"A poem might begin for me from a rhythmical phrase without words but with an an emotional / tonal pitch or colour which will announce itself.Other times I' ll just become obsessed by something..hoping that eventually it will speak to me in English."

Jan Zwicky Literature See all quotes by Jan Zwicky →

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“Lyric poetry is a kind of poetry that's literally musical.”

“In my poetry, I am just as influenced by musicians or composers. As I am by people who create with words.”

“Other times I am pestered by a recurrent visual image and this image will resonate with some tone-rhythm pattern , only after that does language start to come.”

“Art is not merely a decorative enhancement of our lives but a sign of our desire to live in the world fully and honestly.”

“When I write I am attempting to do justice to something I have glimpsed about the world.”

“In the moment of creating I am aware neither of myself nor of others.”

Resonant Thoughts

"If beings are grasped as will to power, the “should” which is supposed to hang suspended over them, against which they might be measured, becomes superfluous. If life itself is will to power, it is it…"

— Martin Heidegger

Philosophy1889–1976

#power

"The desire of Whites to occupy Indian lands, and the constant rivalry between French and English traders for furs gathered by the Indians, led to many skirmishes and several bloody wars, all of which …"

— Peter Farb

Science1929–1980

#war

"When one merely states that one has many subscribers and keeps on saying it, then one gets many; just as when one sheep goes to water, the next one also goes, and when it is continually said of a larg…"

— Søren Kierkegaard

Philosophy1813–1855

#justice

"Magic has been confounded too long with the jugglery of mountebanks, the hallucinations of disordered minds and the crimes of certain unusual malefactors. There are otherwise many who would promptly e…"

— Eliphas Levi

Religion1810–1875

#justice