(20 September 1902 – 7 March 1971 / Kingston upon Hull)

poet Stevie Smith
#135 on top 500 poets

Quotations

  • ''Our Bog is dood, our Bog is dood,
    They lisped in accents mild,
    But when I asked them to explain
    They grew a little wild.''
    Stevie Smith (1902-1971), British poet. Our Bog is Dood (l. 1-4). . . No Nature; New and Selected Poems [Gary Snyder]. (1992) Pantheon Books.
    12 person liked.
    		4 person did not like.
  • ''Cry pretty, pretty, pretty and you'll be able
    Very soon not even to cry pretty
    And so be delivered entirely from humanity
    This is prettiest of all, it is very pretty.''
    Stevie Smith (1902-1971), British poet, novelist. Pretty (l. 33-36). . . No Nature; New and Selected Poems [Gary Snyder]. (1992) Pantheon Books.
    11 person liked.
    		5 person did not like.
  • ''As Nature is always careless and indifferent
    Who sees, who steps, means nothing and this is pretty.''
    Stevie Smith (1902-1971), British poet, novelist. Pretty (l. 27-28). . . CP-Smit.
    10 person liked.
    		4 person did not like.
  • ''Fourteen-year-old, why must you giggle and dote,
    Fourteen-year-old, why are you such a goat?
    I'm fourteen years old, that is the reason,
    I giggle and dote in season.''
    Stevie Smith (1902-1971), British poet. "The Conventionalist."
    11 person liked.
    		4 person did not like.
  • ''People who are always praising the past
    And especially the times of faith as best
    Ought to go and live in the Middle Ages
    And be burnt at the stake as witches and sages.''
    Stevie Smith (1902-1971), British poet, novelist. The Past, Selected Poems (1962).
    7 person liked.
    		3 person did not like.
  • ''Hi yih, yippity-yap, merrily I flow,
    O I may be an old foul river but I have plenty of go.''
    Stevie Smith (1902-1971), British poet, novelist. The River God (l. 9-10). . . Faber Book of Nonsense Verse, The. Geoffrey Grigson, ed. (1979) Faber and Faber.
    2 person liked.
    		1 person did not like.
  • ''I may be smelly and I may be old,
    Rough in my pebbles, reedy in my pools,
    But where my fish float by I bless their swimming
    And I like the people to bathe in me, especially women.''
    Stevie Smith (1902-1971), British poet, novelist. The River God (l. 1-4). . . Faber Book of Nonsense Verse, The. Geoffrey Grigson, ed. (1979) Faber and Faber.
    3 person liked.
    		1 person did not like.
  • ''This Englishwoman is so refined
    She has no bosom and no behind.''
    Stevie Smith (1902-1971), British poet, novelist. "This Englishwoman," A Good Time Was Had By All (1937). The title of Stevie Smith's first book of poems is given as the original source of the expression "A good time was had by all" in Eric Partridge, A Dictionary of Catch Phrases, ed. Paul Beale (1985).
    13 person liked.
    		1 person did not like.
  • ''I am hungry to be interrupted
    For ever and ever amen
    O Person from Porlock come quickly
    And bring my thoughts to an end.''
    Stevie Smith (1902-1971), British poet, novelist. Thoughts about the Person from Porlock (l. 34-37). . . No Nature; New and Selected Poems [Gary Snyder]. (1992) Pantheon Books.
    3 person liked.
    		0 person did not like.
  • ''Coleridge received the Person from Porlock
    And ever after called him a curse,
    Then why did he hurry to let him in?
    He could have hid in the house.''
    Stevie Smith (1902-1971), British poet, novelist. Thoughts about the Person from Porlock (l. 1-4). . . No Nature; New and Selected Poems [Gary Snyder]. (1992) Pantheon Books.
    2 person liked.
    		0 person did not like.

Read more quotations »

I Do Not Speak

I do not ask for mercy for understanding for peace
And in these heavy days I do not ask for release
I do not ask that suffering shall cease.

I do not pray to God to let me die
To give an ear attentive to my cry
To pause in his marching and not hurry by.

I do not ask for anything I do not speak

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