William Carlos Williams Quotes

124 Sourced Quotes

It's a strange world made up of disappointments for the most part.
I keep writing largely because I get a satisfaction from it which can't be duplicated elsewhere. It fills the moments which otherwise are either terrifying or depressed. Not that I live that way, work too quiets me. My chief dissatisfaction with myself at the moment is that I don't seem to be able to lose myself in what I have to do as I should like to.

William Carlos Williams
There is no poetry of distinction without formal invention, for it is in the intimate form that works of art achieve their exact meaning, in which they most resemble the machine, to give language its highest dignity, its illumination in the environment to which it is native. Such war, as the arts live and breathe by, is continuous.
It may be that my interests as expressed here are pre-art. If so I look for a development along these lines and will be satisfied with nothing else.

William Carlos Williams
It is in tune with the tempo of life — scattered yet welded into the whole, — broken, yet woven together.

William Carlos Williams
Let the snake wait under
his weed
and the writing
be of words, slow and quick, sharp
to strike, quiet to wait,
sleepless.
— through metaphor to reconcile
the people and the stones.
Compose. (No ideas
but in things) Invent!
Saxifrage is my flower that splits
the rocks.

William Carlos Williams
I think these days when there is so little to believe in——when the old loyalties——God, country, and the hope of Heaven——aren't very real, we are more dependent than we should be on our friends. The only thing left to believe in——someone who seems beautiful.

William Carlos Williams
Outside, the north wind, coming and passing, swelling and dying, lifts the frozen sand drives it a-rattle against the lidless windows and we may dear sit stroking the cat stroking the cat and smiling sleepily, prrrr.

William Carlos Williams
Is it any better in Heaven, my friend Ford,
Than you found it in Provence?

William Carlos Williams
There is no thing that with a twist of the imagination cannot be something else. Porpoises risen in a green sea, the wind at nightfall bending the rose- red grasses and you- in your apron hurrying to catch- say it seems to you to be your son. How ridiculous! You will pass up into a cloud and look back at me, not count the scribbling foolish that put wings at your heels, at your knees.

William Carlos Williams
As birds' wings beat the solid air without which none could fly so words freed by the imagination affirm reality by their flight.

William Carlos Williams
You lethargic, waiting upon me, waiting for the fire and I attendant upon you, shaken by your beauty Shaken by your beauty Shaken.

William Carlos Williams
I will teach you my townspeople how to perform a funeral for you have it over a troop of artists unless one should scour the world you have the ground sense necessary.

William Carlos Williams
I'll write whatever I damn please, whenever I damn please and as I damn please and it'll be good if the authentic spirit of change is on it.

William Carlos Williams
Being an art form, verse cannot be "free" in the sense of having no limitations or guiding principle.

William Carlos Williams
Lift your flowers
on bitter stems
chickory!
Lift them up
out of the scorched ground!
Bear no foliage
but give yourself
wholly to that!
Strain under them
you bitter stems
that no beast eats —
and scorn greyness!

William Carlos Williams
Blessed moon
noon
of night
that through the dark
bids Love
stay.

William Carlos Williams
The art of the poem nowadays is something unstable; but at least the construction of the poem should make sense; you should know where you stand. Many questions haven't been answered as yet. Our poets may be wrong; but what can any of us do with his talent but try to develop his vision, so that through frequent failures we may learn better what we have missed in the past.

William Carlos Williams
Brother!
— if we were rich
we'd stick our chests out
and hold our heads high! It is dreams that have destroyed us. There is no more pride
in horses or in rein holding. We sit hunched together brooding
our fate. Well —
all things turn bitter in the end
whether you choose the right or
the left way
and —
dreams are not a bad thing.

William Carlos Williams
Man has survived hitherto because he was too ignorant to know how to realise his wishes- Now that he can realise them, he must either change them or perish

William Carlos Williams
Covertly the hands of a great clock go round and round! Were they to move quickly and at once the whole secret would be out and the shuffling of all ants be done forever.

William Carlos Williams
The earth cracks and
is shriveled up;
the wind moans piteously;
the sky goes out
if you should fail.

William Carlos Williams
Beauty' is related not to 'loveliness' but to a state in which reality plays a part.

William Carlos Williams
All women are not Helen, I know that, but have Helen in their hearts.

William Carlos Williams
It's a strange courage
you give me ancient star: Shine alone in the sunrise
toward which you lend no part!

William Carlos Williams
Poetry demands a different material than prose. It uses another facet of the same fact … the spontaneous conformation of language as it is heard.

William Carlos Williams