Robert Graves Quotes

Through the window I can see Rooks above the cherry-tree, Sparrows in the violet bed, Bramble-bush and bumble-bee, And old red bracken smoulders still Among boulders on the hill, Far too bright to seem quite dead. But old Death, who can't forget, Waits his time and watches yet, Waits and watches by the door.

Poet, never chase the dream. Laugh yourself and turn away. Mask your hunger, let it seem Small matter if he come or stay; But when he nestles in your hand at last, Close up your fingers tight and hold him fast.

When a dream is born in you With a sudden clamorous pain, When you know the dream is true And lovely, with no flaw nor stain, O then, be careful, or with sudden clutch You'll hurt the delicate thing you prize so much.

Robin, and Red Riding Hood Take together to the wood, And Sir Galahad lies hid In a cave with Captain Kidd. None of all the magic hosts, None remain but a few ghosts Of timorous heart, to linger on Weeping for lost Babylon.

Wisdom made him old and wary Banishing the Lords of Faery. Wisdom made a breach and battered Babylon to bits: she scattered To the hedges and ditches All our nursery gnomes and witches.

The child alone a poet is: Spring and Fairyland are his. Truth and Reason show but dim, And all's poetry with him.

Let statesmen bluster, bark and bray, And so decide who started This bloody war, and who's to pay, But he must be stout-hearted, Must sit and stake with quiet breath, Playing at cards with Death. Don't plume yourself he fights for you; It is no courage, love, or hate, But let us do the things we do; It's pride that makes the heart be great; It is not anger, no, nor fear — Lucasta he's a Fusilier, And his pride keeps him here.

It doesn't matter what's the cause, What wrong they say we're righting, A curse for treaties, bonds and laws, When we're to do the fighting!

The holiest, cruellest pains I feel, Die stillborn, because old men squeal For something new: "Write something new: We've read this poem — that one too, And twelve more like 'em yesterday"?

Take courage, lover! Could you endure such pain At any hand but hers?

Love is a universal migraine. A bright stain on the vision Blotting out reason.

But we are gifted, even in November, Rawest of seasons, with so huge a sense Of her nakedly worn magnificence We forget cruelty and past betrayal, Heedless of where the next bright bolt may fall.

All saints revile her, and all sober men Ruled by the God Apollo's golden mean — In scorn of which we sailed to find her In distant regions likeliest to hold her Whom we desired above all things to know, Sister of the mirage and echo.

Dwell on her graciousness, dwell on her smiling, Do not forget what flowers The great boar trampled down in ivy time. Her brow was creamy as the crested wave, Her sea-blue eyes were wild But nothing promised that is not performed.

Fear in your heart cries to the loving-cup: Sorrow to sorrow as the sparks fly upward. The log groans and confesses There is one story and one story only.