Quédate hoy conmigo,
vive conmigo un día y una noche
y te mostraré el origen de todos los poemas.

Stop this day and night with me, and you shall possess the origin of all poems,

Have you reckon’d a thousand acres much? have you reckon’d the earth much?
Have you practis’d so long to learn to read?
Have you felt so proud to get at the meaning of poems?

Stop this day and night with me and you shall possess the origin of all poems,
You shall possess the good of the earth and sun, (there are millions of suns left,)
You shall no longer take things at second or third hand, nor look through the eyes of the dead, nor feed on the spectres in books,
You shall not look through my eyes either, nor take things from me,
You shall listen to all sides and filter them from your self.

Bleib diesen Tag und diese Nacht mit mir, und du sollst den Ursprung aller Gedichte besitzen,
Sollst besitzen das Gut der Erde und der Sonne, (Millionen Sonnen bleiben noch übrig).
Sollst fürder Dinge nicht mehr nehmen aus zweiter und dritter Hand, noch sollst du sehen durch die Augen der Toten, noch dich nähren von den Schemen in Büchern,
Sollst auch nicht durch meine Augen blicken, noch die Dinge aus meiner Hand nehmen,
Sollst nach allen Seiten lauschen und die Dinge klären durch dich selbst.
(übersetzt von Franz Blei; Hymnen an die Erde)

Every word was once a poem.

There is not a particle of life which does not bear poetry within it

Every phrase and every sentence is an end and a beginning, every poem an epitaph.

I believe that poetry is a primal impulse within us all.

Poetry is the first and last of all knowledge - it is as immortal as the heart of man.

I want to make a poem of my life.

It probably started in poetry; almost everything does.

A poem begins with a lump in the throat; a homesickness or a love sickness. It is a reaching-out toward expression; an effort to find fulfillment. A complete poem is one where an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words.

The words of the true poems give you more than poems,
They give you to form for yourself poems, religions, politics, war, peace, behavior, histories, essays, daily life, and everything else,
They balance the ranks, colors, races, creeds, and the sexes,
They do not seek beauty, they are sought,
Forever touching them or close upon them follows beauty, longing, fain, love-sick.

They prepare for death, yet they are not the finish, but rather the outset,
They bring none of his or her terminus or to be content and full,
Whom they take they take into space to behold the birth of the stars, to learn one of the meanings,
To launch off with absolute faith, to sweep through the ceaseless rings and never be quiet again.

We all write poems; it is simply that poets are the ones who write in words.