John Ashbery Quotes

Somewhere someone is traveling furiously toward you, At incredible speed, traveling day and night, Through blizzards and desert heat, across torrents, through narrow passes. But will he know where to find you, Recognize you when he sees you, Give you the thing he has for you?

There is the view that poetry should improve your life. I think people confuse it with the Salvation Army.

The summer demands and takes away too much. /But night, the reserved, the reticent, gives more than it takes

The first year was like icing. Then the cake started to show through "¦

In the increasingly convincing darkness The words become palpable, like a fruit That is too beautiful to eat.

How many people came and stayed a certain time,Uttered light or dark speech that became part of youLike light behind windblown fog and sandFiltered and influenced by it, until no partRemains that is surely you.

I write with experiences in mind, but I don't write about them, I write out of them.

I don't look on poetry as closed works. I feel they're going on all the time in my head and I occasionally snip off a length.

Once you've lived in France, you don't want to live anywhere else, including France.

Things can harden meaningfully in the moment of indecision