Ilya Kaminsky, "Letters", You Are Here: Poetry In The Natural World

The Average Fourth Grader Is a Better Poet Than You (and Me Too) by hannah gamble

Sometimes you climb out of bed in the morning and you think, I'm not going to make it, but you laugh inside — remembering all the times you've felt that way.

Charles Bukowski

Don’t ask for guarantees. And don’t look to be saved in any one thing, person, machine, or library. Do your own bit of saving, and if you drown, at least die knowing you were heading for shore.

Ray Bradbury, Farenheit 451 (via the-book-diaries)

Casablanca (1942), dir. Michael Curtiz

every epigraph in The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt

“To die is nothing; but it is terrible not to live.”

— Victor Hugo, Les Misérables

how do you sustain morale during a long project Lutheran guilt how do you sustain morale during a long project bourbon how do you sustain morale during a long project just smile how do you sustain morale during a long project pills can help

- Anne Carson, Wrong Norma

writer aesthetics

john keats: the lavender in sunsets, flowers in the rain, sunlight slipping through clouds, lazy summer afternoons, the heavy scent of musk, flickering candlelight reflecting off the gold titles of books, fireflies on a cool summer night, being wrapped in fresh bedsheets, the ache of wanting what you can never have, dripping sunlight like gold, loving someone so exquisite, soft lips and soft whispers, fingers through hair, names of lovers carved in trees, broken glass, the insistence of being perpetually dreamy

f. scott fitzgerald: mahogany wood, crisp winter skies with cold bright stars, the solitude of an early autumn morning wrapped in fog, empty bottles on stacks and stacks of books haphazardly placed in a messy room, pale bruised arms reaching out into the darkness, cigarette smoke just barely hiding the scent of alcohol, a wall of books all poetry and old and weathered, a bad thunderstorm occurring at the end of a beautiful day, the way tragedy strikes in your heart but ends up stopping your breathing for a moment,  your favorite sweater, parties spilling into four a.m. with the stars above spinning and dancing, the contrast of blood against snow, a purple split lip oozing blood, black eyes fading to blue to pale skin, the butterflies of falling in love for the first time, the statues falling apart over time in cemeteries, the romanticization of self-destruction

franz kafka: the weight of dread that sits heavily in your stomach when thinking about the future, decrepit houses cloaked in mystery from children telling stories of people who died there, the way not even light can escape a black hole, the rich smell of old books,  delicate veins in the wrist, ghosts filling lungs, shattered bones, raindrops on the tongue, rusting metal, nostalgia that aches, the way hope feels like a plastic bag over your head

h.p. lovecraft:  the anxiety felt when staring into an unknown cave, pouring rain and mud, a child’s fear of the dark, thinking so many questions about your existence as you stare at the vast expanse of never ending ocean,  the silence of three a.m.,  danse macabre by camille saint-saens playing on a record in an empty house, the possibility of aliens and the weird feeling it gives you that you can’t explain, unexplainable phenomena, strange lights in the sky in the dead of night, ouija boards and urban legends

jack kerouac: the brisk pine air of being on a mountain, travels without a destination, those nights where you’re missing three hours of memory, screaming to a lifeless desert about how you’re so alive, coffee shops late at night, car rides at night spent speeding and laughing in the dark, naps spent in the sun,  novels highlighted and underlined with notes and epiphanies in the margins, the way uncertainty sits on the shoulders, ignoring flaws and loving life, wind through hair, depression as fog in the brain, impossible ideals, a quiet sunrise, walks alone, when you think about trying to discover all the secrets to the universe, dazzling people, open lands stretching out into infinity, falling in love with being alive

edgar allan poe: the ocean’s horizon inseparable from fog, hollow bones, a preserved heart held in hands, twinkling stars above an old graveyard, the way everything turns to dust, silent black birds with eyes full of wisdom, self-inflicted flames, perfection depicted as a rotting corpse, death as bricks in the heart, lips barely brushing against each other, glassy glazed eyes, biting into a lemon,  heart-shaped bruises, rotting flowers on a grave, dried blood and spilled liquor, the hush of dusk when it begins raining, the intimacy of a secret