“The purpose of poetry is to remind us / how difficult it is to remain just one person...”

“The purpose of poetry is to remind ushow difficult it is to remain just one person,for our house is open, there are no keys in the doors, and invisible guests come in and out at will.”

“I have defined poetry as a 'passionate pursuit of the Real.”

“What is poetry which does not save nations or people?”

“You who think of us: they lived only in delusion... Know that we the People of the Book, will never die!”

“Not that I want to be a god or a hero. Just to change into a tree, grow for ages, not hurt anyone.”

“Tomber amoureux. To fall in love. Does it occur suddenly or gradually? If gradually, when is the moment “already”? I would fall in love with a monkey made of rags. With a plywood squirrel. With a botanical atlas. With an oriole. With a ferret. With a marten in a picture. With the forest one sees to the right when riding in a cart to Jaszuny. With a poem by a little-known poet. With human beings whose names still move me. And always the object of love was enveloped in erotic fantasy or was submitted, as in Stendhal, to a “cristallisation,” so it is frightful to think of that object as it was, naked among the naked things, and of the fairy tales about it one invents. Yes, I was often in love with something or someone. Yet falling in love is not the same as being able to love. That is something different.”