It is the first experience you ever had of reading a decent poem: 'Oh, somebody else is lonely, too! — Mary Ruefle Copy Share Image
A poem is a neutrino - mainly nothing - it has no mass and can pass through the earth undetected. — Mary Ruefle Copy Share Image
A poem is a finished work of the mind, it is not the work of a finished mind. — Mary Ruefle Copy Share Image
Yes, the mistrust of poetry has a long history, for a variety of reasons, but they all come down to sentiment and… — Mary Ruefle Copy Share Image
In life, the number of beginnings is exactly equal to the number of endings ... In poetry, the number of beginnings so… — Mary Ruefle Copy Share Image
I remember I was a child, and when I grew up I was a poet. It all happened at sixty miles an… — Mary Ruefle Copy Share Image
The origins of poetry are clearly rooted in obscurity, in secretiveness, in incantation, in spells that must at once invoke and protect,… — Mary Ruefle Copy Share Image
I'm lucky enough to occasionally be able to do something I love - write poems - and unlucky enough that what I… — Mary Ruefle Copy Share Image
If you have any idea for a poem, an exact grid of intent, you are on the wrong path, a dead-end alley,… — Mary Ruefle Copy Share Image
There is a world which poets cannot seem to enter. It is the world everybody else lives in. And the only thing… — Mary Ruefle Copy Share Image
“Choice, and all its attendant energy, is a characteristic of youth. It is before one chooses that one feels desire and longing… — Mary Ruefle Copy Share Image
“Sent to the Monk" Night falls and the empty intimacy of the whole world fills my heart to frothing. The past has… — Mary Ruefle Copy Share Image
When I first encountered the poems of Jon Woodward, I was stunned into the state that is my life's joy-I was in… — Mary Ruefle Copy Share Image
Poetry is sentimental to begin with. To write a sentimental poem is an act of redundancy. — Mary Ruefle Copy Share Image
I am convinced that the first lyric poem was written at night, and that the moon was witness to the event and… — Mary Ruefle Copy Share Image
Now I will give you a piece of advice. I will tell you something that I absolutely believe you should do, and if you… — Mary Ruefle Copy Share Image
The industrial world destroys nature not because it doesn’t love it but because it is not afraid of it. — Mary Ruefle Copy Share Image
I remember I was a child, and when I grew up I was a poet. It all happened at sixty miles an hour and… — Mary Ruefle Copy Share Image
Yes, the mistrust of poetry has a long history, for a variety of reasons, but they all come down to sentiment and invention over… — Mary Ruefle Copy Share Image
“If there is any irreverence in my own work, I hope it is the irreverence I bear in mistrusting my own sincere self, which… — Mary Ruefle Copy Share Image
We are all one question, and the best answer seems to be love—a connection between things. — Mary Ruefle Copy Share Image
Every creative act is an act of hypocrisy and violence. You may have to think about it for a while, but I am sure… — Mary Ruefle Copy Share Image
I have become an orchid washed in on the salt white beach. Memory, what can I make of it now that might please you-… — Mary Ruefle Copy Share Image
Irreverence is a way of playing hooky and remaining present at the same time. — Mary Ruefle Copy Share Image
