81 Quotes by John Ciardi

Hell is the denial of the ordinary...

The day will happen whether or not you get up.

Intelligence recognizes what has happened. Genius recognizes what will happen.

The classroom should be an entrance into the world, not an escape from it.

Nothing goes further toward a man's liberation than the act of surviving his need for character.

You don't have to suffer to be a poet; adolescence is enough suffering for anyone.

A good question is never answered. It is not a bolt to be tightened into place but a seed to be planted and to bear more seed toward the hope of greening the landscape of idea.

Every parent is at some time the father of the unreturned prodigal, with nothing to do but keep his house open to hope.

Love is the word used to label the sexual excitement of the young, the habituation of the middle-aged, and the mutual dependence of the old.