We all use phrases such as ‘the ordinary world,’ ‘ordinary life,’ ‘the ordinary course of events.’ But in the language of poetry, nothing is usual or normal. Not a single stone and not a single cloud above it. Not a single day and not a single night after it. And above all, not a single existence, not anyone’s existence in this world.

But in the language of poetry, where every word is weighed, nothing is usual or normal. Not a single stone and not a single cloud above it.

It is difficult to imagine this kind of a new world because our present world is so different. On the whole, our life is too complex, our scholarship too serious, our philosophy too somber, and our thoughts too involved. This seriousness and this involved complexity of our thought and scholarship make the present world such an unhappy one today.

Every poem is a momentary stay against the confusion of the world.

And what of this new book the whole world makes such a rout about? — Oh ! 'tis out of all plumb, my lord, — quite an irregular thing!

The public for which masterpieces are intended is not on this earth.

Life does not seem to present itself to me for my convenience, to box itself up nicely so I can write about it with wisdom and a point to make before putting it on a shelf somewhere.

The world is not to be put in order. The world is order. It is for us to put ourselves in unison with this order.

Because the universe is not a fairy tale.

And that wasn't the first time it ever occurred to me that this world ain't run like it ought to be run a heap of more times than what it is.

I don't work at being ordinary.

Readers are not sheep, and not every pen tempts them.

In literature, too, it is not great achievement to memorize what you have read while not formulating an opinion of your own.

But if it is prose, it is prose of a previously unknown order, for the depth and multiplicity of mind that seem to function at every choice have not been matched in any piece of Western writing.