“The plain truth is we are going to die. Here I am, a teeny spec surrounded by boundless space and time, arguing with the whole of creation, shaking my fist, sputtering, growing even eloquent at times, and then-poof! I am gone. Swept off once and for all. I think that is very, very funny.”

“I was already dozing off in the shade, dreaming that the rustling trees were my many selves explaining themselves all at the same time so that I could not make out a single word. My life was a beautiful mystery on the verge of understanding, always on the verge! Think of it!”

“Here in the United States, we speak with reverence of authentic experience. We write poems about our daddies taking us fishing and breaking our hearts by making us throw the little fish back into the river. We even tell the reader the kind of car we were driving, the year and the model, to give the impression that it’s all true. It’s because we think of ourselves as journalists of a kind. Like them, we’ll go anywhere for a story. Don’t believe a word of it. As any poet can tell you, one often sees better with eyes closed than with eyes wide open.”

“Inside my empty bottle I was constructing a lighthouse while all others were making ships.”

“If I believe in anything, it is in the dark night of the soul. Awe is my religion, and mystery is its church.”

“Because the light is always with usand the hush of an early morningtime propitious to plain speechspace between the premonition and the eventthe small lovely realm of the possible.”

“The truth is dark under your eyelids.What are you going to do about it?The birds are silent; there's no one to ask.All day long you'll squint at the gray sky.When the wind blows you'll shiver like straw.A meek little lamb you grew your woolTill they came after you with huge shears.Flies hovered over open mouth,Then they, too, flew off like the leaves,The bare branches reached after them in vain. Winter coming. Like the last heroic soldierOf a defeated army, you'll stay at your post,Head bared to the first snow flake.Till a neighbor comes to yell at you,You're crazier than the weather, Charlie.”