Environmental Poetry Quotes

Butterflies and moths
to the flame
--- and we are the flame ~ Christina M. Ward

You may be able
to fly to heaven with my love.
But for real, my love is only
a cheap wine.
Seriously,
Only God's love is the precious wine.
And She even
gives it to everyone.
For free! ~ Subhan Zein

From what the moderns want, we must learn what poetry should become; from what the ancients did, what poetry must be. ~ Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel

In poetry we pare down our thoughts into their most graceful shapes, like minimalist sculptures. ~ Patricia Robin Woodruff

If breath is as close as I can get,
tomorrow, I'll become the wind
just to be with you again. ~ Frederick Espiritu

Just as we don't spend a lot of time worrying about how all those poets out there are going to monetize their poetry, the same is true for most bloggers. ~ Seth Godin

Something bad happened on both Mars with its dried-up watercourses and Venus with its runaway greenhouse effect. Could something bad happen on Earth too? Our species currently turns row upon row of environmental knobs, without much regard to long-term consequences. ~ Neil DeGrasse Tyson

The core of the ecological imbalance and global warming is the exploitation mindset. Nature is not for exploitation but exploration for better living, coexistence, co-caring, and co-growing. ~ Amit Ray

Come with me
And you will find
What's been trapped
Inside my mind... ~ K.B. Lewis

The first song I wrote and had published was titled "Just As Long As That Someone Is You". It was written in 1959, and recorded in 1965 by Jimmy Ellege. I started writing songs because I wanted something of my own to sing. I, at that time, was not aware that the songs I heard on the radio were not written by the folks singing them. I had always loved poetry, and found it easy to integrate a melody with poetry. ~ Mickey Newbury

It is our fate to give ourselves most lavishly
to those who'd rather not be burdened with the gift ~ Rodney Hall

A thousand times over with you,
I yearned to linger in a perfect moment
and stop the passing of time.

A thousand times over with you,
I caught your tender smile and tucked it
carefully away in my heart for safekeeping.

A thousand times over with you,
I took in your sunny gaze and
hoarded its light for the wintry season.

A thousand times over with you,
I heard your laughter and sat silent
as it vibrated like music in my soul.

A thousand times over with you,
I saw your eyes twinkle like stars,
and I made a wish for forever.

A thousand times over with you,
I noted wisdom in your years,
and I filed away your thoughtful words.

A thousand times over with you,
I felt the warmth of your hand in mine
and squeezed tight, reluctant to let go.

A thousand times over with you,
I pondered how quickly mortality ushers us
from sunrise to sunset, and I dreaded the night.

A thousand times over with you,
I embraced the promise of immortality,
dreaming of a day when perfect moments
linger pleasantly on and on and on
a thousand times over with you. ~ Richelle E. Goodrich

There's a psychologist called Mary & Diamond who at Brooklyn in California, in the 80s studied rats. And they took rats at different ages. Newborns, some of whom they deliberately brain damaged, adult, middle-aged, elderly rats. And they exposed these rats to different levels of environmental stimulation, better food, more playmates, toys to play with and so on.

They found out a couple of months later that the rats, at any age, including the brain-damaged rats, who had the better stimulation, they were smarter. But in the autopsy then they also found that in the front part of their brain they had larger nerve-cells with more connections with other nerve-cells and richer blood supply. In other words that environmental stimulation actually caused a change in the state of the brain, even in the older rats.

And that's called neuroplasticity. The capacity of the brain to develop new circuits. So whether it comes to ADHD, addiction, depression or other childhood disorders or any other issue with adults as well, if we recognize them not as ingrained, genetically-determined diseases, but as problems of development, then the question becomes very different. Then the question becomes not just "how do we treat the symptoms?" (and addiction itself is a symptom, depression is a symptom), but "how do we help people develop out of these conditions?"

