Anne Sexton citations

“Live or die, but don't poison everything.”

“Sometimes the soul takes pictures of things it has wished for, but never seen.”

“It doesn't matter who my father was; it matters who I remember he was.”

“All I wanted was a little piece of life, to be married, to have children…. I was trying my damnedest to lead a conventional life, for that was how I was brought up, and it was what my husband wanted of me. But one can't build little white picket fences to keep the nightmares out.”

“Perhaps I am no one.
True, I have a body
and I cannot escape from it.
I would like to fly out of my head,
but that is out of the question.”

“She is so naked and singular
She is the sum of yourself and your dream.
Climb her like a monument, step after step.
She is solid.
As for me, I am a watercolor.
I wash off.

(For My Lover, Returning To His Wife)”

“Watch out for intellect,
because it knows so much it knows nothing
and leaves you hanging upside down,
mouthing knowledge as your heart
falls out of your mouth.”

“God has a brown voice, as soft and full as beer.”

“I am a collection of dismantled almosts.”

“Only my books anoint me,
and a few friends,
those who reach into my veins.”

“I know that I have died before—once in November.”

“As it has been said:
Love and a cough
cannot be concealed.
Even a small cough.
Even a small love.”

“Put your ear down close to your soul and listen hard.”

“As for me, I am a watercolor.
I wash off.”

“I am stuffing your mouth with your
promises and watching
you vomit them out upon my face.”

“Even so, I must admire your skill.
You are so gracefully insane.”

“I like you; your eyes are full of language."

[Letter to Anne Clarke, July 3, 1964. ]”

“Everyone in me is a bird
I am beating all my wings”

“I’m lost. And it’s my own fault. It’s about time I figured out that I can’t ask people to keep me found.”

“The joy that isn't shared dies young.”

“All day I've built
a lifetime and now
the sun sinks to
undo it.”

“Depression is boring, I think
and I would do better to make
some soup and light up the cave.”

“Saints have no moderation, nor do poets, just exuberance.”

“She is so naked and singular.
She is the sum of yourself and your dream.
Climb her like a monument, step after step.
She is solid.”

“Don't bite till you know if it's bread or stone.”

“I am God, la de dah.”

“Suicide is, after all, the opposite of the poem.”

“O starry night, This is how I want to die”

“Being kissed on the back
of the knee is a moth
at the windowscreen….”