Poetry
Quotes - My candle burns at both ends
“I
want you to tell me about every person you’ve ever been in love with.
Tell
me why you loved them,
then
tell me why they loved you.
Tell
me about a day in your life you didn’t think you’d live through.
Tell
me what the word home means to you
and
tell me in a way that I’ll know your mother’s name
just
by the way you describe your bedroom
when
you were eight.
See,
I want to know the first time you felt the weight of hate,
and
if that day still trembles beneath your bones.
Do
you prefer to play in puddles of rain
or
bounce in the bellies of snow?
And
if you were to build a snowman,
would
you rip two branches from a tree to build your snowman arms
or
would leave your snowman armless
for
the sake of being harmless to the tree?
And
if you would,
would
you notice how that tree weeps for you
because
your snowman has no arms to hug you
every
time you kiss him on the cheek?
Do
you kiss your friends on the cheek?
Do
you sleep beside them when they’re sad
even
if it makes your lover mad?
Do
you think that anger is a sincere emotion
or
just the timid motion of a fragile heart trying to beat away its pain?
See,
I wanna know what you think of your first name,
and
if you often lie awake at night and imagine your mother’s joy
when
she spoke it for the very first time.
I
want you to tell me all the ways you’ve been unkind.
Tell
me all the ways you’ve been cruel.
Tell
me, knowing I often picture Gandhi at ten years old
beating
up little boys at school.
If
you were walking by a chemical plant
where
smokestacks were filling the sky with dark black clouds
would
you holler “Poison! Poison! Poison!” really loud
or
would you whisper
“That
cloud looks like a fish,
and
that cloud looks like a fairy!”
Do
you believe that Mary was really a virgin?
Do
you believe that Moses really parted the sea?
And
if you don’t believe in miracles, tell me —
how
would you explain the miracle of my life to me?
See,
I wanna know if you believe in any god
or
if you believe in many gods
or
better yet
what
gods believe in you.
And
for all the times that you’ve knelt before the temple of yourself,
have
the prayers you asked come true?
And
if they didn’t, did you feel denied?
And
if you felt denied,
denied
by who?
I
wanna know what you see when you look in the mirror
on a
day you’re feeling good.
I
wanna know what you see when you look in the mirror
on a
day you’re feeling bad.
I
wanna know the first person who taught you your beauty
could
ever be reflected on a lousy piece of glass.
If
you ever reach enlightenment
will
you remember how to laugh?
Have
you ever been a song?
Would
you think less of me
if I
told you I’ve lived my entire life a little off-key?
And
I’m not nearly as smart as my poetry
I
just plagiarize the thoughts of the people around me
who
have learned the wisdom of silence.
Do
you believe that concrete perpetuates violence?
And
if you do —
I
want you to tell me of a meadow
where
my skateboard will soar.
See,
I wanna know more than what you do for a living.
I
wanna know how much of your life you spend just giving,
and
if you love yourself enough to also receive sometimes.
I
wanna know if you bleed sometimes
from
other people’s wounds,
and
if you dream sometimes
that
this life is just a balloon —
that
if you wanted to, you could pop,
but
you never would
‘cause
you’d never want it to stop.
If a
tree fell in the forest
and
you were the only one there to hear —
if
its fall to the ground didn’t make a sound,
would
you panic in fear that you didn’t exist,
or
would you bask in the bliss of your nothingness?
And
lastly, let me ask you this:
If
you and I went for a walk
and
the entire walk, we didn’t talk —
do
you think eventually, we’d… kiss?
No,
wait.
That’s
asking too much —
after
all,
this
is only our first date.”
―
Andrea Gibson
“some
moments are nice, some are
nicer,
some are even worth
writing
about.”
―
Charles Bukowski, War All the Time: Poems 1981 - 1984
“My
candle burns at both ends;
It
will not last the night;
But
ah, my foes, and oh, my friends—
It
gives a lovely light!”
―
Edna St. Vincent Millay, A Few Figs from Thistles
“We
the mortals touch the metals,
the
wind, the ocean shores, the stones,
knowing
they will go on, inert or burning,
and
I was discovering, naming all the these things:
it
was my destiny to love and say goodbye.”
―
Pablo Neruda, Still Another Day
“I
turned silences and nights into words. What was unutterable, I wrote down. I
made the whirling world stand still.”
―
Arthur Rimbaud, A Season in Hell and The Drunken Boat
“Tears,
idle tears, I know not what they mean,
Tears
from the depths of some devine despair
Rise
in the heart, and gather to the eyes,
In
looking on the happy autumn fields,
And
thinking of the days that are no more.”
―
Alfred Lord Tennyson
“There
is a pleasure in the pathless woods,
There
is a rapture on the lonely shore,
There
is society, where none intrudes,
By
the deep Sea, and music in its roar:
I
love not Man the less, but Nature more,
From
these our interviews, in which I steal
From
all I may be, or have been before,
To
mingle with the Universe, and feel
What
I can ne’er express, yet cannot all conceal.”
―
Lord Byron, Childe Harold's Pilgrimage
“I'm
nobody! Who are you?
Are
you nobody, too?
Then
there ’s a pair of us—don’t tell!
They
’d banish us, you know.
How
dreary to be somebody!
How
public, like a frog
To
tell your name the livelong day
To
an admiring bog!”
―
Emily Dickinson, The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson
“The
Peace of Wild Things
When
despair for the world grows in me
and
I wake in the night at the least sound
in
fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go
and lie down where the wood drake
rests
in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I
come into the peace of wild things
who
do not tax their lives with forethought
of
grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And
I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting
with their light. For a time
I
rest in the grace of the world, and am free.”
―
Wendell Berry, The Selected Poems of Wendell Berry
“you
not
wanting me
was
the
beginning of me
wanting
myself
thank
you”
―
Nayyirah Waheed
“grief
is a house
where
the chairs
have
forgotten how to hold us
the
mirrors how to reflect us
the
walls how to contain us
grief
is a house that disappears
each
time someone knocks at the door
or
rings the bell
a
house that blows into the air
at
the slightest gust
that
buries itself deep in the ground
while
everyone is sleeping
grief
is a house where no one can protect you
where
the younger sister
will
grow older than the older one
where
the doors
no
longer let you in
or
out”
―
Jandy Nelson, The Sky Is Everywhere
“The
death of a beautiful woman is, unquestionably, the most poetical topic in the
world.”
―
Edgar Allan Poe
