A Quote by Tony Harrison
Coming from a very inarticulate family made me try to speak for those who can't express themselves and created a need for articulation at its most ceremonial - poetry.
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we need poetry most at those moments when life astounds us with losses, gains, or celebrations. We need it most when we are most hurt, most happy, most downcast, most jubilant. Poetry is the language we speak in times of greatest need. And the fact that it is an endangered species in our culture tells us that we are in deep trouble.
The books, the authors who matter the most are those who speak to me and speak for me all those things about life I most need to hear as the confession of myself
That's one of those questions that would just love to have a pat answer. You know, poetry's job is to make us feel good. Poetry exists to allow us to express our innermost feelings. There isn't one role for poetry in society. There are many roles for poetry. I wrote a poem to seduce my wife. I wrote a poem when I asked her to marry me. Poetry got me laid. Poetry got me married.
People like me write because otherwise we are pretty inarticulate. Our articulation is our writing.
You have to let people express themselves in the way that they need to express themselves. You have to express yourself in any way possible, provided you're prepared to live with the consequences.
To me, acting is the most logical way for people's neuroses to manifest themselves, in this great need we all have to express ourselves.
The thing about animals that speaks to me so much is that my passion for the animals and against animal abuse is based on the knowledge that these creatures which think and feel can't speak for themselves. I feel it is my responsibility to speak for those who can't speak for themselves.
The women's choice of footwear doesn't speak for their most important inner life, but rather it tells a story - this is an opportunity to express themselves. I think the thing that's most compelling about other people is when you don't look like you're trying to dress like your friend, colleague, neighbor, or anything else. That's a very arresting and exciting and compelling quality to possess - not everybody has the courage to walk out the door feeling like themselves, but once they do, it's thrilling to witness.
May Sarton said, "the deeper you go, the more universal you become." It's a reminder to me that those things I try to convince myself I don't need to admit are usually those things I need the most to say. Speaking the truth, in its most poignant details, is liberating and gives those around us the freedom to be real.
Poetry is the language we speak in the most terrifying or ecstatic passages of our lives. But the very word poetry scares people. They think of their grade school teachers reciting 'Hiawatha' and they groan.
The Internet is a blessing and a curse. I mean, it's a place where lots of people can express themselves, which is amazing, but it's a place where a lot of people can express themselves that probably should keep those expressions to themselves.
As a young man, I was a navy officer in Vietnam. I made $320 a month and would always give away $50 a month to a family I felt that was in greater need than me, in addition to my tithing to my church. I've just always felt in my heart, coming from a very humble background, that there are plenty of people who need a break in life.
There is no observation more frequently made by such as employ themselves in surveying the conduct of mankind, than that marriage, though the dictate of nature, and the institution of Providence, is yet very often the cause of misery, and that those who enter into that state can seldom forbear to express their repentance, and their envy of those whom either chance or caution hath withheld from it.
Most people would rather change their circumstances to improve their lives when instead they need to change themselves to improve their circumstances. They put in just enough effort to distance themselves from their problems without ever trying to go after the root, which can often be found in themselves. Because they don't try to change the source of their problems, their problems keep coming back at them.
I realize that we all do express ourselves, but those who express that which is always being done are those whose thinking is almost in every way in accord with everyone else. Expression on this basis has become dull to those who wish to think for themselves.
In poetry you can express almost inexpressible feelings. You can express the pain of loss, you can express love. People always turn to poetry when someone they love dies, when they fall in love.
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