Quotes by Carl Sandburg

“Life is like an onion: you peel it off one layer at a time, and sometimes you weep”

“The secret of happiness is to admire without desiring.”

“I wont take my religion from any man who never works except with his mouth.”

“Poetry is a packsack of invisible keepsakes.”

“The moon is a friend for the lonesome to talk to”

“Let a joy keep you. Reach out your hands and take it when it runs by.”

“A book is never a masterpiece: it becomes one. Genius is the talent of a dead man.”

“I am an idealist. I dont know where Im going but Im on my way.”

“A baby is Gods opinion that life should go on. Never will a time come when the most marvelous recent invention is as marvelous as a newborn baby. The finest of our precision watches, the most super-colossal of our supercargo planes dont compare with a newborn baby in the number and ingenuity of coils and springs, in the flow and change of chemical solutions, in timing devises and interrelated parts that are irreplaceable.”

“Poetry is the synthesis of hyacinths and biscuits.”

“Poetry is the journal of a sea animal living on land, wanting to fly in the air”

“If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry.”

“Poetry is to prose as dancing is to walking”

“Poetry is an orphan of silence. The words never quite equal the experience behind them.”

“Poetry is the opening and closing of a door, leaving those who look through to guess about what is seen during a moment”

“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?”

“Arithmetic is where the answer is right and everything is nice and you can look out of the window and see the blue sky - or the answer is wrong and you have to start over and try again and see how it comes out this time.”

“(Chicago) Hog Butcher for the World, Tool Maker, Stacker of Wheat, Player with Railroads and the Nations Freight Handler; Stormy, husky, brawling, City of the Big Shoulders”

“A man may be born, but in order to be born he must first die, and in order to die he must first awake.”