Stephen Spender
Stephen Spender
Sir Stephen Harold Spender CBEwas an English poet, novelist and essayist who concentrated on themes of social injustice and the class struggle in his work. He was appointed the seventeenth Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the United States Library of Congress in 1965...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth28 February 1909
hope dust brightness
For I had expected always Some brightness to hold in trust, Some final innocence To save from dust
morning spring simple
What is precious is never to forget The delight of the blood drawn from ancient springs Breaking through rocks in worlds before our earth ; Never to deny its pleasure in the simple morning light, Nor its grave evening demand for love; Never to allow gradually the traffic to smother With noise and fog the flowering of the spirit.
justice criticism certain
There is a certain justice in criticism.
littles chaos rich
When you read and understand a poem, comprehending its rich and formal meanings, then you master chaos a little.
daughter father hands
Bright clasp of her whole hand around my finger My daughter as we walk together now. All my life I'll feel a ring invisibly Circle this bone with shining When she is grown.
civilization doe events
The only true hope for civilization-the conviction of the individual that his inner life can affect outward events and that, whether or not he does so he is responsible for them.
block religion church
Religion stands, the Church blocking the sun.
memories poetry genius
Memory exercised in a particular way is a natural gift of poetic genius. The poet above all else, is a person who never forgets certain sense impressions which he has experienced and which he can relive again as though with all their original freshness.
cutting poetry shaving
If Rilke cut himself shaving, he would bleed poetry.
dream horse children
When a child, my dreams rode on your wishes, I was your son, high on your horse, My mind a top whipped by the lashes Of your rhetoric, windy of course.
imagination imagine knows
All that you can imagine you already know.
clouds soul despair
Paint here no draped despairs, no saddening clouds Where the soul rests, proclaims eternity. But let the wrong cry out as raw as wounds This Time forgets and never heals, far less transcends.
light years feet
Since we are what we are, what shall we be But what we are? We are, we have Six feet and seventy years, to see The light , and then resign it for the grave .
light killers
Death to the killers, bringing light to life.