Poetry Quotes by Mary Oliver

Maybe the world, without us, is the real poem.

— Mary Oliver

A poet's interest in craft never fades, of course.

— Mary Oliver

Poetry is meant to be heard.

— Mary Oliver

Poetry is a life-cherishing force.

— Mary Oliver

I read Rumi, the 13th-century Persian poet, every day.

— Mary Oliver

I've always wanted to write poems and nothing else.

— Mary Oliver

Look for verbs of muscle, adjectives of exactitude.

— Mary Oliver

“because my life without you would be a place of parched and broken trees”

— Mary Oliver

One thing I do know is that poetry, to be understood, must be clear.

— Mary Oliver

I always feel that whatever isn't necessary shouldn't be in a poem.

— Mary Oliver

“Poems arrive ready to begin. Poets are only the transportation.”

— Mary Oliver

The challenge is to keep up with all the new poets at the same time I love the old ones.

— Mary Oliver

I learn a lot about my poems when I read them by the way people respond to them.

— Mary Oliver

“I think there ought to be a little music here: hum, hum.”

— Mary Oliver

“Now of all voyagers I remember, who among them Did not board ship with grief among their maps?”

— Mary Oliver

As a child, what captivated me was reading the poems myself and realizing that there was a world without material substance which…

— Mary Oliver

“from the poem Hum, Hum The resurrection of the morning. The mystery of the night. The hummingbird's wings. The excitement of thunder.…

— Mary Oliver

Writing a poem ... is a kind of possible love affair between something like the heart (that courageous but also shy factory…

— Mary Oliver

At the time I was growing up, literature was involved with the so-called confessional poets. And I was not interested in that.…

— Mary Oliver

A mind that is lively and inquiring, compassionate, curious, angry, full of music, full of feeling, is a mind full of possible…

— Mary Oliver

I worked privately, and sometimes I feel that might be better for poets than the kind of social workshop gathering. My school…

— Mary Oliver

“Poetry is a life-cherishing force. For poems are not words, after all, but fires for the cold, ropes let down to the…

— Mary Oliver

Poetry isn't a profession, it's a way of life. It's an empty basket; you put your life into it and make something…

— Mary Oliver

“from Hum, Hum Oh the house of denial has thick walls and very small windows and whoever lives there, little by little,…

— Mary Oliver

“If I had another life I would want to spend it all on some unstinting happiness. I would be a fox, or…

— Mary Oliver

Poetry is a river; many voices travel in it; poem after poem moves along in the exciting crests and falls of the…

— Mary Oliver

The poet dreams of the classroom I dreamed I stood up in class And I said aloud: Teacher, Why is algebra important?…

— Mary Oliver

“It's very important to write things down instantly, or you can lose the way you were thinking out a line. I have…

— Mary Oliver

The poet must not only write the poem but must scrutinize the world intensely, or anyway that part of the world he…

— Mary Oliver

“Certainly imagery can be gleaned from the industrial world — what do Blake's "dark Satanic Mills," for example, owe to the natural…

— Mary Oliver

“and anyway it’s just the same old story -- a few people just trying, one way or another, to survive. Mostly, I…

— Mary Oliver

“I went down not long ago to the Mad River, under the willows I knelt and drank from that crumpled flow, call…

— Mary Oliver

“That Little Beast That pretty little beast, a poem, has a mind of its own. Sometimes I want it to crave apples…

— Mary Oliver

“When Death Comes When death comes like the hungry bear in autumn; when death comes and takes all the bright coins from…

— Mary Oliver

“Percy and Books Percy does not like it when I read a book. He puts his face over the top of it,…

— Mary Oliver

“Percy wakes me (fourteen) Percy wakes me and I am not ready. He has slept all night under the covers. Now he’s…

— Mary Oliver

“The Fourth Sign of The Zodiac (Part 3) by Mary Oliver I know, you never intended to be in this world. But…

— Mary Oliver

“oxygen Everything needs it: bone, muscles, and even, while it calls the earth its home, the soul. So the merciful, noisy machine…

— Mary Oliver

“Look, the trees are turning their own bodies into pillars of light, are giving off the rich fragrance of cinnamon and fulfillment,…

— Mary Oliver

The language of the poem is the language of particulars.

— Mary Oliver