Diane Ackerman
Diane Ackerman
Diane Ackermanis an American poet, essayist, and naturalist known for her wide-ranging curiosity and poetic explorations of the natural world...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth7 October 1948
CountryUnited States of America
unraveling fabric intimate
We evolved as creatures knitted into the fabric of nature, and without its intimate truths, we can find ourselves unraveling.
ideas fool well-dressed
There are well-dressed foolish ideas just as there are well-dressed fools.
mistake mean talent
Our relationship with nature has changed radically, irreversibly, but by no means all for the bad. Our new epoch is laced with invention. Our mistakes are legion, but our talent is immeasurable.
inspirational prayer vacation
There is a way of beholding nature which is a form of prayer, a way of minding something with such clarity and aliveness that the rest of the world recedes. It . . . gives the brain a small vacation.
art self people
A self is a frightening thing to waste, it's the lens through which one's whole life is viewed, and few people are willing to part with it, in death, or even imaginatively, in art.
wind white goes-on
There's no place you can go on the prairie that you don't hear the white noise of the wind, steady and rough as surf curling along a non-existant shore.
unique weekend astonishment
There is that unique moment when one confronts something new and astonishment begins.
ideas space flying
Flying has changed how we imagine our planet, which we have seen whole from space, so that even the farthest nations are ecological neighbors. It has changed our ideas about time. When you can gird the earth at 1,000 m.p.h., how can you endure the tardiness of a plumber? Most of all, flying has changed our sense of our body, the personal space in which we live, now elastic and swift. I could be in Bombay for afternoon tea if I wished. My body isn't limited by its own weaknesses; it can rush through space.
successful environment all-time
Humans are the most successful invasives of all time.
shopping eugenics tree
We're dabbling in eugenics all the time, breeding ideal crops to replace less aesthetic or nutritious or hardy varieties; leveling forests to graze cattle or erect shopping malls and condos; planting groves of a few familiar trees that homeowners and industries prefer.
dust house trying
We try to exile ourselves more and more from nature - not always consciously: We build houses; we dismiss nature; nature has to be outside, because we're inside. God forbid something like a cockroach comes inside, or some dust.
memories smell vision
Hit a tripwire of smell and memories explode all at once. A complex vision leaps out of the undergrowth.
lonely zoos animal
What a lonely species we are, searching for signals of life from other galaxies, adopting companion animals, visiting parks and zoos to commune with other beasts. In the process, we discover our shared identity.
sweet unrest logic
The daftest logic brings such sweet unrest.