“The prettiest dresses are worn to be taken off.”

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.

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.

This is good for you. Death is a thing of beauty, and it needs to be executed in such a way that does it justice.

A lot of ugly people hide behind beautiful eyes. A lot of things are only lies.

We need to see inside our souls the massive beauty of this world.

Misery only ever lingers on those who choose not to see the beauty in anyone, other than themselves.

Without the fog, London would not be a beautiful city. It is fog that gives it its magnificent amplitude its regular and massive blocks become grandiose in that mysterious mantle.

Women are beautiful. But some are made of hell.

The way that the water reflects off of her eyes, tells me a story of beautiful pain.

Optimism – the doctrine or belief that everything is beautiful, including what is ugly.