

A man is but the product of his thoughts -
what he thinks, he becomes.
- Mohandas (Mahatma) Gandhi

If a man empties his purse into his head,
no man can take it away from him.
An investment in knowledge always pays the best interest.
- Benjamin Franklin

It is a man's own mind, not his enemy or foe,
that lures him to evil ways.
- The Buddha

If thou wilt make a man happy,
add not unto his riches but take away from his desires.
- Epicurus

Non-violence means avoiding not only external physical violence
but also internal violence of spirit.
You not only refuse to shoot a man,
but you refuse to hate him.
- Martin Luther King, Jr.

If a man loses his reverence for any part of life,
he will lose his reverence for all of life.
- Albert Schweitzer

Man lives freely only by his readiness to die, if need be,
at the hands of his brother, never by killing him.
- Mohandas (Mahatma) Gandhi

The more a man can forget, the greater the number
of metamorphoses which his life can undergo,
the more he can remember, the more divine his life becomes.
- Soren Kierkegaard

A man can do only what he can do.
But if he does that each day he can sleep at night
and do it again the next day.
- Albert Schweitzer

You cannot build character and courage by
taking away a man's initiative and independence.
- Abraham Lincoln

Mystery creates wonder, and wonder is the basis
of man's desire to understand.
- Neil Armstrong

Man falls from the pursuit of the ideal
of plain living and high thinking
the moment he wants to multiply his daily wants.
Man's happiness really lies in contentment.
- Mohandas (Mahatma) Gandhi

We must, however, acknowledge, as it seems to me,
that man with all his noble qualities...
still bears in his bodily frame
the indelible stamp of his lowly origin.
- Charles Darwin

Intent is what can make a man succeed
when his thoughts tell him that he is defeated.
- Carlos Castaneda

The man who has won millions at the cost of his conscience is a failure.
- B. C. Forbes

All things share the same breath -
the beast, the tree, the man...
the air shares its spirit with all the life it supports.
- Chief Seattle (attributed)

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May the world be kind to you, and may your own thoughts be gentle upon yourself.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Jonathan Huie jlh(at)jlhuie(dot)com - About & Disclosure

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Poet Quotes

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