Stanley Kunitz
Stanley Kunitz
Stanley Jasspon Kunitzwas an American poet. He was appointed Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress twice, first in 1974 and then again in 2000...
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth29 July 1905
CityWorcester, MA
dream art writing
I want to write poems that are natural, luminous, deep, spare. I dream of an art so transparent that you can look through and see the world.
summer writing thinking
I dropped my hoe and ran into the house and started to write this poem, 'End of Summer.’ It began as a celebration of wild geese. Eventually the geese flew out of the poem, but I like to think they left behind the sound of their beating wings.
writing ears pages
...few young poets [are] testing their poems against the ear. They're writing for the page, and the page, let me tell you, is a cold bed.
writing tasks firsts
The first task of the poet is to create the person who will write the poems.
writing mind ears
The ear writes my poems, not the mind.
writing poetry today
Poetry today is easier to write but harder to remember.
writing ends
End with an image and don't explain.
american-poet bottom heroes represent sleeping waiting wisdom
Old myths, old gods, old heroes have never died. They are only sleeping at the bottom of our mind, waiting for our call. We have need for them. They represent the wisdom of our race.
dart eyes single sound sudden
A single glance: a sudden dart of painstitching her eyes before she made a sound . . .
begins life scarcely till wait
I can scarcely wait till tomorrowwhen a new life begins for me,as it does each day,as it does each way.
needs alive awareness
A poet needs to keep his wilderness alive inside him. To remain a poet after forty requires an awareness of your darkest Africa, that part of yourself that will never be tamed.
art morality endure
The supreme morality of art is to endure.
suicide sweet art
Writer's block is a natural affliction. Writers who have never experienced it have something wrong with them. It means there isn't enough friction-that they aren't making enough of an effort to reconcile the contradictions of life. All you get is sweet monotonous flow. Writer's block is nothing to commit suicide over. It simply indicates some imbalance between your experience and your art, and I think that's constructive.
men who-i-am remember
Darling, do you remember the man you married? Touch me, remind me who I am.