Poetry Quote by Adrienne Rich — Inspiring Words on Life, Love & Wisdom

“We are not supposed to go down into the darkness of the core. Yet, if we can risk it, the something born of that nothing is the beginning of truth.”

“[Poetry] is the liquid voice that can wear through stone.”

“Truthfulness, honor, is not something which springs ablaze of itself; it has to be created between people. This is true in political situations. The quality and depth of the politics evolving from a group depends in large part on their understanding of honor. Much of what is narrowly termed "politics" seems to rest on a longing for certainty even at the cost of honesty, for an analysis which, once given, need not be re-examined…It isn't that to have an honorable relationship with you, I have to understand everything, or tell you everything at once, or that I can know, beforehand, everything I need to tell you. It means that most of the time I am eager, longing for the possibility of telling you. That these possibilities may seem frightening, but not destructive to me. That I feel strong enough to hear your tentative and groping words. That we both know we are trying, all the time, to extend the possibilities of truth between us.”

“I touch you knowing we weren't born tomorrow,”

“I choose to love this time for once”

“Night”

“the only thing”

“And if the world has ceased to hear you,”

“I carry your heart with me (I carry it in my heart)I am never without it (anywhere”

“A book of verses underneath the bough”

“If we surrendered”