MAXIMS OF COOL QUIETUDE


Invention is the mother of necessity.

*

Poets are painters and should be treated as such (rubbing alcohol).

*

Critics ought to approach poetry the way Teddy Roosevelt approached the River of Doubt.

*

People generally believe poetry is made of words. Nothing could be further from the truth.

*

A poem is a ziggurat.

*

A poet is a rat.

*

The best poetry is always in translation. One discovers this after the native tongue has turned to gibberish.

*

Poets are deaf-mutes surrounded by packs of gossip hounds.

*

Poems are made out of pure lead.

*

American poetry - an oxymoron. Some have lived and died (simultaneously) for an oxymoron.

*