Quotes by John Ashbery

It is the lumps and trialsThat tell us whether we shall be knownAnd whether our fate can be exemplary, like a star.

You bad birds,But God shall not punish you, youShall be with us in heaven, though lessConscious of your happiness, perhaps, than we.Hell is a not quite satisfactory heaven, probably,But you are the fruit and jewelsOf my arrangement . . .

The summer demands and takes away too much. /But night, the reserved, the reticent, gives more than it takes

I tried each thing, only some were immortal and free.

The poem is sad because it wants to be yours, and cannot be.

There is the view that poetry should improve your life. I think people confuse it with the Salvation Army.

I dont look on poetry as closed works. I feel theyre going on all the time in my head and I occasionally snip off a length.

“Things can harden meaningfully in the moment of indecision”

“The first year was like icing. Then the cake started to show through …”