“The better work men do is always done under stress and at great personal cost.”

“It is difficultto get the news from poems yet men die miserably every day for lackof what is found there.”

“You remember I had a strong inclination all my life to be a painter. Under different circumstances I would rather have been a painter than to bother with these god-damn words. I never actually thought of myself as a poet but I knew I had to be an artist in some way.”

“After some years of varied experience with the bodies of the rich and the poor a man finds little to distinguish between them, bulks them as one and bases his working judgements on other matters.”

“The Last Words of My English GrandmotherThere were some dirty platesand a glass of milkbeside her on a small tablenear the rank, disheveled bed--Wrinkled and nearly blindshe lay and snoredrousing with anger in her tonesto cry for food,Gimme something to eat--They're starving me--I'm all right--I won't goto the hospital. No, no, noGive me something to eat!Let me take youto the hospital, I saidand after you are wellyou can do as you please.She smiled, Yesyou do what you please firstthen I can do what I please--Oh, oh, oh! she criedas the ambulance men liftedher to the stretcher--Is this what you callmaking me comfortable?By now her mind was clear--Oh you think you're smartyou young people,she said, but I'll tell youyou don't know anything.Then we started.On the waywe passed a long rowof elms. She looked at themawhile out ofthe ambulance window and said,What are all thosefuzzy looking things out there?Trees? Well, I'm tiredof them and rolled her head away.”

“We laughed at the hollyhocks together and then I sprayed them with lye. Forgive me. I simply do not know what I am doing.”

“You're a romanticist. What do you think a man is, a papaya? To digest your dinner? In pill form?”