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

Living is a horizontal fall.

The poet is a liar who always speaks the truth.

May the devil himself splatter you with dung.

One must not mistake majority for truth.

An original artist is unable to copy. So he has only to copy in order to be original.

I have seafoam in my veins, I understand the language of waves.

If it has to choose who is to be crucified, the crowd will always save Barabbas.

After the writer’s death, reading his journal is like receiving a long letter.

Art produces ugly things which frequently become more beautiful with time. Fashion, on the other hand, produces beautiful things which always become ugly with time.

My method is simple: not to bother about poetry. It must come of its own accord. Merely whispering its name drives it away.

The speed of a runaway horse counts for nothing.

Never do what a specialist can do better. Discover your own specialty. Do not despair if your specialty appears to be more delicate, a lesser thing. Make up in finesse what you lose in force.

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.

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.

Life works in mysterious ways and rejection is more a sign of guidance rather than an attack. You have to learn to be patient and open-hearted. Opportunity comes to those who wait.

A wanderer who found beauty in a quiet jungle and went into a mysterious paradise in search of a treasure of silence in which the whole universe hides.

The awful thing is that beauty is mysterious as well as terrible. God and the devil are fighting there and the battlefield is the heart of man.

Man is a mystery. It needs to be unravelled, and if you spend your whole life unravelling it, don’t say that you’ve wasted time. I am studying that mystery because I want to be a human being.

The mystery of human existence lies not in just staying alive, but in finding something to live for.

It’s always wonderful to get to know women, with the mystery, the joy and the depth.

It is a mistake to confound strangeness with mystery.

At my age, there is really only one big surprise left, and I’d just as soon leave it a mystery.