“Why are poets so apt to choose their mates, not for any similarity of poetic endowment, but for qualities which might make the happiness of the rudest handicraftsman as well as that of the ideal craftsman of the spirit? Because, probably, at his highest elevation, the poet needs no human intercourse; but he finds it dreary to descend, and be a stranger.”

“The poet will be discontented even in the streets of heaven. The poet is always in revolt." "There again," said Syme irritably, "what is there poetical about being in revolt? You might as well say that it is poetical to be sea-sick.”

“There are two men inside the artist, the poet and the craftsman. One is born a poet. One becomes a craftsman.”

“- How is he in bed? Gladiator or poet?- Hmmm... A poetic gladiator.”

“Yangi, a philosopher, art historian and poet, had evolved a theory of why some objects - pots, baskets, cloth made by unknown craftsmen - were so beautiful. In his view, they expressed unconscious beauty because they had been made in such numbers that the craftsman had been liberated from his ego.”

“Black is not sad. Bright colors are what depresses me. They’re so… empty. Black is poetic. How do you imagine a poet? In a bright yellow jacket? Probably not.”