(28 July 1927 / Rochester, New York)

poet John Ashbery
#155 on top 500 poets

Quotations

  • ''A novice was sitting on a cornice
    High over the city. Angels
    Combined their prayers with those
    Of the police, begging her to come off it.''
    John Ashbery (b. 1927), U.S. poet, critic. "Illustration."
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  • ''As night returns bringing doubts
    That swarm around the sleeper's head
    But are fended off with clubs and knives ...''
    John Ashbery (b. 1927), U.S. poet, critic. "Spring Day."
    2 person liked.
    		0 person did not like.
  • ''Worry and brown desk
    Stain it by infusion. There aren't enough tags at the end,
    And the grove is blind, blossoming, but we are too porous to hear it.''
    John Ashbery (b. 1927), U.S. poet, critic. "Unusual Precautions."
    2 person liked.
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  • ''Man is never without woman, the neuter sex
    Casting up her equations, looks to her lord for loving kindness
    For man smiles never at woman.''
    John Ashbery (b. 1927), U.S. poet, critic. "A Last World."
    2 person liked.
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  • ''Much that is beautiful must be discarded
    So that we may resemble a taller
    Impression of ourselves.''
    John Ashbery (b. 1927), U.S. poet, critic. "Illustration."
    2 person liked.
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  • ''... with autumn falling over everything;
    The plush leaves the chattels in barrels
    Of an obscure family being evicted
    Into the way it was, and is.''
    John Ashbery (b. 1927), U.S. poet, critic. "Street Musicians."
    2 person liked.
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  • ''Sometimes a word will start it, like
    Hands and feet, sun and gloves. The way
    Is fraught with danger, you say, and I
    Notice the word "fraught"....''
    John Ashbery (b. 1927), U.S. poet, critic. "Variant."
    2 person liked.
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  • ''He gathers deeds
    In the pure air, the agent
    Of their factual excesses.''
    John Ashbery (b. 1927), U.S. poet, critic. "A Long Novel."
    2 person liked.
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  • ''There is the view that poetry should improve your life. I think people confuse it with the Salvation Army.''
    John Ashbery (b. 1927), U.S. poet, critic. International Herald Tribune (Paris, October 2, 1989).
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  • ''So I cradle this average violin that knows
    Only forgotten showtunes, but argues
    The possibility of free declamation anchored
    To a dull refrain....''
    John Ashbery (b. 1927), U.S. poet, critic. "Street Musicians."
    2 person liked.
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Daffy Duck In Hollywood

Something strange is creeping across me.
La Celestina has only to warble the first few bars
Of "I Thought about You" or something mellow from
Amadigi di Gaula for everything--a mint-condition can
Of Rumford's Baking Powder, a celluloid earring, Speedy
Gonzales, the latest from Helen Topping Miller's fertile
Escritoire, a sheaf of suggestive pix on greige, deckle-edged
Stock--to come clattering through the rainbow trellis
Where Pistachio Avenue rams the 2300 block of Highland

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