Rhyme, that enslaved queen, that supreme charm of our poetry, that creator of our meter.

Racism is a much more clandestine, much more hidden kind of phenomenon, but at the same time it's perhaps far more terrible than it's ever been.

All satire is blind to the forces liberated by decay. Which is why total decay has absorbed the forces of satire.

Being unwanted, unloved, uncared for, forgotten by everybody, I think that is a much greater hunger, a much greater poverty than the person who has nothing to eat.

In the United States today, we have more than our share of the nattering nabobs of negativism.

Society is now one polished horde, Formed of two mighty tribes, The Bores and the Bored.

It seldom happens that any felicity comes so pure as not to be tempered and allayed by some mixture of sorrow.

Delay always breeds danger. To protract a great design is often to ruin it.

I can bear any pain as long as it has meaning.

A great city is the place to escape the true drama of provincial life, and find solace in fantasy.

You don't have to be the Dalai Lama to tell people that life's about change.

I love children, especially when they cry, for then someone takes them away.

There is the view that poetry should improve your life. I think people confuse it with the Salvation Army.

A mediocre idea that generates enthusiasm will go further than a great idea that inspires no one.

Children show me in their playful smiles the divine in everyone.

Maybe, just once, someone will call me 'Sir' without adding, 'You're making a scene.'

How vain it is to sit down to write when you have not stood up to live.

Charity ... is the opium of the privileged.

Many have had their greatness made for them by their enemies.

If a little is great, and a lot is better, then way too much is just about right!

To the young people I say, you are a gift to your communities and indeed the world. You are our hope and our future.