Tradition: How The Vitality Of The Past

One Of The Surest Tests Of The Superiority Or Inferiority Of A Poet Is The Way In Which A Poet Borrows. Immature Poets Imitate Mature Poets Steal Bad Poets Deface What They Take And Good Poets Make It Into Something Better Or At Least Something Different. The Good Poet Welds His Theft Into A Whole Of Feeling Which Is Unique Utterly Different Than That From Which It Is Torn The Bad Poet Throws It Into Something Which Has No Cohesion. A Good Poet Will Usually Borrow From Authors Remote In Time Or Alien In Language Or Diverse In Interest.

To Justify Christian Morality Because It Provides A Foundation Of Morality, Instead Of Showing The Necessity Of Christian Morality From The Truth Of Christianity, Is A Very Dangerous Inversion.

Taking The Question In General, I Should Say, In The Case Of Many Poets, That The Most Important Thing For Them To Do ... Is To Write As Little As Possible

Now That The Lilacs Are In Bloom She Has A Bowl Of Lilacs In Her Room

That Is The Worst Moment, When You Feel You Have Lost / The Desires For All That Was Most Desirable, / Before You Are Contented With What You Can Desire; / Before You Know What Is Left To Be Desired; / And You Go On Wishing That You Could Desire / What Desire Has Left Behind.