quotes from classic
/ page 945 of 1205 /I'm uncomfortable with the focus on the poet and not on the poem.
more quotes from Yusef Komunyakaa
I like what Oliver Lakes does on the saxophone. The saxophone comes pretty close to the sound of the human voice and when Oliver plays with other sax players, it's like a dialogue.
more quotes from Yusef Komunyakaa
It wasn't a deliberate decision to become a poet. It was something I found myself doing - and loving. Language became an addiction.
more quotes from Yusef Komunyakaa
Through the years I have seen myself as a peaceful person, but the awareness of the anger is part of that process.
more quotes from Yusef Komunyakaa
It took me 14 years to write poems about Vietnam. I had never thought about writing about it, and in a way I had been systematically writing around it.
more quotes from Yusef Komunyakaa
I define poetry as celebration and confrontation. When we witness something, are we responsible for what we witness? That's an on-going existential question. Perhaps we are and perhaps there's a kind of daring, a kind of necessary energetic questioning. Because often I say it's not what we know, it's what we can risk discovering.
more quotes from Yusef Komunyakaa
Poetry helps me understand who I am. It helps me understand the world around me. But above all, what poetry has taught me is the fact that I need to embrace mystery in order to be completely human.
more quotes from Yusef Komunyakaa
I originally wanted to embrace the imagery and forthrightness of rap music. There are some interesting, dynamic voices in rap. But I find most of it irresponsible in its overt violence and commercialization of anger. As artists, we believe we can will action through language. If that's the case, we have to take responsibility for what we say.
more quotes from Yusef Komunyakaa
We have to embrace the good over the bad. That has to be one's personal project.
more quotes from Yusef Komunyakaa
My great-grandfather Melvin had been a carpenter - so was my father - and they taught me the value of tools: saws, hammers, chisels, files and rulers. It all dealt with conciseness and precision. It eliminated guesswork. One has to know his tools, so he doesn't work against himself.
more quotes from Yusef Komunyakaa
I think of my poems as personal and public at the same time. You could say they serve as psychological overlays. One fits on top of the other, and hopefully there's an ongoing evolution of clarity.
more quotes from Yusef Komunyakaa
Students often have such a lofty idea of what a poem is, and I want them to realize that their own lives are where the poetry comes from. The most important things are to respect the language; to know the classical rules, even if only to break them; and to be prepared to edit, to revise, to shape.
more quotes from Yusef Komunyakaa
I excavate history. I look at lives buried under too much silence. Periods of time, like slavery, have to be revisited, reimagined, so we can move through them.
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I see many black males grasping for some thread of hope. There are so many destructive practices, glimpses into a psychic abyss. That must be very frightening.
more quotes from Yusef Komunyakaa
I and life: The case was settled chivalrously. The opponents parted without having made up.
more quotes from Karl Kraus
Virginity is the ideal of those who want to deflower.
more quotes from Karl Kraus
Do not learn more than you absolutely need to get through life.
more quotes from Karl Kraus
When a man is treated like a beast, he says, 'After all, I'm human.' When he behaves like a beast, he says 'After all, I'm only human.'
more quotes from Karl Kraus
Science is spectral analysis. Art is light synthesis.
more quotes from Karl Kraus
Matrimony is the union of meanness and martyrdom.
more quotes from Karl Kraus
