No poet will ever take the written word as a substitute for the spoken word; he knows that it is on the spoken word, and the spoken word only, that his art is founded.
Lascelles Abercrombie

With several different kinds of poetry to choose from, a man would decide that he would like best to be an epic poet, and he would set out, in conscious determination, on an epic poem.
Lascelles Abercrombie

The epic poet has behind him a tradition of matter and a tradition of style; and that is what every other poet has behind him too; only, for the epic poet, tradition is rather narrower, rather more strictly compelling.
Lascelles Abercrombie

The epic poet collaborates with the spirit of his time in the composition of his work. That is, if he is successful; the time may refuse to work with him, but he may not refuse to work with his time.
Lascelles Abercrombie

The writer of prose can only step aside when the poet passes.
W. Somerset Maugham

I would love to be the poet laureate of Coney Island.
Thornton Wilder

Only the poet can look beyond the detail and see the whole picture.
Helen Hayes

I am very sure that any man of common understanding may, by culture, care, attention, and labor, make himself what- ever he pleases, except a great poet.
Lord Chesterfield

A poet looks at the world the way a man looks at a woman.
Wallace Stevens

The power of daring anything their fancy suggest, as always been conceded to the painter and the poet.
Horace

The philosopher proves that the philosopher exists. The poet merely enjoys existence.
Wallace Stevens

The poet is the priest of the invisible.
Wallace Stevens

Poetry is not an expression of the party line. It's that time of night, lying in bed, thinking what you really think, making the private world public, that's what the poet does.
Allen Ginsberg

A sculptor is a person who is interested in the shape of things, a poet in words, a musician by sounds.
Henry Moore

The eye is the notebook of the poet.
James Russell Lowell

I have never considered myself a poet. I have no interest in poetic artistry.
Muhammad Iqbal

Anyone can escape into sleep, we are all geniuses when we dream, the butcher's the poet's equal there.
Emile M. Cioran

I'd like people to remember me for a diligent expert workman. I think a poet is a workman. I think Shakespeare was a workman. And God's a workman. I don't think there's anything better than a workman.
Laurence Olivier

The player envies only the player, the poet envies only the poet.
William Hazlitt

And in a way, that's been a help to me, because I take great passions for a particular poet - sometimes it lasts for many years, sometimes only for a while. This happens to everybody.
Norman MacCaig