Writer poet Nature American Poetry Probably all the attention to poetry results in some value, though the attention is more often directed to lesser than to greater values. - A. R. Ammons
Poetry The poet exposes himself to the risk. All that has been said about poetry, all that he has learned about poetry, is only a partial assurance. - A. R. Ammons
God If the greatest god is the stillness all the motions add up to, then we must ineluctably be included. - A. R. Ammons
Purpose Past Man I can't tell you where a poem comes from, what it is, or what it is for: nor can any other man. The reason I can't tell you is that the purpose of a poem is to go past telling, to be recognised by burning. - A. R. Ammons
Nature I am grateful for - though I can't keep up with - the flood of articles, theses, and textbooks that mean to share insight concerning the nature of poetry. - A. R. Ammons
Friends Change Today That's a wonderful change that's taken place, and so most poetry today is published, if not directly by the person, certainly by the enterprise of the poet himself, working with his friends. - A. R. Ammons
Disaster May Time If a poem is each time new, then it is necessarily an act of discovery, a chance taken, a chance that may lead to fulfillment or disaster. - A. R. Ammons
And History will smile to think that this is the species for which Socrates and Jesus Christ died. - Julien Benda
Bereavement is the sharpest challenge to our trust in God; if faith can overcome this, there is no mountain which it cannot remove. - Dean Inge