Michael Schmidt (poet) Quotes (1947-)

“A living poem can energise another poem at five hundred years distance, or across the other side of the world.”

“Poetry is a collaborative art, and yet—as it is being created—the most solitary and 'individual' of activities.”

“The reader does not need a technical vocabulary to read poetry, only a voice in the head or out loud which can deliver the sounds.”

“What matters in poetry is form, how words work together, the sounds and silences their combinations make. The ordered effects they produce on the attentive hearer.”

“Prose and poetry are different in construction. You can lie back and read prose, and you can read it fast. Poetry on the other hand, requires a different kind of attention and concentration … the effect it has on the ear and the imagination.”