X. J. Kennedy Quotes

That's the way it is with poetry: When it is incomprehensible it seems profound, and when you understand it, it is only ridiculous.

Hatred would have been easier. With hatred, I would have known what to do. Hatred is clear, metallic, one-handed, unwavering; unlike love.

You walked in, laughing, tears welling confused, mingling in your throat. How can you be so many women to so many people, oh you strange girl?

Poetry is a mock of a cry at finding a million dollars and a mock of a laugh at losing it.

I write poetry to figure things out. It's what I use as a navigating tool in my life, so when there's something that I just can't understand, I have to "poem" my way through it. For that reason I write a lot about family, because my family confuses me and I'm always trying to figure them out. I write a lot about love, because love is continually confusing in all of its many glorious aspects.

I do love you. I mean, love has nothing to do with this.

But smiles and tears are so alike with me, they are neither of them confined to any particular feelings: I often cry when I am happy, and smile when I am sad.

Certain songs just feel a way that's hard to put into words and it's not happy and it's also not really sad but I couldn't say what it is

Why are they sad and glad and bad? I do not know, go ask your dad.

I wanted to laugh. Or maybe get mad. Or maybe shrug at how strange everyone was, especially me.

But you can't truly hate a man without loving him first, and there's always a trace of that love left over.

Love was that way. You could not render it in black or white. It always came down to the strange, blended shades of grey.

Relationships are not straight forward. They're not black and white. Sometimes things don't always going in a straight line, and that's okay. Love can be very confusing.

Tears and laughter, they are so much Gaelic to me.

It's easier to be terrified by an enemy you admire.

When you aren't sure what it is you hate or why you even hate it, it's hard to hold onto the details...you just hold on to the feelings.

Poetry, unlike oratory, should not aim at clarity... but be dense with meaning, 'something to be chewed and digested'.

Happy," I muttered, trying to pin the word down. But it is one of those words, like Love, that I have never quite understood. Most people who deal in words don’t have much faith in them and I am no exception – especially the big ones like Happy and Love and Honest and Strong. They are too elusive and far to relative when you compare them to sharp, mean little words like Punk and Cheap and Phony. I feel at home with these, because they’re scrawny and easy to pin, but the big ones are tough and it takes either a priest or a fool to use them with any confidence.

I'm not disappointed - just disappointed.

Why then, O brawling love! O loving hate! O any thing, of nothing first create! O heavy lightness, serious vanity, Misshapen chaos of well-seeming forms, Feather of lead, bright smoke, cold fire, sick health, Still-waking sleep, that is not what it is! This love feel I, that feel no love in this.

Love: A term which has no meaning if defined.

All lyrical work must, as a whole, be perfectly intelligible, but in some particulars a little unintelligible.

Emotions are the natural result of striving for something. Every single scene has two or more people in it, and nobody wants the same thing, so they are negotiating this one way or another. The result of that negotiation will bring out all kinds of emotional stuff in you.

I know you’re going to find this hard to believe, but for some reason I don’t understand, I actually like you…most of the time. (Simone) Well, you also love Jesse. Obviously your taste in men leaves a lot to be desired. (Xypher)

I thought you were just mean," Reagan said. "I liked that about you.