106 notes

The body is the first writer of the poem. The mind is the caretaker who moves in to make order. Sometimes what the mind does to the poem is good. Sometimes, it’s too much. “I am an enemy of the mind,” writes Berryman, while Ginsberg insists that “mind is shapely.” With whatever trust or mistrust we have of it, the mind works the poem in a different way. But let’s be clear: intellects don’t write poems. While they’re wonderful to have, they are no substitute for the body’s senses of the world. Because the body is irrational, and the irrational is where discovery happens.

44 notes

And writer guys, we don’t get to have writers block. That’s like a chef sayin’ ‘I don’t feel like cookin’ them taters.’

566 notes

Everyone thinks writers must know more about the inside of the human head, but that is wrong. They know less, that’s why they write. Trying to find out what everyone else takes for granted.

258 notes

We can destroy what we have written, but we cannot unwrite it.

686 notes

Art is not only the desire to tell one’s secret; it is the desire to tell it and hide it at the same time.

807 notes

I’ve always been interested in people, but I’ve never liked them.

223 notes

I may not have been sure about what really did interest me, but I was absolutely sure about what didn’t.

185 notes

Put down everything that comes into your head and then you’re a writer. But an author is one who can judge his own stuff’s worth, without pity, and destroy most of it.

4 notes

You are someone and you have a right to your life.