I think that there are fiction writers for whom that works well. I could never do it. I feel as if, by the time I see that it's a poem, it's almost written in my head somewhere. — Sharon Olds Copy Share Image
Because a poem is not written while running or while answering the phone. It's written in whatever minutes one has. Sometimes you have half an hour. — Sharon Olds Copy Share Image
Poems come from ordinary experiences and objects, I think. Out of memory - a dress I lent my daughter on her way back to… — Sharon Olds Copy Share Image
There are some fine books and essays about that. Lewis Hyde has written about alcoholism and poets and the role that society gives its… — Sharon Olds Copy Share Image
I'm not asking a poem to carry a lot of rocks in its pockets. Just being an ordinary observer and liver and feeler and… — Sharon Olds Copy Share Image
“How do they do it, the ones who make love without love? How do they come to the come to the come to the… — Sharon Olds Copy Share Image
She'd crack A joke sharp as a tin lid Hot from the teeth of the can-opener, And cackle her crack-corn laugh. — Sharon Olds Copy Share Image
If I wrote in a sonnet form, I would be distorting. Or if I had some great new idea for line breaks and I… — Sharon Olds Copy Share Image
Many poets write books. They'll tell you: Well, I've got my next book, but there are two poems I need to write, one about… — Sharon Olds Copy Share Image
“as if languagelessness was a step up, in evolution, from the chatter of consciousness.” — Sharon Olds Copy Share Image
Maybe we can use a metaphor for it, out of dance. I think for many years I was aware of the need, in dance… — Sharon Olds Copy Share Image
Who wants to put together something that will bear some relationship to the vision or memory or experience or story or idea or dream… — Sharon Olds Copy Share Image
“I put my arms around a trunk and squeezed it, then I lay down on my father's grave.” — Sharon Olds Copy Share Image
I'm probably so out of it at my age that I don't know what people think. — Sharon Olds Copy Share Image
“Some people think I should be over my ex by now — maybe I thought I might have been over him more by now.… — Sharon Olds Copy Share Image
Maybe in order to understand sex fully/one has to risk being destroyed by it. — Sharon Olds Copy Share Image
