All poetry is an ordered voice, one which tries to tell you about a vision in the un-visionary language of farm, city, and love. Paul Engle More Quotes by Paul Engle More Quotes From Paul Engle Poetry is ordinary language raised to the Nth power. Poetry is boned with ideas, nerved and blooded with emotions, all held together by the delicate, tough skin of words. Paul Engle reading-poetry skins ideas I knew about holiness, never having missed a Sunday-school class since I started at four years. But if Jews were also religious, how could our neighbor with the grease-grimy shirt use the word 'damn' about them? Paul Engle sunday religious school The sharpest memory of our old-fashioned Christmas eve is my mother's hand making sure I was settled in bed. Paul Engle christmas mother memories The corncob was the central object of my life. My father was a horse handler, first trotting and pacing horses, then coach horses, then work horses, finally saddle horses. I grew up around, on, and under horses, fed them, shoveled their manure, emptied the mangers of corncobs. Paul Engle horse father firsts Soldiers of the American Revolution fought that 18th century war with heavy muskets. In the early 20th century, we kids fought it every Fourth of July not only with exploding powder and shimmering flares, but with all of our senses. Paul Engle july war kids Other families bought automobiles; we had a horse-headed hitching post in front of our house and drove horses. Paul Engle automobile horse house Writing is rewriting what you have rewritten. Paul Engle rewriting writing I have published in 'The New Yorker,' 'Holiday,' 'Life,' 'Mademoiselle,' 'American Heritage,' 'Horizon,' 'The Ladies Home Journal,' 'The Kenyon Review,' 'The Sewanee Review,' 'Poetry,' 'Botteghe Oscure,' the 'Atlantic Monthly,' 'Harper's.' Paul Engle horizon holiday home Our small ears never had such a workout as on the Fourth of July, hearing not only our own bursting crackers but also those of our friends, and often the boom of homemade cannon shot off by daring boys of 16 years, ready to lose a hand if it blew up. Paul Engle july workout boys There must be an alternative between Hollywood and New York, between those two places psychically as well as geographically. The University of Iowa tries to offer such a community, congenial to the young writer, with his uneasiness about writing as an honorable career, or with his excess of ego about calling himself a writer. Paul Engle iowa new-york writing I have lectured at Town Hall N.Y., The Library of Congress, Harvard, Yale, Amherst, Wellesley, Columbia, Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, Louisiana State University, Colorado, Stanford, and scores of other places. Paul Engle library illinois yale I can still remember the feel in my hand of that most wonderful American coin ever minted, a nickel with a buffalo on one side and the head of an Indian on the other. That nickel was a daily proof of our country's past. Bring it back! Paul Engle country hands past Has the painter not always gone to an art school, or at least to an established master, for instruction? And the composer, the sculptor, the architect? Then why not the writer? Good poets, like good hybrid corn, are both born and made. Paul Engle gone art school For my Oxford degree, I had to translate French and German philosophy (as it turned out, Descartes and Kant) at sight without a dictionary. That meant Germany for my first summer vacation, to learn the thorny language on my own. Paul Engle vacation summer philosophy I wanted to write poetry almost a little more than I wanted to eat. Paul Engle wanted writing littles Without vision you don't see, and without practicality the bills don't get paid. Paul Engle paid bills vision All families had their special Christmas food. Ours was called Dutch Bread, made from a dough halfway between bread and cake, stuffed with citron and every sort of nut from the farm - hazel, black walnut, hickory, butternut. Paul Engle cake black nuts Writing is like this -- you dredge for the poem's meaning the way police dredge for a body. They think it is down there under the black water, they work the grappling hooks back and forth. Paul Engle writing water thinking You come to know the aches and vanities and tastes and intrigues of an entire neighborhood at a drug store. Paul Engle vanity drug taste I grew up in the prolonged survival of the great age of the horse, with harness and saddle and sleigh bells and horse pictures, not as antiques but the facts of our lives. Paul Engle horse survival age
