John Ashbery Quotes

The first year was like icing. Then the cake started to show through …

I'm heading for a clean-named place
like Wisconsin, and mad as a jack-o'-lantern, will get there
without help and nosy proclivities.

A little
bunny or some kind of ferret was probably
there too, and bore witness as only rodents can.

Its a bit mad. Too bad, I mean, that getting to know each just for a fleeting second
Must be replaced by unperfect knowledge of the featureless whole
Like some pocket history of the world, so general
As to constitute a sob or wail

Things can harden meaningfully in the moment of indecision

until only infinity remained of beauty

The music brought us what it seemed / We had long desired, but in a form / so rarefied there was no emptiness of sensation