Men will clutch at illusions when they have nothing else to hold to.
CZESLAW MILOSZA true opium of the people is a belief in nothingness after death.
More Czeslaw Milosz Quotes
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The partition separating life from death is so tenuous. The unbelievable fragility of our organism suggests a vision on a screen: a kind of mist condenses itself into a human shape, lasts a moment and scatters.
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I think that I am here, on this earth, to present a report on it, but to whom I don’t know. As if I were sent so that whatever takes place has meaning because it changes into memory.
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The revolt against one’s environment is usually ‘shame’ of one’s environment.
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What is this enigmatic impulse that does not allow one to settle down in the achieved, the finished? I think it is a quest for reality.
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The death of a man is like the fall of a mighty nation That had valiant armies, captains, and prophets, And wealthy ports and ships all over the seas.
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And now I am ready to keep running When the sun rises beyond the borderlands of death. I already see mountain ridges in the heavenly forest Where, beyond every essence, a new essence awaits.
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The purpose of poetry is to remind us / how difficult it is to remain just one person.
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Love means to look at yourself The way one looks at distant things For you are only one thing among many.
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Irony is the glory of slaves.
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Our memory is childish and it saves only what we need.
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All was taken away from you: white dresses, wings, even existence.
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Not that I want to be a god or a hero. Just to change into a tree, grow for ages, not hurt anyone.
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At every sunrise I renounce the doubts of night and greet the new day of a most precious delusion.
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Grow your tree of falsehood from a small grain of truth.
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I have defined poetry as a ‘passionate pursuit of the Real.
CZESLAW MILOSZ