Richard Wilbur Quotes

My father, Eric Trethewey, is a poet, so I had one right inside the house. And on long trips, he'd tell me, if I got bored in the car, to write a poem about it. And I did find that poetry was a way for me, I think as it for a lot of people, to articulate those things that seem hardest to say.

When you think intensely and beautifully, something happens. That something is called poetry. If you think that way and speak at the same time, poetry gets in your mouth. If people hear you, it gets in their ears. If you think that way and write at the same time, then poetry gets written. But poetry exists in any case. The question is only: are you going to take part, and if so, how?

There is some reason to believe that when a man does not write his poetry it escapes by other vents through him, instead of the one vent of writing; clings to his form and manners, whilst poets have often nothing poetical about them except their verses.

The - writing is a kind of act of aggression, and a person who is not aggressive in his normal, may I say, intercourse with humanity might well be an aggressive writer.

Writing eases my suffering . . . writing is my way of reaffirming my own existence.

Words, yes, formulating things, creating something from your heart, it is something very necessary, yes.

We all write poems; it is simply that poets are the ones who write in words.

Women who are inclined to write poetry at all are inspired by being mad at something.

Well, I had this little notion - I started writing when I was eleven, writing poetry. I was passionately addicted to it; it was my great refuge through adolescence.

Writing is how I stay sane. It's completely necessary.

When I get depressed, I try to get something for the terrible sadness that comes over me and create something in terms of poetry.

It's going to sound cliche, but I started acting as an emotional outlet.

Writing dark poetry was always my escape.

I've always viewed writing as an outlet for being vulnerable and all that comes with that. You are able to let things all out.

I think and write whenever I want an outlet.

Most artists - painters or writers - I think create out of stress or negative situations. Look at rock music. It's about getting things off of your chest, and it's a means of venting in many ways. That's what my work is about.

Oftentimes I feel like I can, through the music, paint a picture of something that I can't look anywhere and see in my real life.

I feel like songwriting, for me, is kind of therapy.

I try to work every day because you have no refuge but writing. When you're going through a period of unhappiness, a broken love affair, the death of someone you love, or some other disorder in your life, then you have no refuge but writing.

By writing I can live in ways that I could not survive.

Try to think of writing as a gift - more complexly put: it is the curse and the cure.

I started with poetry because it was direct, immediate, and short. It was the ecstasy of striking matches in the dark.

Writing is not my problem, it is my solution.

It is not a waste to write beautiful prose or poetry for one person's eyes alone!

Instead of noting down things I’m unlikely to forget, I will write a poem. Even if I have never written one before and even if I never do so again, I will at least know that I once had the courage to put my feelings into words.