“Since the day of my birth, my death began its walk. It is walking toward me, without hurrying.”

If a poet has a dream, it is not of becoming famous, but of being believed.

The prettiest dresses are worn to be taken off.

Since these mysteries exceed my grasp, I shall pretend to have organized them.

We are in a period of such individualism that one no longer speaks of disciples; one speaks of thieves.

Not only should you not accept a prize. You should not try to deserve one either.

Beauty cannot be recognized with a cursory glance.

Children and lunatics cut the Gordian knot which the poet spends his life patiently trying to untie.

Wealth is an inborn attitude of mind, like poverty. The pauper who has made his pile may flaunt his spoils, but cannot wear them plausibly.

Art is not a pastime but a priesthood.

You’ve never seen death? Look in the mirror every day and you will see it like bees working in a glass hive.

Every day in the mirror I watch death at work.

Do as the beautiful woman: see to your figure and your petticoats. Though, of course, I am not speaking literally.

There’s no such thing as love; only proof of love.

Nothing ever gets anywhere. The earth keeps turning round and gets nowhere. The moment is the only thing that counts.

The eyes of the dead are closed gently; we also have to open gently the eyes of the living.

After you have written a thing and you reread it, there is always the temptation to fix it up, to improve it, to remove its poison, blunt its sting.

The end of great beginnings is to disregard the cognisance.

Healthy relationships should always begin at the spiritual and intellectual levels – the levels of purpose, motivation, interests, dreams,and personality.

I am afraid that if we begin to put our trust in human help, some of our Divine help will fail us.

I lift my hands in praise and all else begins to fade, for you are all that matters; lord take all of me.

Where we ended I began.

Yesterday ended last night. Every day is a new beginning. Learn the skill of forgetting. And move on.

Any society begins by realizing that together, by helping each other, you can survive better than if you fight each other and compete with each other.

The fact that Saigyo composed a poem that begins, “I shall be unhappy without loneliness,” shows that he made loneliness his master.