Kathleen Raine

Nature is the common, universal language, understood by all.

— Kathleen Raine

As a child I became a confirmed believer in the ancient gods simply because as between the reality of fact and the…

— Kathleen Raine

Of all the arts the living of a life is perhaps the greatest; to live every moment of life with the same…

— Kathleen Raine

Sensing us, the trees tremble in their sleep, The living leaves recoil before our fires, Baring to us war-charred and broken branches,…

— Kathleen Raine

Academia is a graveyard of poets.

— Kathleen Raine

The work of the artist is to heal the soul.

— Kathleen Raine

Chemistry dissolves the goddess in the alembic, Venus, the white queen, the universal matrix, Down to the molecular hexagons and carbon-chains.

— Kathleen Raine

I couldn't claim that I have never felt the urge to explore evil, but when you descend into hell you have to…

— Kathleen Raine

Intent on one great love, perfect, Requited and for ever, I missed love's everywhere Small presence, thousand-guised.

— Kathleen Raine

The air is full of a farewell- deserted by the silver lake lies the wild world, overturned. Cities rise where the mountains…

— Kathleen Raine

“Within the ring there lies an O, Within the O there looks an eye, In the eye there swims a sea, And…

— Kathleen Raine

And see the peaceful trees extend their myriad leaves in leisured dance- they bear the weight of sky and cloud upon the…

— Kathleen Raine

“The icon is transparent as a representation of the special reality it depicts; an idol replaces and obscures that reality ... but…

— Kathleen Raine

Strangers have crossed the sound, but not the sound of the dark oarsmen Or the golden-haired sons of kings, Strangers whose thought…

— Kathleen Raine

Poetry is not an end in itself but in the service of life; of what use are poems, or any other works…

— Kathleen Raine

“For [W. B.] Yeats magic was not so much a kind of poetry as poetry a kind of magic, and the object…

— Kathleen Raine

Of all created things the source is one, Simple, single as love; remember The cell and seed of life, the sphere That…

— Kathleen Raine

It was not the purpose of poetry to record anything and everything, to merely describe either the outer world or some subjective…

— Kathleen Raine

Meanings, moods, the whole scale of our inner experience, finds in nature the 'correspondences' through which we may know our boundless selves.

— Kathleen Raine

Being a poet is not a job or a profession but a way of life.

— Kathleen Raine

I make no apology for writing in nature's age-old and unaging language, of whose images we build our paradises, Broceliande and Brindavan,…

— Kathleen Raine

I've read all the books but one Only remains sacred: this Volume of wonders, open Always before my eyes.

— Kathleen Raine

O never harm the dreaming world, the world of green, the world of leaves, but let its million palms unfold the adoration…

— Kathleen Raine

... the poem reminds us of what we ourselves know, but did not know we knew; reminds us, above all, of what…

— Kathleen Raine