A poet is a man who manages, in a lifetime of standing out in thunderstorms, to be struck by lightning five or six times. —Randall JarrellGunnerText within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedDid they send me away from my cat and my wife To a doctor who poked me and counted m
By: Erik RittenberryTo be a creator, one must possess the capacity to rebel.Rebellion stems from a strong sense of self and shouldn’t be confused with adolescent defiance. True rebellion is an expression of inner freedom that challenges the complacency of those willingly confined. It is the assertio
By: Erik Rittenberry“Already, he was dreaming of a refined solitude, a comfortable desert, a motionless ark in which to seek refuge from the unending deluge of human stupidity.” —Joris-Karl HuysmansI flew west into Albuquerque, grabbed my rental car, and pointed it north. Towards Taos. That mythical
By: Giacomo LeopardiPhoto: Gabriel Guerrero CarocaText within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedRest forever, tired heart. The final illusion has perished. The one we believed eternal is gone. Just like that. Out the door desire follows hope. Rest forever. Enough throbbing.
By: Tom RobbinsArt: Ryan Sheffield"What limits people is lack of character. What limits people is that they don't have the fucking nerve or imagination to star in their own movie, let alone direct it."― Tom RobbinsThe great and hilarious American novelist Tom Robbins passed away earlier this year. W
By: Colin WilsonReligion and the Rebel, Colin Wilson’s second book in his famous Outsider Cycle, is like a guidebook for anyone who has a hard time “falling in line” with conventional society— spiritual rebels who harbor “an infinite appetite for life” beyond the humdrum of daily life. With a blend
By: David LernerText within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedexperts on the news wholesaling cheap wisdom at retail prices experts with fireproof smiles telling you how to get closer to your dog why friendship's a reasonable investment how to know when love is more tro
By: Charles BukowskiText within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedhe came to the door one night wet thin beaten and terrorized a white cross-eyed tailless cat I took him in and fed him and he stayed grew to trust me until a friend drove up the driveway and ran him over I to
Humanityis the start of the race; I sayHumanity is the mould to break away from, the crust tobreak through, the coal to break into fire,The atom to be split.― Robinson JeffersRobinson Jeffers (1887–1962) was a poet of the wild, a seer who stood at the edge of the Pacific, watching the waves carve et
By: Anne SextonArt: Seiichi FuruyaText within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedWhen man, enters woman, like the surf biting the shore, again and again, and the woman opens her mouth with pleasure and her teeth gleam like the alphabet, Logos appears milking a star, and the
By: Erik RittenberryPhoto: Erik Rittenberry, Chimney RockIn the magnificent fierce morning of New Mexico one sprang awake, a new part of the soul woke up suddenly, and the old world gave way to a new.”― D.H. LawrenceI’ve just come back from a solitary journey through the northern reaches of New Mexi
By: Erik RittenberryIf we are to achieve freedom, we must do so with daring and profundity that refuse to flinch at engaging our destiny. — Rollo May“Lock up your libraries if you like; but there is no gate, no lock, no bolt that you can set upon the freedom of my mind,” Virginia Woolf once wrote in
By: Manly P. HallArt: Laura Makabresku“To live in the world without becoming aware of the meaning of the world is like wandering about in a great library without touching the books.”—Many P. HallText within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedWe can only escape from the world
Every morning you have to conquer the demons who say, “This will never be any good. This will never be what I saw when I dreamed of it.” But you just have to say, “Keep on, keep on,” and finally it gets through. —May SartonI am at my desk from three to four hours every day…It has to be the morning,
By: Erik RittenberryPhoto: TONY NAHRAText within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedI have tried to write Paradise Do not move Let the wind speak that is paradise. --Ezra PoundText within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedFrom that brief spark in t
By: Erik Rittenberry“The idea of death, the fear of it, haunts the human animal like nothing else; it is a mainspring of human activity — activity designed largely to avoid the fatality of death, to overcome it by denying in some way that it is the final destiny for men… It is fateful and ironic how
By: Erik RittenberrySpring has returned. The Earth is like a child that knows poems. —Rainer Maria RilkeI packed light, as I always do—a camera, a journal, a few worn books—and left Florida behind, heading north until the pavement gave way to winding dirt roads that cut through meadows, mountains, a
Georgia O’Keeffe in the bedroom at Abiquiu. John Loengard / The LIFE Picture CollectionI've been absolutely terrified every moment of my life - and I've never let it keep me from doing a single thing I wanted to do. —Georgia O’KeeffeSubscribe nowBy the late 1920s, painter Georgia O’Keeffe was alread
"It's no good trying to get rid of your own aloneness. You've got to stick to it all your life."— D.H. LawrenceD.H. Lawrence, widely recognized for his novels, was also a poet deeply preoccupied with solitude, introspection, death, and humanity’s bond with nature. His time in northern New Mexico, pa
By: William Saroyan“When you laugh, laugh like hell. And when you get angry, get good and angry. Try to be alive. You will be dead soon enough.”― William SaroyanIn the time of your life, live—so that in that good time there shall be no ugliness or death for yourself or for any life your life touches
