I think the culture can absorb so many people writing poetry and trying to earn their living in poetry. — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
A person who's only suffering can't write a poem. There are choices to be made, and you need to be objective. — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
Once your poems are completed, you send them into the world. You don't write for a coterie of other writers - you… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
There are a lot of poems where I am questing for God. I don't think there is any finding of God. — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
I think that as long as you have other poets before you and that you can learn from them, then it's always… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
You're shadowed by your own dream, especially as you get older, of trying to create something that will last in poetry. And… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
In every culture, in every language, there is expressive play, expressive word play; there's language use to different purposes that we would… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
think what you hope for is that at different times of your life you're able to write the poetry that reflects the… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
Often you've read another poem that you think is so beautiful that you'd like to make something like that. And so you… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
Emily Dickinson calls previous poets her kinsmen of the shelf. You can always be consoled by your kinsmen of the shelf and… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
The mysterious thing about writing poetry is that when you're - when things are going poorly, when you're not thinking well, even… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
In American tradition a certain kind of, I would say, desperate American friendliness in which the poet tries to reach out through… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
And when my second book had come out, "Wild Gratitude," I went to Pearl London's class and she worked through different drafts… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
When I was a freshman in college I went to Grinnell College in Iowa. I brought my poems to my freshman humanities… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
There's been no poet, no great poet in the history of poetry who hasn't also been a great reader of poetry. This… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
Scholars of the Hebrew bible define something they call wisdom literature and I would say clearly the poetry of wisdom is something… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
Poetry takes courage because you have to face things and you try to articulate how you feel. — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
I think one of the things that distinguished my work from the beginning when I was in college was my turning towards… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
I began to imitate what I was reading, and I started to become a poet, even though what I was writing were… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
As a reader you have a task to do, you have something to do. You bring your experience to it. It's not… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
And sometimes you look at the first poems by someone and you go, "They have freshness and a sense of wonder that… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
I would keep in mind to a young poet that you are entering into something that is very important, that has always… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
My focus is on the reader and that the poet's job is not to inspire himself or herself. The poet's job is… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
The poet wants justice. And the poet wants art. In poetry we can't have one without the other. — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
You're alone with yourself and your own feelings and that gives you deeper access to what you need to get in touch… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
I think it's true that that's something that poetry can go to school on fiction. I think poetry can go to fiction… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
I aspire to a poetry of great formal integrity, deep passion and high intellect, and I have many models for how to… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
I was surprised recently to find a book called "Poetry in Persons" that's coming out about visit to poets to a class… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
When poetry separates from song, then the words have to carry all the rhythm themselves; they have to do all the work.… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
I started writing poetry as a teenager in suburban Chicago out of emotional desperation. — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
A stress on the system and I think a painful thing for many young poets who are looking to find a life… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
I don't think poetry will die, but I think that poetry does demand a certain kind of attention to language. — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
There's the brilliant audacity of youth that poets strike upon in their earliest work sometimes that they never can hit upon again. — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
And what I've found over time is that for me to write a poem that I think is worthy that I can… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
I'd say people do need some help with poetry because I think poetry just helps takes us to places that Americans aren't… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
Reading poetry is an adventure in renewal, a creative act, a perpetual beginning, a rebirth of wonder. — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
First of all I think that poetry is very noble and I always have with me the sense of the nobility of… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
The spiritual desire for poetry can be overwhelming, so much do I need it to experience and name my own perilous depths… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share Image
And my experience is the best titles, for me, emerge in the process of writing. They don't usually come at the very beginning and… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share
“I did not know the work of mourning Is like carrying a bag of cement Up a mountain at night The mountaintop is not… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share
“Fall" Fall, falling, fallen. That’s the way the season Changes its tense in the long-haired maples That dot the road; the veiny hand-shaped leaves… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share
I find great consolation in having a lot of poetry books around. I believe that writing poetry and reading it are deeply intertwined. I've… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share
I had feelings that I didn't know what to do with, and I felt better when I started writing them. I thought of it… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share
I think in terms of educating a group of readers, MFA programs are very good. I just think the model of MFA programs in… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share
“Jonson wrote a poem and called his son His best piece of poetrie A lovely line a little loathsome I loved that poem once… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share
After my grandfather died I went down to the basement of my family house where my family kept books, anthologies and things and there… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share
It does demand a certain space in order to read it and I think that space is somewhat threatened by the lack of attention… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share
...I put down these memorandums of my affections in honor of tenderness, in honor of all of those who have been conscripted into the… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share
You're shadowed by your own dream, especially as you get older, of trying to create something that will last in poetry. And so, you're… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share
The attention deficit disorder of the culture is very distressing in America now and I think it puts a lot of things at risk,… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share
Now, as I've gotten older I've been able to write more quickly. Sometimes I get in the space of something and I can do… — Edward Hirsch Copy Share
Poetry takes courage because you have to face things and you try to articulate how you feel. — Edward Hirsch Copy Share
