I have no wisdom, no skills, and no faith but I received strength, it tears the world apart. I shall break, a heavy wave, against its shores and a young wave will cover my trace.
CZESLAW MILOSZWhat has no shadow has no strength to live.
More Czeslaw Milosz Quotes
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Two attributes of a poet, avidity of the eye and the desire to describe that which he sees.
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Do not feel safe. The poet remembers. You can kill one, but another is born. The words are written down, the deed, the date.
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Poetry is news brought to the mountains by a unicorn and an echo.
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If I am all mankind, are they themselves without me?
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When I die, I will see the lining of the world. The other side, beyond bird, mountain, sunset.
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Consolation Calm down. Both your sins and your good deeds will be lost in oblivion.
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Even if that is so, there will remain A word wakened by lips that perish, A tireless messenger who runs and runs Through interstellar fields, through the revolving galaxies, And calls out, protests, screams.
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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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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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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 purpose of poetry is to remind us how difficult it is to remain just one person, for our house is open, there are no keys in the doors, and invisible guests come in and out at will.
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He returns years later, has no demands. He wants only one, most precious thing: To see, purely and simply, without name, Without expectations, fears, or hopes, At the edge where there is no I or not-I.
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For a country without a past is nothing, a word That, hardly spoken, loses its meaning, A perishable wall destroyed by flame, An echo of animal emotions.
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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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You who think of us: they lived only in delusion, Know that we the People of the Book, will never die!
CZESLAW MILOSZ