Stevie Smith Quotes

Nothing is more wistful than the scent of lilac, nor more robust than its woody stalk, for we must remember that it is a tree as well as a flower, we must try not to forget this.

I'm alive today, therefore I'm just as much a part of our time as everybody else. The times will just have to enlarge themselves to make room for me, won't they, and for everybody else.

Who is this that comes in grandeur, coming from the blazing East? This is he we had not thought of, this is he the airy Christ.

All poetry has to do is to make a strong communication. All the poet has to do is listen. The poet is not an important fellow. There will also be another poet.

Unpopular, lonely and loving, Elinor need not trouble, For if she were not so loving, She would not be so miserable.

The human creature is alone in his carapace. Poetry is a strong way out.

Life may be treacherous, but you can always depend on death.

The sea was angry that day my friend, like an old man trying to send back soup at a deli.

I'll have your heart, if not by gift my knife Shall carve it out. I'll have your heart, your life.

Why does my muse only speak when she is uhnhappy? She does not, I only listen when I am unhappy.

The religion of Christianity Is mixed of sweetness and cruelty Reject this Sweetness, for she wears A smoky dress out of hell fires.

People who are always praising the past And especially the time of faith as best Ought to go and live in the Middle Ages And be burnt at the stake as witches and sages.

I may be smelly and I may be old, Rough in my pebbles, reedy in my pools, But where my fish float by I bless their swimming, And I like the people to bathe in me especially women.

My Muse sits forlorn She wishes she had not been born She sits in the cold No word she says is ever told.

A man may forgive many wrongs, but he cannot easily forgive anyone who makes it plain that his conversation is tedious.

Oh, no no no, it was too cold always (Still the dead one lay moaning) I was much too far out all my life And not waving but drowning.

O happy dogs of England, Bark well at errand boys, If you lived anywhere else, You would not be allowed to make such an infernal noise.

If there wasn't death, I think you couldn't go on.

Fourteen-year-old, why must you giggle and dote, Fourteen-year-old, why are you such a goat? I'm fourteen years old, that is the reason, I giggle and dote in season.

I like food, I like stripping vegetables of their skins, I like to have a slim young parsnip under my knife.

You must have some money if you are going to live simply. It need not be much, but you must have some.

The world is come upon me, I used to keep it a long way off, But now I have been run over and I am in the hands of the hospital staff.

My heart was full of softening showers, I used to swing like this for hours, I did not care for war or death, I was glad to draw my breath.

Love is not love that wounded bleeds And bleeding sullies slow. Come death within my hands and I Unto my love will go.

If I lie down on my bed I must be here, But if I lie down in my grave I may be elsewhere.

I am hungry to be interrupted For ever and ever amen O Person from Porlock come quickly And bring my thoughts to an end.

I don't think Auden liked my poetry very much, he's very Anglican.

I'm sorry to say my dear wife is a dreamer, and as she dreams she gets paler and leaner. Then be off to your Dream, with his fly-away hat, I stay with the girls who are happy and fat.

Cry pretty, pretty, pretty and you'll be able Very soon not even to cry pretty And so be delivered entirely from humanity This is prettiest of all, it is very pretty.

This is the simplest of all thoughts, that Death must come when we call, although he is a god.

Oh Lion in a peculiar guise, Sharp Roman road to Paradise, Come eat me up, I'll pay thy toll With all my flesh, and keep my soul.

There can be no good art that is international. Art to be vigorous and gesund must use the material at hand.

The flower and fruit of love are mine The ant, the fieldmouse and the mole

Christianity in the suburb is cheerful. The church is a centre of social activity and those who go to church need never be lonely.

I made Man with too many faults. Yet I love him. And if he wishes, I have a home above for him.

Into the dark night Resignedly I go, I am not so afraid of the dark night As the friends I do not know, I do not fear the night above As I fear the friends below.

As Nature is always careless and indifferent Who sees, who steps, means nothing and this is pretty.

I only asked my friends to be friendly and polite, I found them indifferent and censorious; The one I left to silence, the other to reproach: God send me over all such friends victorious.

A great artist ... takes what he did not make and makes of it something that only he can make.

I love people, but I love the thought and memory of them just as much.

Death's not a separation or alteration or parting; it's just a one-handled door.

This Englishwoman is so refined, She has no bosom and no behind.

It is an amiable part of human nature, that we should love our animals; it is even better to love them to the point of folly, than not to love them at all.

one never knows really how things are with other people, they just do always seem more spirited than oneself somehow.

Colours are what drive me most strongly.

So I fancy my Muse says, when I wish to die, Oh no, Oh no, we are not yet friends enough, And Virtue also says: We are not yet friends enough.

Youth is an arithmetical statement of passing interest, each hour eats it up.

Coleridge received the Person from Porlock And ever after called him a curse, Then why did he hurry to let him in? He could have hid in the house.

The English woman is so refined She has no bosom and no behind.

Oh Lion in a peculiar guise, Sharp Roman road to Paradise, Come eat me up, I'll pay thy tollWith all my flesh, and keep my soul.