All you can usually say about a poem or a picture is, ‘Look at it, listen to it.’ Whether you listen to a piece of music or a poem, or look at a picture or a jug or a piece of sculpture, what matters about it is not what it has in common with others of its kind, but what is singularly its own.
BASIL BUNTING
BASIL BUNTING
Basil Bunting on looks
Basil Bunting15 quotes“All you can usually say about a poem or a picture is, ‘Look at it, listen to it.’ Whether you listen to a piece of music or a poem, or look at a picture or a jug or a piece of sculpture, what matters about it is not what it has in common with others of its kind, but what is singularly its own.”
More from Basil Bunting
Always carry a corkscrew and the wine shall provide itself.
Basil BuntingBasil Bunting Sooner or later we must absorb Islam if our own culture is not to die of anemia.
Basil BuntingBasil Bunting The mystic purchases a moment of exhilaration with a lifetime of confusion; and the confusion is infectious and destructive. It is confusing and destructive to try and explain anything in terms of anything else, poetry in terms of psychology.
Basil BuntingBasil Bunting Our doom is, to be sifted by the wind, heaped up, smoothed down like silly sands. We are less permanent than thought.
Basil BuntingBasil Bunting I hate Science. It denies a man’s responsibility for his own deeds, abolishes the brotherhood that springs from God’s fatherhood. It is a hectoring, dictating expertise, which makes the least lovable of the Church Fathers seem liberal by contrast.
Basil BuntingBasil Bunting To appreciate present conditions, collate them with those of antiquity.
Basil BuntingBasil Bunting Prose exists to convey meaning, and no meaning such as prose conveys can be expressed as well in poetry. That’s not poetry’s purpose.
Basil BuntingBasil Bunting Men are fools to invest in real estate.
Basil BuntingBasil Bunting Name and date split in soft slate a few months obliterate. 166
Basil BuntingBasil Bunting Can a moment of madness make up for an age of consent?
Basil BuntingBasil Bunting The times are squalid. They always were. It is a poet’s duty to hold the line.
Basil BuntingBasil Bunting But their determination to banish fools foundered ultimately in the installation of absolute idiots.
Basil BuntingBasil Bunting Praise the green earth. Chance has appointed her home, workshop, larder, middenpit. Her lousy skin scabbed here and there by cities provides us with name and nation.
Basil BuntingBasil Bunting Compose aloud: poetry is a sound. Never explain- your reader is as smart as you. Your reader is not just any reader, but is the rare one with ears in his head.
Basil BuntingBasil Bunting
Original quotes
From our community writers
Love is mostly easy at night, it is morning you got to learn about.
Leon MarshLeon Marsh You can find beauty in the darkest of places. Be the light, my love. Bring smiles to their faces.
Aletheia LiolaAletheia Liola This fearless heart is trapped between these anxious walls of my worried mind.
CindyCindy Don’t push away your emotions too hard, remember they can push back if held for too long.
SargamSargam To choose a plain life, I choose neither to lose and nor do I gain, If happiness is not in my destiny, I refuse to accept pain.
Astha SrivastavaAstha Srivastava Steal back your heart – self-love.
Mona-LiseMona-Lise Hope is the only thing that keeps us alive. Without hope there can be no you or I.
BelaBela An open mind opens our hearts to have compassion for others.
Elaine HaysElaine Hays
More on looks
He looks like something that fell out of a deck of cards!
Bobby HeenanBobby Heenan To be honest, I look at my Pinball program and feel that it is old stuff. I could do much better.
Bill BudgeBill Budge Ontario is fortunate to have the expertise, insight and leadership of The Honourable David C. Onley. I look forward to working with him to promote an inclusive, accessible Ontario that will help strengthen our province’s economy.
Brad DuguidBrad Duguid I love ‘Goodfellas’ because it’s a great movie – it’s funny and there is action at perfect points. I just think Martin Scorsese makes everyone look really cool.
Booboo StewartBooboo Stewart If you look carefully, almost all Old Money secrets can be traced to a single source: a longer-term outlook.
Bill BonnerBill Bonner You’re 83? Really? You don’t look it. I would’ve guessed 81 or 82.
Bobby HeenanBobby Heenan My real life was when I was just a working guy. You know, it’s OK to head out for Wonderful. But on your way to Wonderful, you’re gonna have to pass through All Right.
Bill WithersBill Withers I think anyone who makes products has this simultaneous joy and, almost, shame looking at it. You look at it all day and all you can see is all these things you want to make better.
Ben SilbermannBen Silbermann