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The only real evidence that any critic may bring before his gaze is the finished poem.

Allen Tate

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Allen Tate
Age: 79 †
Born: 1899
Born: November 19
Died: 1979
Died: February 9
Author
Literary Critic
Poet
University Teacher
Writer
Winchester
Kentucky
John Orley Allen Tate
Critics
Finished
Evidence
Bring
May
Real
Gaze
Critic
Poem

More quotes by Allen Tate

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The dreary flies, lazy and casual, Stick to the ceiling, buzz along the wall. O heart, the spider shuffles from the mould Weaving, between the pinks and grapes, his pall.
Allen Tate
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Narcissism and the Confederate dead cannot be connected logically, or even historically even were the connection an historical fact, they would not stand connected as art, for no one experiences raw history.
Allen Tate
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There's precious little to say between day and dark, Perhaps a few words on the implacable will Of time sailing like a magic barque Or something as fine for the amenities.
Allen Tate
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Dark accurate plunger down the successive knell Of arch on arch, where ogives burst a red Reverberance of hail upon the dead Thunder like an exploding crucible!
Allen Tate
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Peering, I heard the hooves come down the hill. The posse passed, twelve horse the leader's face Was worn as limestone on an ancient sill.
Allen Tate
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POET If not in a place, where are the People weeping? LIBERAL They creep weeping in the face, not place. POET Is it something with which we may cope The weeping, the creeping, the peepee-ing, the peeping?
Allen Tate
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So the poet, who wants to be something that he cannot be, and is a failure in plain life, makes up fictitious versions of his predicament that are interesting even to other persons because nobody is a perfect automobile salesman.
Allen Tate
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Yevgeny Yevtushenko is a ham actor, not a poet.
Allen Tate
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How does one happen to write a poem: where does it come from? That is the question asked by the psychologists or the geneticists of poetry.
Allen Tate
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There is probably nothing wrong with art for art's sake if we take the phrase seriously, and not take it to mean the kind of poetry written in England forty years ago.
Allen Tate
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The twilight is long fingers and black hair.
Allen Tate
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Swimmer of noonday, lean for the perfect dive To the dead Mother's face, whose subtile down You had not seen take amber light alive.
Allen Tate
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What is the flesh and blood compounded ofBut a few moments in the life of time?This prowling of the cells, litigious love,Wears the long claw of flesh-arguing crime.
Allen Tate
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Walk in this faithless grass with studious tread, Lest mice, weasels, germane beasts, too soon The tall hat and eyes, the fierce feet, for dead Descry, and fix you prone in their revelling moon.
Allen Tate
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I say that what one loves is best: The midnight fastness of the heart.
Allen Tate
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Punctilious abyss, the yawn of space Come once a day to suffocate the sight.
Allen Tate
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The dusk runs down the lane driven like hail Far off a precise whistle is escheat To the dark and then the towering weak and pale.
Allen Tate
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Venus knows country matters: country knows Venus: For Love, Dione's boy, was born on the farm.
Allen Tate
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Row after row with strict impunity The headstones yield their names to the element, The wind whirrs without recollection.
Allen Tate
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Among friends one has the privilege of saying nothing the civility consists in the assumption that one's silence will be civilly understood. I can imagine a small gathering of friends who say nothing all evening: they recoil from saying anything that the others don't want to hear and their silence would be the subtlest courtesy.
Allen Tate