In other words, it is not a medical question, purely, but a developmental question. And development always ~ Gabor Mate

Come on up, boys
-I'm dead. ~ Dylan Thomas

More people write poetry than read it. ~ George Carlin

Science has succeeded to poetry, no less in the little walks of children than with men. Is there no possibility of averting this sore evil? ~ Charles Lamb

As flames do work and wind when they ascend,
So did I weave myself into the sense. ~ George Herbert

On a small table beside his chair were other haphazardly stacked volumes by such poets as Emerson, Whitman, and Wallace Stevens, a dangerous crew to let into your head. ~ Dean Koontz

There's a poetry to it, engineer's poetry ... it suggests Haverie - average, you know - certainly you have two lobes, don't you, symmetrical about the rocket's intended azimuth ... hauen, too-smashing someone with a hoe or a club ... off on a voyage of his own here, smiling at no one in particular, bringing in the popular wartime expression ab-hauen, quarterstaff technique, peasant humor, phallic comedy dating back to the ancient Greeks ... Slothrop's first impulse is to get back to what that Plas is into, but something about the man, despite obvious membership in the plot, keeps him listening ... an innocence, maybe a try at being friendly in the only way he has available, sharing what engages and runs him, a love for the Word. ~ Thomas Pynchon

The religious environmental movement is potentially key to dealing with the greatest problem humans have ever faced, and it has never been captured with more breadth and force than in RENEWAL. I hope this movie is screened in church basements and synagogue social halls across the country, and that it moves many more people of faith off the fence and into action. ~ Bill McKibben

Poetry ~~ No definition of poetry is adequate unless it be poetry itself. The most accurate analysis by the rarest wisdom is yet insufficient, and the poet will instantly prove it false by setting aside its requistions. It is indeed all that we do not know. The poet does not need to see how meadows are something else than earth, grass, and water, but how they are thus much. He does not need discover that potato blows are as beautiful as violets, as the farmer thinks, but only how good potato blows are. The poem is drawn out from under the feet of the poet, his whole weight has rested on this ground. It has a logic more severe than the logician's. You might as well think to go in pursuit of the rainbow, and embrace it on the next hill, as to embrace the whole of poetry even in thought. ~ Henry David Thoreau

If we don't continue to pursue alternative, emissions-free energy sources like nuclear fuel, we are at risk of increasing our dependence on costly natural gas. ~ Judy Biggert

The peace and beauty of it all, before I can fly, I learn how to crawl. Mentally rich so space jam is where I take my lessons to ball. Failures of life? Haa, angels surround me as if I'm never destined to fall, It's destined for all, tap into conscious mind is what makes me so raw. ~ Jose R. Coronado

I. Those of us born by water are never afraid enough of drowning. Bruises used to trophy my knees from my death-defying tree climb jumps. Growing up, my backyard was a forest of blackberry bushes. I learned early nothing sweet will come to you unthorned.

II. At twelve your body becomes a currency. So Jenny and I sat down and cut up all our clothes into nothing. That year I failed math class but knew the exact number of calories in a carrot stick. I learned early being desired goes hand in hand with hunger.

III. The last time I tried to scream I felt my father climbing up through my throat and into my mouth.

IV. There is a certain kind of girl who reads Lolita at fourteen and finds religion. I painted my eyes black and sucked barroom cherries to red my tongue. There was a boy who promised Judas really did love Jesus. I learned early every kiss and betrayal are up for interpretation.

V. I think he must have conferenced with my nightmares on exactly how to hurt me.

VI. He never broke my heart. He only turned it into a compass that always points me back to him. ~ Clementine Von Radics

A schoolgirl forbidden from school is like a bird forbidden from the sky. ~ J.L. Harlow,"Malala Yousafzai"

I write poems about relationships, love relationships, and I'm not able to do that all the time. I could go two years without writing poems, and then write a dozen. Having a novel to work on, with the intricate puzzle of character and plot to work out, is satisfying for the time there is no poetry. ~ May Sarton

In the distance, a Benz motor sounds. A neon light wraps itself around the driver and the winter that beats in his heart. His heart stays cold. stays melting. ~ Gwen Calvo

