Murder is unique in that it abolishes the party it injures, so that society must take the place of the victim, and on his behalf demand atonement or … - W. H. Auden

Follow, poet, follow right To the bottom of the night, With your unconstraining voice Still persuade us to rejoice; <p> With the farming of a verse Make a vineyard of the curse, Sing of human unsuccess In a rapture of distress; <p> In the deserts of the heart Let the healing fountains start, In the prison of his days Teach the free man how to praise.

You will be a poet because you will always be humiliated.

If a stranger in the train asks me my occupation, I never answer 'writer' for fear that he may go on to ask me what I write, and to answer poetry would embarrass us both.