Paul Celan Quotes

Only truthful hands write true poems. I cannot see any basic difference between a handshake and a poem.

Only one thing remained reachable, close and secure amid all losses: language. Yes, language. In spite of everything, it remained secure against loss.

A nothing we were, are, shall remain, flowering: the nothing--, the no one's rose.

Reality is not simply there, it does not simply exist: it must be sought out and won.

Poetry is a sort of homecoming.

The poem is lonely. It is lonely and en route. Its author stays with it. Does this very fact not place the poem already here, at its inception, in the encounter, in the mystery of encounter?

There's nothing in the world for which a poet will give up writing, not even he is a Jew and the language of his poems is German.

Don't sign your name between worlds, surmount the manifold of meanings, trust the tearstain, learn to live.

We are told that when Hölderlin went 'mad,' he constantly repeated, 'Nothing is happening to me, nothing is happening to me.'

German poetry is going in a very different direction from French poetry.... Its language has become more sober, more factual. It distrusts "beauty." It tries to be truthful.

They've healed me to pieces.

Death is a master from Germany.

There was earth inside them, and they dug.

in the air, there your root remains, there, in the air

The two heart-grey puddles: two mouthsfull of silence.

Illegibility of this world. All things twice over. The strong clocks justify the splitting hour, hoarsely. You , clamped into your deepest part, climb out of yourself for ever.

who is invisible enough to see you

no one bears witness for the witness

How you die out in me: down to the last worn-out knot of breath you're there, with a splinter of life.

The heart hid still in the dark, hard as the Philosophers Stone.

Each arrow you shoot off carries its own target into the decidedly secret tangle

He speaks truly who speaks the shade.

Spring: trees flying up to their birds

I went with my very being toward language.

The language with which I make my poems has nothing to do with one spoken here, or anywhere.

Black milk of daybreak we drink it at sundown.

rush of pine scent (once upon a time), the unlicensed conviction there ought to be another way of saying this.

Read! Read all the time, the understanding will come by itself.

you're rowing by wordlight

Tall poplars--human beings of this earth!

How you die out in me:down to the lastworn-out knot of breathyou're there, with a splinter of life.

Don't sign your namebetween worlds, surmountthe manifold of meanings, trust the tearstain, learn to live.

Each arrow you shoot offcarries its own targetinto the decidedlysecrettangle

rush of pine scent (once upon a time), the unlicensed convictionthere ought to be another wayof sayingthis.