“Technique is the test of sincerity.”

Great literature is simply language charged with meaning to the utmost possible degree.

The what is so much more important than how.

The history of an art is the history of masterwork, not of failures, or mediocrity.

In verse one can take any damn constant one likes, one can alliterate, or assone, or rhyme, or quant, or smack, only one MUST leave the other elements irregular.

Consider the way of the scientists rather than the way of an advertising agent for a new soap.

I guess the definition of a lunatic is a man surrounded by them.

The serious artist must be as open as nature. Nature does not give all of herself in a paragraph. She is rugged and not set apart into discreet categories.

Rhythm is form cut into time.

I have never known anyone worth a damn who wasn’t irascible.

When two men in business always agree, one of them is unnecessary.

Poets who are not interested in music are, or become, bad poets.

Poetry must be as well written as prose.

Poetry is a language pared down to its essentials.

The concept of genius as akin to madness has been carefully cultivated by the inferiority complex of the public.

Either move or be moved.

I desired my dust to be mingled with yours Forever and forever and forever.

I think test screening works at its best when the audience knows what it’s getting.

So even though I consider myself a fairly upbeat person, energetic and things like that, I never do very well on happiness tests.

In search of some rest, in search of a break From a life of tests where something’s always at stake Where something’s always so far What about my broken car?

Heroes put to the test, keeping a promise, doing their best.

The infallible test of spiritual integrity, Jesus says, is your private prayer life.

I like to test myself and see where I am and how I am against other people in this sport. I think that’s the real draw for me.

The test of an outfielder’s skill comes when he has to go against the fence to make a catch.

I’ve got a nice collection of paintings – a Basquiat, a black-and-white Warhol that’s like a Rorschach test, and I commissioned Takashi Murakami to do a ten-foot joint for me. It’s almost like the explosion in Hiroshima with his famous skeleton head. There’s a wall above my fireplace reserved for it.