Stevie Smith
Stevie Smith
Florence Margaret Smith, known as Stevie Smithwas an English poet and novelist...
NationalityBritish
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth20 September 1902
cold drowning moaning
Oh, no no no, it was too cold always (Still the dead one lay moaning) I was much too far out all my life And not waving but drowning.
food knives vegetables
I like food, I like stripping vegetables of their skins, I like to have a slim young parsnip under my knife.
pain lying thinking
I love Death because he breaks the human pattern and frees us from pleasures too prolonged as well as from the pains of this world. It is pleasant, too, to remember that Death lies in our hands; he must come if we call him. ... I think if there were no death, life would be more than flesh and blood could bear ...
simplest
This is the simplest of all thoughts, that Death must come when we call, although he is a god.
thoughtful thinking hungry
I am hungry to be interrupted For ever and ever amen O Person from Porlock come quickly And bring my thoughts to an end.
beauty nature mean
As Nature is always careless and indifferent Who sees, who steps, means nothing and this is pretty.
house poetry ever-after
Coleridge received the Person from Porlock And ever after called him a curse, Then why did he hurry to let him in? He could have hid in the house.
may treacherous depends
Life may be treacherous, but you can always depend on death.
youth hours passing
Youth is an arithmetical statement of passing interest, each hour eats it up.
beauty humanity able
Cry pretty, pretty, pretty and you'll be able Very soon not even to cry pretty And so be delivered entirely from humanity This is prettiest of all, it is very pretty.
needs live-simply ifs
You must have some money if you are going to live simply. It need not be much, but you must have some.
strong nice bye
My friendships, they are a very strong part of my life, they are as light as gossamer but also they are as strong as steel. And I cannot throw them off, nor altogether do with them or without them. And I love them at the point where they say: It is nice to see you again. And I love them too at the point when they say: Good-bye, come again soon. The rhythm of friendship is a very good rhythm.
grief doors separation
Death's not a separation or alteration or parting; it's just a one-handled door.
death thinking goes-on
If there wasn't death, I think you couldn't go on.