“Bright beads of red are rising through the ink, Hearts-blood bubbles smearing out into the black stream”

“Out of the ash I rise with my red hairand I eat men like air.”

“Do you realize the illicit sensuous delight I get from picking my nose? I always have, ever since I was a child. There are so many subtle variations of sensation. A delicate, pointed-nailed fifth finger can catch under dry scabs and flakes of mucous in the nostril and draw them out to be looked at, crumbled between fingers, and flicked to the floor in minute crusts. Or a heavier, determined forefinger can reach up and smear down-and-out the soft, resilient, elastic greenish-yellow smallish blobs of mucous, roll them round and jellylike between thumb and forefinger, and spread them on the undersurface of a desk or chair where they will harden into organic crusts. How many desks and chairs have I thus secretively befouled since childhood? Or sometimes there will be blood mingled with the mucous: in dry brown scabs, or bright sudden wet red on the finger that scraped too rudely the nasal membranes. God, what sexual satisfaction!”

“And I am aware of my heart: it opens and closesIts bowl of red blooms out of sheer love of me.--from "Tulips", written 18 March 1961”

“I am accused. I dream of massacres.I am a garden of black and red agonies. I drink them,Hating myself, hating and fearing. And now theworld conceivesIts end and runs toward it, arms held out in love.”

“The blood of love welled up in my heart with a slow pain. ”

“Even the sun-clouds this morning cannot manage such skirts Nor the woman in the ambulance Whore red heart blooms through her coat so astoundingly....Oh my God, what am IThat these late mouths should cry openIn a forest of frost, in a dawn of cornflowers”