Character Quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson

One who writes a poem writes it because the language prompts, or simply dictates, the next line.

— Joseph Brodsky

A poem, once it's written, is meant to be read with the inner voice of the person who reads it.

— Tony Harrison

People are so used to reading novels now, they just read a poem straight through to get the meaning. And that's something totally different…

— Alice Oswald

Action, looks, words, steps, form the alphabet by which you may spell character.

— Johann Kaspar Lavater

The poet's other readers are the ancient poets, who look upon the freshly written pages from an incorruptible distance. Their poetic forms are permanent,…

— Salvatore Quasimodo

The function of poetry is to point out that the sign is not identical to the referent.

— Roman Jakobson

A backward poet writes inverse.

— Nikhil Saluja

“The direction in which the characters look determines the direction in which they should be read. This alternate or boustrophedon mode of writing also…

— A. H. SAYCE

But since I have a poet's weakness for symbols, I am using this character also as a symbol; he is the long-delayed but always…

— Tennessee Williams

Reading is perception as translation. The inert signs of an alphabet become living meanings in the mind.

— Siri Hustvedt

Poetry is a sequence of dots and dashes, spelling depths, crypts, cross-lights, and moon wisps.

— Carl Sandburg

Reading is not walking on the words; it's grasping the soul of them.

— Paulo Freire