I have begun to think of life as a series of ripples widening out from an original center. Seamus Heaney More Quotes by Seamus Heaney More Quotes From Seamus Heaney It is always better to avenge dear ones than to indulge in mourning. For every one of us, living in this world means waiting for our end. Let whoever can win glory before death. When a warrior is gone, that will be his best and only bulwark. Seamus Heaney warrior winning mean The most exhilarating for the writer and the reader, are gift-things-poems which arrive on their own energy, poems that in William Shakespeare's term "slip" from you. Seamus Heaney term reader energy Part of my gradual education of myself has been to think that there is a deep relationship between the nature of the creature and the worth of the art. Seamus Heaney deep-relationship art thinking I've nothing against the Queen personally: I had lunch at the Palace once upon a time. Seamus Heaney lunch queens once-upon-a-time Publication is rather like pushing the boat out; then the boat/book turns into a melting ice floe and you have to conjure a second boat which again turns into a melting floe under your feet. All the stepping stones that you conjure disappear under the water behind you. Seamus Heaney ice feet book Yet there are times when a deeper need enters, when we want the poem to be not only pleasurably right but compellingly wise, not only a surprising variation played upon the world, but a re-tuning of the world itself. Seamus Heaney variation wise needs Allow ourselves to do as Ram Dass said in his delicious phrase "Be Here Now." If you are here now you cannot fall into falsely constructed gender projections. Seamus Heaney rams phrases fall One of the very first poems I wrote was Docker That fist would drop a hammer on a Catholic and one of the sturdiest was Requiem for the Croppies, written 50 years after 1916 [the year of the Easter Rising]. Being responsible and what it means, what it demands, have indeed preoccupied me maybe too much. But this is it, this is the thing, this is what you're up against. Seamus Heaney easter mean years The Ireland I now inhabit is one that these Irish contemporaries have helped to imagine. Seamus Heaney ireland imagine My body was braille for the creeping influences. Seamus Heaney braille influence body Poetry cannot afford to lose its fundamentally self-delighting inventiveness, its joy in being a process of language as well as a representation of things in the world. Seamus Heaney self joy world I suppose I did feel a certain public pressure always. Seamus Heaney certain pressure feels The faking of feelings is a sin against the imagination. Seamus Heaney against sin imagination feelings Your temperament is what you write with, but it's also how you deal with the world. Seamus Heaney your how you world I think childhood is, generally speaking, a preparation for disappointment. Seamus Heaney childhood preparation disappointment In a way, Anglo-Saxon poetry cannot be translated. Seamus Heaney anglo-saxon cannot poetry way Every time you read a poem aloud to yourself in the presence of others, you are reading it into yourself and them. Voice helps to carry words farther and deeper than the eye. Seamus Heaney words yourself you time Poetry is more a threshold than a path. Seamus Heaney than more poetry path Anybody serious about poetry knows how hard it is to achieve anything worthwhile in it. Seamus Heaney hard achieve serious poetry The experiment of poetry, as far as I am concerned, happens when the poem carries you beyond where you could have reasonably expected to go. Seamus Heaney i-am go you poetry
