"I am two fools, I know, for loving, and for saying so in whining poetry"
- John Donne
About this Quote
John Donne's quote is a reflection on the foolishness of love and the foolishness of expressing it in poetry. He acknowledges that he is silly for caring somebody and for revealing his love in a "whining" way. This could mean that he is revealing his love in such a way that is extremely sentimental or melodramatic. He is aware that his love is foolish and that his expression of it is absurd, however he is unable to help himself. This quote talks to the power of love and how it can make us do things that we know are foolish. It likewise talks to the power of poetry and how it can be used to express our deepest feelings. Regardless of knowing that his love and his expression of it are foolish, John Donne is still willing to take the risk and reveal his love in a poetic method.
"We don't attempt to have any theme for a number of the anthology, or to have any particular sequence. We just put in things that we like, and then we try to alternate the prose and the poetry"
"Concrete poets continue to turn out beautiful things, but to me they're more visual than oral, and they almost really belong on the wall rather than in a book. I haven't the least idea of where poetry is going"
"I think Ginsberg has done more harm to the craft that I honor and live by than anybody else by reducing it to a kind of mean that enables the most dubious practitioners to claim they are poets because they think, If the kind of thing Ginsberg does is poetry, I can do that"