Don't trust the heart, it wants your blood. ~ Stanislaw Jerzy Lec

I asked him for it.
For the blood, for the rust,
for the sin.
I didn't want the pearls other girls talked about,
or the fine marble of palaces,
or even the roses in the mouth of servants.
I wanted pomegranates -
I wanted darkness,
I wanted him.
So I grabbed my king and ran away
to a land of death,
where I reigned and people whispered
that I'd been dragged.
I'll tell you I've changed. I'll tell you,
the red on my lips isn't wine.
I hope you've heard of horns,
but that isn't half of it. Out of an entire kingdom
he kneels only to me,
calls me Queen, calls me Mercy.
Mama, Mama, I hope you get this.
Know the bed is warm and our hearts are cold,
know never have I been better
than when I am here.
Do not send flowers,
we'll throw them in the river.
'Flowers are for the dead', 'least that's what
the mortals say.
I'll come back when he bores me,
but Mama,
not today. ~ Daniella Michalleni

The stars will live for me, if not anything else ~ Munia Khan

there are no angels
brighter than dawn ~ Eugene Warren

Through and through the inspired leaves,
Ye maggots, make your windings;
But, oh! respect his lordship's taste,
And spare his golden bindings. ~ Robert Burns

Once government's objectives were economic growth and social cohesion. Now they are prosperity, fairness and environmental care ~ Gordon Brown

From remote and sparsely populated Vermont, Indiana seemed hopeless; a collection of turtle-shooting subliterates--people opposed to evolution, pluralism, and poetry.

And yet. Those leaves. ~ Brian Kimberling

Sometimes we need a wise guide to peel back the ceiling of our lives to remind us that infinity never places any limits on our skies. ~ Curtis Tyrone Jones

I often wonder and imagine
What lies just beyond the fringe
Of the human experience;
What is it that we do not see? ~ Justin Wetch

Again, we can see the importance of imaginal practices such as journals, dream work, poetry, painting, and therapy aimed at exploring images in dream and life. These methods keep us actively engaged in the mythologies that are the stuff of our own lives. The ~ Thomas Moore

We don't need every dream to come true -
sometimes we just need to dream them for a while. ~ Atticus Poetry

Whoever can endure unmixed delight, whoever can tolerate music and painting and poetry all in one, whoever wishes to be rid of thought and to let the busy anvils of the brain be silent for a time, let him read in the "Faery Queen." ~ James Russell Lowell

Put your mouthful of words away
and come with me to watch
the lilies open in such a field,
growing there like yachts,
slowly steering their petals
without nurses or clocks. ~ Anne Sexton

EVERYTHING
WE
LOVE
IS
WELL
ARRANGED
DUST.

- ATTICUS ~ Atticus Poetry

I love Sylvia Plath and Anne Sexton. I also love more cerebral poets like H.D. and Emily Dickinson. My parents subscribed to a monthly poetry periodical, and as a teenager I was introduced to Denise Levertov, who was an influence. ~ Francesca Lia Block

Imagine what you are writing about. See it and live it. Do not think it up laboriously, as if you were working out mental arithmetic. Just look at it, touch it, smell it, listen to it, turn yourself into it. When you do this, the words look after themselves, like magic. ~ Ted Hughes

Maybe all pain in the world requires poetry. ~ Sandra Cisneros

In that flash of ecstasy she suddenly knew what all poetry, all music, all sculpture, except things like winged Assyrian Bulls, or the very broken pieces in the British museum, meant. ~ Angela Thirkell

He took my hand, and pulled me into his living room where a book was open on his sofa. It was poetry, of course, because he was perfect. ~ Cora Carmack

People who write poetry while walking their dog can't possibly write poetry i'd be fucking interested in ~ Martijn Benders

The soundtrack in the poetry is the soundtrack from your own heartbeat. ~ Russell Simmons

Poetry's task is to increase the available stock of reality, R P Blackmur said. ~ Jane Hirshfield

I want to be a poet, from head to toe, living and dying by poetry. ~ Federico Garcia Lorca