T. S. Eliot
T. S. Eliot
Thomas Stearns Eliot OMwas an American-born British essayist, publisher, playwright, literary and social critic and "one of the twentieth century's major poets". He moved to England in 1914 at age 25, settling, working and marrying there. He was eventually naturalised as a British subject in 1927 at age 39, renouncing his American citizenship...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth26 September 1888
CountryUnited States of America
beyond clutch expert found seize substitute
Donne, I suppose, was such another / Who found no substitute for sense. / To seize and clutch and penetrate; / Expert beyond experience.
age awful daring prudence surrender
The awful daring of a moment's surrender which an age of prudence can never retract.
fare
Not fare well, / But fare forward, voyagers.
bald descend disturb indeed middle spot time turn
And indeed there will be time/ To wonder, "Do I dare?" and, "Do I dare?"/ Time to turn back and descend the stair,/ With a bald spot in the middle of my hair. . ./ Do I dare/ Disturb the universe?
air breaks descending dove flame
The dove descending breaks the air / With flame of incandescent terror.
genius talent stealing
Talent imitates, but genius steals.
world stills
...the still point in a turning world.
noise window should
We ask only to be reassured About the noises in the cellar And the window that should not have been open
rats jew
The rats are underneath the piles/ The Jew is underneath the lot.
golf people balls
Here were decent godless people; Their only monument the asphalt road And a thousand lost golf balls.
past quartets
The past and future / Are conquered, and reconciled.
hair pavement sunlight
Weave, weave the sunlight in your hair-
cat names profound
The name that no human research can discover-- But THE CAT HIMSELF KNOWS, and will never confess. When you notice a cat in profound meditation, The reason, I tell you, is always the same: His mind is engaged in a rapt contemplation Of the thought, of the thought, of the thought of his name: His ineffable effable Effanineffable Deep and inscrutable singular Name.
ambition men deception
Ambition fortifies the will of man to become ruler over other men: it operates with deception, cajolery, and violence, it is the action of impurity upon impurity.