287 Quotes by Edward Hirsch

There are a lot of poems where I am questing for God. I don't think there is any finding of God.

But, the best times I have found, in my life, are late at night or early in the morning and I think it's because you're outside the social realm.

When poetry separates from song, then the words have to carry all the rhythm themselves; they have to do all the work. They can't rely on the singing voice.

You're alone with yourself and your own feelings and that gives you deeper access to what you need to get in touch with to write poetry.

When I was young, I wrote everything, and I thought I would be an all around writer, that I would write everything.

Now, the process of writing poetry is very messy. Not systematic, never quite the same

There have always been great defenses of poetry, and I've tried to write mine, and I think all of my work and criticism is a defense of poetry to try and keep something alive in poetry.

Sometimes I have a feeling that I just can't get rid of. Sometimes there's an experience that I want to write about that I have to get off my chest. Sometimes there are some words that appeal to you.

There's something really unnatural about losing a child, and there's something unnatural about having to write an elegy for your child, but I felt that I wanted people to know what he was like.