A Quote by Lawrence Durrell

To write a poem is like trying to catch a lizard without its tail falling off.

Lawrence Durrell

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Catch Falling Falling Off Like Lizard Off Poem Tail Trying Without Write

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Lawrence Durrell
British - Novelist
February 27, 1912 - November 7, 1990

The people who bind themselves to systems are those who are unable to encompass the whole truth and try to catch it by the tail; a system is like the tail of truth, but truth is like a lizard; it leaves its tail in your fingers and runs away knowing full well that it will grow a new one in a twinkling.

Ivan Turgenev

The sort of man who likes to spend his time watching a cage of monkeys chase one another, or a lion gnaw its tail, or a lizard catch flies, is precisely the sort of man whose mental weakness should be combated at the public expense, not fostered.

H. L. Mencken

I'm constantly surprised by... an orange will roll off a table, and I'll catch it before I knew it was falling. Something happens there. We could write it off and say, 'Subconsciously I knew that was happening,' but there's so many things every day - I'm amazed by how little we know.

Shane Carruth

Like a pianist runs her fingers over the keys, I'll search my mind for what to say. Now, the poem may want you to write it. And then sometimes you see a situation and think, 'I'd like to write about that.' Those are two different ways of being approached by a poem, or approaching a poem.

Maya Angelou

I've always kind of pushed the envelope in terms of trying to get away with things no one else was going near. I always thought of myself like a mouse trying to get cheese that no one else could get without getting their tail snipped off.

Emo Philips

Trying to have wisdom without application is like trying to catch the winds without raising the sails!

Thomas Russell

You should always be trying to write a poem you are unable to write, a poem you lack the technique, the language, the courage to achieve. Otherwise you're merely imitating yourself, going nowhere, because that's always easiest.

John Berryman

You cannot live in Los Angeles for any period of time without eventually trying to write a screenplay. It's like a flu bug that you catch ... Even the plumber has a screenplay in his truck.

Gilda Radner

They were black like a lizard's and very large and, like the eyes of a lizard, could sometimes look sleepy.

Scott O'Dell

The leaves are falling, falling as from way off, as though far gardens withered in the skies; they are falling with denying gestures. And in the nights the heavy earth is falling from all the stars down into loneliness. We all are falling. This hand falls. And look at others: it is in them all. And yet there is one who holds this falling endlessly gently in his hands.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Cut off my head, and singular I am, Cut off my tail, and plural I appear; Although my middle's left, there's nothing there! What is my head cut off? A sounding sea; What is my tail cut off? A rushing river; And in their mingling depths I fearless play, Parent of sweetest sounds, yet mute forever.

Thomas B. Macaulay

I write poems from dreams pretty frequently. It's limiting to think the poem has to come from a sensical lyric "I" stating things clearly or dramatically. This whole course is trying to say there are millions of ways to approach writing a poem.

Matthea Harvey

Do not wait for a poem; a poem is too fast for you. Do not wait for the poem; run with the poem and then write the poem.

Juan Felipe Herrera

Every poem I write falls short in some important way. But I go on trying to write the one that won’t.

Dorianne Laux

One way of ending the poem is to turn it back on itself, like a serpent with its tail in its mouth.

Maxine Kumin

I try to come in with a focus to stop my man and win the game. I'm always trying to be ready to catch them off their strides by being physical enough without getting fouls.

Kawhi Leonard

A Quote by Lawrence Durrell

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