Carl Sandburg Quotes

"Revolt and terror pay a price,/ Order and law have a cost."

"Poetry is an echo, asking a shadow to dance."

"Poetry is the synthesis of hyacinths and biscuits."

"Time is the coin of your life. It is the only coin you have, and only you can determine how it will be spent. Be careful lest you let other people spend it for you."

"Anger is the most impotent of passions. It effects nothing it goes about, and hurts the one who is possessed by it more than the one against whom it is directed."

"I feel like I'm drowning. Every night, I'm carrying home loads of things to read but I'm too exhausted. I keep clipping things and Xeroxing them and planning to read them eventually, but I just end up throwing it all away and feeling guilty."

"The secret of happiness is to admire without desiring."

"Ordering a man to write a poem is like commanding a pregnant woman to give birth to a red-headed child."

"Men of ideas vanish first when freedom vanishes."

"If America forgets where she came from, if the people lose sight of what brought them along, if she listens to the deniers and mockers, then will begin the rot and dissolution."

"To be a good loser is to learn how to win."

"I've written some poetry I don't understand myself."

"Poetry is a phantom script telling how rainbows are made and why they go away."

"Nothing happens unless first a dream."

"I'll die propped up in bed trying to do a poem about America."

"One of the greatest necessities in America is to discover creative solitude"

"And how should a beautiful, ignorant stream of water know it heads for an early release - out across the desert, running toward the Gulf, below sea level, to murmur its lullaby, and see the Imperial Valley rise out of burning sand with cotton blossoms, wheat, watermelons, roses, how should it know?"

"Let the gentle bush dig its root deep and spread upward to split the boulder."

"In these times you have to be an optimist to open your eyes when you awake in the morning."

"I never made a mistake in grammar but one in my life and as soon as I done it I seen it."