William Carlos Williams Quotes

I have had my dream — like others — And it has come to nothing, so that
I remain now carelessly
With feet planted on the ground,
And look up at the sky — Feeling my clothes about me,
The weight of my body in my shoes,
The rim of my hat, air passing in and out
At my nose — and decide to dream no more.

If there is progress then there is a novel.

The Hurricane

The tree lay down
on the garage roof
and stretched, You
have your heaven,
it said, go to it.

The business of love is
cruelty which,
by our wills,
we transform
to live together.

The noiseless wheels of my car
rush with a crackling sound over
dried leaves as I bow and pass smiling.

To hell with everything I myself have ever written.

You remember I had a strong inclination all my life to be a painter. Under different circumstances I would rather have been a painter than to bother with these god-damn words. I never actually thought of myself as a poet but I knew I had to be an artist in some way.

Shoes twisted into incredible lilies.

Saxifrage is my flower that splits the rocks.

We laughed at the hollyhocks together and then I sprayed them with lye. Forgive me. I simply do not know what I am doing.

Your thighs are apple trees. Your knees are the southern breeze.

You're a romanticist. What do you think a man is, a papaya? To digest your dinner? In pill form?

Rot dead marigolds- an acre at a time! Gold are you?

A man is indeed a city, and for the poet there are no ideas but in things.

…those who belong properly to books, and to whom books, perhaps, do not quite so properly belong.