“Maybe poetry took the life out of both of them, Idea and friendship.” — Kenneth Koch Copy Share Image
Poetry is a deliberate attempt to make language suggestive and imprecise. — Kenneth Koch Copy Share Image
You can't be too influenced by a great poet. You simply have to live through it. — Kenneth Koch Copy Share Image
“Write poetry as if you were in love. If you are always in love you will not always write the same poem,… — Kenneth Koch Copy Share Image
When you finish a poem, it clicks shut like the top of a jewel box, but prose is endless. I haven't experienced… — Kenneth Koch Copy Share Image
Poetry, which is written while no one is looking, is meant to be looked at for all time. — Kenneth Koch Copy Share Image
I was influenced by surrealist poetry and painting as were thousands of other people, and it seems to me to have become… — Kenneth Koch Copy Share Image
I don't think the nature of my poetry is satirical or even ironic, I think it's essentially lyrical but again I don't… — Kenneth Koch Copy Share Image
I was excited by what my painter friends were doing, and they seemed to be interested in our poetry too, and that… — Kenneth Koch Copy Share Image
As for political poetry, as it's usually defined, it seems there's very little good political poetry. — Kenneth Koch Copy Share Image
I've had trouble with criticism, I guess. It's hard to know what role criticism plays in either encouraging poets or in getting… — Kenneth Koch Copy Share Image
I thought, 'There are a lot of poets who have the courage to look into the abyss, but there are very few… — Kenneth Koch Copy Share Image
As I look over my work, I mean every time I look over my early work, I see, yes, I could do… — Kenneth Koch Copy Share Image
Also, I liked John Cage's music. I liked it for its craziness, the use of silence, the boldness-anything to get me away… — Kenneth Koch Copy Share Image
I love painting and music, of course. I don't know nearly as much about them as I know about poetry. I've certainly… — Kenneth Koch Copy Share Image
I wonder if I ever thought of an ideal reader... I guess when I was in my 20s and in New York… — Kenneth Koch Copy Share Image
“Summer in the trees! “It is time to strangle several bad poets.” / The yellow hobbyhorse rocks to and fro, and from… — Kenneth Koch Copy Share Image
The subject matter of the stories on the surface... there seem to be a number of stories about travel. — Kenneth Koch Copy Share
When you finish a poem, it clicks shut like the top of a jewel box, but prose is endless. I haven't experienced an awful… — Kenneth Koch Copy Share
It's a well known thing that ordinary perceptions can have a strange aspect when one is travelling. — Kenneth Koch Copy Share
“Summer in the trees! “It is time to strangle several bad poets.” / The yellow hobbyhorse rocks to and fro, and from the chimney… — Kenneth Koch Copy Share
I was excited by what my painter friends were doing, and they seemed to be interested in our poetry too, and that was a… — Kenneth Koch Copy Share
Picasso said once when being interviewed that one should not be one's own connoisseur. — Kenneth Koch Copy Share
I love painting and music, of course. I don't know nearly as much about them as I know about poetry. I've certainly been influenced… — Kenneth Koch Copy Share
“I wasn’t ready For you. I understood nothing Seemingly except my feelings You were whirling In your life I was keeping Everything in my… — Kenneth Koch Copy Share
I don't think the nature of my poetry is satirical or even ironic, I think it's essentially lyrical but again I don't know if… — Kenneth Koch Copy Share
“I love you as a sheriff searches for a walnut / That will solve a murder case unsolved for years / Because the murderer… — Kenneth Koch Copy Share
As I look over my work, I mean every time I look over my early work, I see, yes, I could do that then… — Kenneth Koch Copy Share
