Although Poets are vain and ambitious, their vanity and ambition are of the purest kind attainable in this world. They are ambitious to be accepted for what they altimately are as revealed in their poetry. Stephen Spender More Quotes by Stephen Spender More Quotes From Stephen Spender Involved in my own entrails and a crust Turning a pitted surface towards a space, I am a world that watches through a sky And is persuaded by mirrors To regard its being as an external shell, One of a universe of stars and faces. Stephen Spender space stars sky My words like eyes that flinch from light, refuse And shut upon obscurity; my acts Cast to their opposites by impatient violence Break up the sequent path; they fly On a circumference to avoid the centre. Stephen Spender light eye opposites There is a certain justice in criticism. The critic is like a midwife - a tyrannical midwife. Stephen Spender certain criticism justice Sometimes when I am writing, I am aware of a rhythm, a dance, a fury, which is as yet empty of words. Stephen Spender empty writing sometimes I think continually of those who were truly great...Born of the sun they traveled a short while towards the sun, and left the vivid air signed with their honor. Stephen Spender honor air thinking If Rilke cut himself shaving, he would bleed poetry. Stephen Spender shaving cutting poetry When you read and understand a poem, comprehending its rich and formal meanings, then you master chaos a little. Stephen Spender chaos rich littles Bright clasp of her whole hand around my finger My daughter as we walk together now. All my life I'll feel a ring invisibly Circle this bone with shining When she is grown. Stephen Spender daughter father hands If you get to a certain age, all people want to know about you is people you knew. ...An American student once said to me, you know, isn't it extraordinary that I am alive and you're not dead. Stephen Spender alive age people Religion stands, the Church blocking the sun. Stephen Spender block church religion The ultimate aim of politics is not politics, but the activities which can be practised within the political framework of the State. Therefore an effective statement of these activities - e.g. science, art, religion - is in itself a declaration of ultimate aims around which the political means will crystallise... a society with no values outside of politics is a machine carrying its human cargo, with no purpose in its institutions reflecting their care, eternal aspirations, loneliness, need for love. Stephen Spender loneliness mean art Since we are what we are, what shall we be But what we are? We are, we have Six feet and seventy years, to see The light , and then resign it for the grave . Stephen Spender light feet years To break out of the chaos of my darkness Into a lucid day is all my will. My words like eyes in night, stare to reach A centre for their light: and my acts thrown To distant places by impatient violence Yet lock together to mould a path of stone Out of my darkness into a lucid day. Stephen Spender light eye night Under the olive trees, from the ground Grows this flower, which is a wound. It is easier to ignore Than the heroes' sunset fire Of death plunged in their willed desire Raging with flags on the world's shore. Stephen Spender sunset flower hero Whatever happens, I shall never be alone, I shall always have a fare, an affair, or a revolution. Stephen Spender whatever-happens affair revolution History has tongues Has angels has guns has saved has praised Today proclaims Achievements of her exiles long returned Now no more rootless, for whom her printed page Glazes their bruised waste years in one Balancing present sky. Stephen Spender gun angel years What the eye delights in, no longer dictates My greed to enjoy: boys, grass, the fenced-off deer. It leaves those figures that distantly play On the horizon's rim: they sign their peace, in games. Stephen Spender eye games boys What is precious is never to forget, The delight of the blood drawn from ancient springs, Breaking through rocks in worlds before our earth; Never to deny its pleasure in the simple morning light, Nor its grave evening demand for love; Never to allow gradually the traffic to smother, With noise and fog the flowering of the spirit. Stephen Spender simple spring morning I think continually of those who were truly great . Who, from the womb, remembered the soul 's history Through corridors of light where the hours are suns , Endless and singing. Whose lovely ambition Was that their lips, still touched with fire , Should tell of the spirit clothed from head to foot in song . Stephen Spender ambition song thinking Paint here no draped despairs, no saddening clouds, Where the soul rests, proclaims eternity. But let the wrong cry out as raw as wounds, This Time forgets and never heals, far less transcends. Stephen Spender despair soul clouds
