T. S. Eliot
T. S. Eliot
Thomas Stearns Eliot OMwas an American-born British essayist, publisher, playwright, literary and social critic and "one of the twentieth century's major poets". He moved to England in 1914 at age 25, settling, working and marrying there. He was eventually naturalised as a British subject in 1927 at age 39, renouncing his American citizenship...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth26 September 1888
CountryUnited States of America
ignorance ideas silence
The endless cycle of idea and action, / Endless invention, endless experiment, / Brings knowledge of motion, but not of stillness; / Knowledge of speech, but not of silence; / Knowledge of words, and ignorance of The Word.
moving silence speech
Words move, music moves Only in time; but that which is only living Can only die. Words, after speech, reach Into the silence. Only by the form, the pattern, Can words or music reach The stillness...
light people silence
If the lost word is lost, if the spent word is spent If the unheard, unspoken Word is unspoken, unheard; Still is the spoken word, the Word unheard, The Word without a word, the Word within The world and for the world; And the light shone in the darkness and Against the Word the unstilled world still whirled About the center of the silent Word. Oh my people, what have I done unto thee. Where shall the word be found, where shall the word Resound? Not here, there is not enough silence
past silence would-be
At the still point of the turning world. Neither flesh nor fleshless; Neither from nor towards; at the still point, there the dance is, But neither arrest nor movement. And do not all it fixity, Where past and future are gathered. Neither movement from nor towards, Neither ascent nor decline. Except for the point, the still point, There would be no dance, and there is only the dance.
silence enough found
Where shall the word be found, where will the word / Resound? Not here, there is not enough silence.
book writing silence
And they write innumerable books; being too vain and distracted for silence: seeking every one after his own elevation, and dodging his emptiness.
heart silence want
If we really want to pray we must first learn to listen, for in the silence of the heart God speaks.
questions steel surgeon wounded
The wounded surgeon plies the steel / That questions the distempered part.
edge river sea within
The river is within us, the sea is all about us; The sea is the land's edge also
beyond communication dead death fire language speech
And what the dead had no speech for, when living, they can tell you, being dead: the communication of the dead is tongued with fire beyond the language of the living.
further
And we must think no further of you.
birth hour pray
Pray for us now and at the hour of our birth.
entertainment joke listen lonesome medium millions people permits radio remain
Radio is a medium of entertainment which permits millions of people to listen to the same joke at the same time, and yet remain lonesome
bright daughter feet moon mrs porter soda wash
O the moon shone bright on Mrs Porter / And on her daughter / They wash their feet in soda water.