(30 October 1885 – 1 November 1972 / Hailey / Idaho)

poet Ezra Pound
#36 on top 500 poets

Quotations

  • ''"You the one, I the few"
    said John Adams
    speaking of fears in the abstract
    to his volatile friend Mr. Jefferson,''
    Ezra Pound (1885-1972), U.S. poet. Canto LXXXI (l. 49-52). . . The Cantos of Ezra Pound. (1970, repr. 1991) New Directions.
    44 person liked.
    		24 person did not like.
  • ''Good writers are those who keep the language efficient. That is to say, keep it accurate, keep it clear.''
    Ezra Pound (1885-1972), U.S. poet, critic. The ABC of Reading, ch. 3 (1934).
    60 person liked.
    		18 person did not like.
  • ''Yet
    Ere the season died a-cold
    Borne upon a zephyr's shoulder
    Irose through the aureate sky''
    Ezra Pound (1885-1972), U.S. poet. Canto LXXXI (l. 94-97). . . The Cantos of Ezra Pound. (1970, repr. 1991) New Directions.
    29 person liked.
    		13 person did not like.
  • ''As a bathtub lined with white porcelain,
    When the hot water gives out or goes tepid,
    So is the slow cooling of our chivalrous passion,
    O my much praised but-not-altogether-satisfactory lady.''
    Ezra Pound (1885-1972), U.S. poet, critic. repr. In Collected Shorter Poems (1984). The Bath Tub, Lustra (1916). The poem is thought to be addressed to Pound's fiancée Dorothy Shakespear, whom he married in April 1914.
    22 person liked.
    		15 person did not like.
  • ''What counts is the cultural level,''
    Ezra Pound (1885-1972), U.S. poet. Canto LXXXI (l. 64). . . The Cantos of Ezra Pound. (1970, repr. 1991) New Directions.
    7 person liked.
    		3 person did not like.
  • ''Like a skein of loose silk blown against a wall
    She walks by the railing of a path in Kensington Gardens,
    And she is dying piecemeal
    of a sort of emotional anemia.''
    Ezra Pound (1885-1972), U.S. poet. The Garden (l. 1-4). . . The Selected Poems of Ezra Pound. (1957) New Directions.
    9 person liked.
    		2 person did not like.
  • ''What thou lov'st well shall not be reft from thee
    What thou lov'st well is thy true heritage
    Whose world, or mine or theirs
    or is it of none?''
    Ezra Pound (1885-1972), U.S. poet. Canto LXXXI (l. 133-136). . . The Cantos of Ezra Pound. (1970, repr. 1991) New Directions.
    9 person liked.
    		2 person did not like.
  • ''In her is the end of breeding.
    Her boredom is exquisite and excessive.
    She would like some one to speak to her,
    And is almost afraid that I
    will commit that indiscretion.''
    Ezra Pound (1885-1972), U.S. poet. The Garden (l. 8-12). . . The Selected Poems of Ezra Pound. (1957) New Directions.
    10 person liked.
    		1 person did not like.
  • ''It hath brought palsey to bed, lyeth
    between the young bride and her bridegroom
    CO-TRA NATURA—
    They have brought whores for Eleusis
    Corpses are set to banquet
    at behest of usura.''
    Ezra Pound (1885-1972), U.S. poet. Canto XLV (l. 44-49). . . The Cantos of Ezra Pound. (1970, repr. 1991) New Directions.
    9 person liked.
    		0 person did not like.
  • ''install me in any profession
    Save this damn'd profession of writing,
    where one needs one's brains all the time.''
    Ezra Pound (1885-1972), U.S. poet. The Lake Isle (l. 14-16). . . The Selected Poems of Ezra Pound. (1957) New Directions.
    10 person liked.
    		2 person did not like.

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The Garrett

Come, let us pity those who are better off than we are.
Come, my friend, and remember
      that the rich have butlers and no friends,
And we have friends and no butlers.
Come, let us pity the married and the unmarried.

Dawn enters with little feet
      like a gilded Pavlova
And I am near my desire.

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