All Quotes by Carol Ann Duffy
“The bed we loved in was a spinning world”
“Words, words were truly alive on the tongue, in the head, warm, beating, frantic, winged; music and blood.”
“Somewhere on the other side of this wide nightThe room is turning slowly away from the moon.”
“Not a red rose or a satin heart.I am trying to be truthful.”
“Here.a wobbling photo of grief.”
“Light gatherer. You fell from a staryou squeal at and fly in.”
“I cannot say where you are. Unreachablein the air, even if souls are stars.”
“As anyone who has the slightest knowledge of my work knows, I have little in common with Larkin, who was tall, taciturn and thin-on-top, and unlike him I laugh, nay, sneer, in the face of death. I will concede one point: we are both lesbian poets.”
“I grew up in a bookless house - my parents didn't read poetry, so if I hadn't had the chance to experience it at school I'd never have experienced it. But I loved English, and I was very lucky in that I had inspirational English teachers, Miss Scriven and Mr. Walker, and they liked us to learn poems by heart, which I found I loved doing.”
“What do I havethe death of love?”
“When you have a child, your previous life seems like someone else's. It's like living in a house and suddenly finding a room you didn't know was there, full of treasure and light.”
“There'll be what you might call a moment of inspiration – a way of seeing or feeling or remembering, an instance or a person that's made a large impression. Like the sand and the oyster, it's a creative irritant. In each poem, I'm trying to reveal a truth, so it can't have a fictional beginning”
“Six hours like this for a few francs.at such an image of a river-whore. They call it Art.”
“This is the word tightrope. Now imagineThe word applause is written all over him.”
“One saw I was alive. Loosenedthis from acts of torture now. They shot her in the eye.”
“The moment of inspiration can come from memory, or language, or the imagination, or experience - anything that makes an impression forcibly enough for language to form.”
“I grew up in a bookless house - my parents didn't read poetry, so if I hadn't had the chance to experience it at school I'd never have experienced it. But I loved English, and I was very lucky in that I had inspirational English teachers, Miss Scriven and Mr. Walker, and they liked us to learn poems by heart, which I found I loved doing.”
“bees are the batteries of orchards, gardens, guard them.”
“Christmas is taken very seriously in this household. I believe in Father Christmas, and there's no way I'd do anything to undermine that belief.”
“If I felt, in the event of a royal wedding, inspired to write about people coming together in marriage or civil partnership, I would just be grateful to have an idea for the poem. And if I didn't, I'd ignore it.”