“You don't have to suffer to be a poet”

“And the time sundials tellMay be minutes and hours. But it may just as wellBe seconds and sparkles, or seasons and flowers.No, I don't think of time as just minutes and hours.Time can be heartbeats, or bird songs, or miles,Or waves on a beach, or ants in their files(They do move like seconds—just watch their feet go:Tick-tick-tick, like a clock). You'll learn as you growThat whatever there is in a garden, the sunCounts up on its dial. By the time it is doneOur sundial—or someone's— will certainly addAll the good things there are. Yes, and all of the bad.And if anyone's here for the finish, the sunWill have told him—by sundial—how well we have done.How well we have done, or how badly. Alas,That is a long thought. Let me hope we all pass.”

“Modern art is what happens when painters stop looking at girls and persuade themselves that they have a better idea.”

“I have one head that wants to be good,And one that wants to be bad.And always, as soon as I get up,One of my heads is sad.”

“There was a young lady from GloucesterWho complained that her parents both bossed her,So she ran off to Maine.Did her parents complain?Not at all -- they were glad to have lost her.”

“The day will happenwhether or not you get up”

“The day will happen whether or not you get up.”