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Paint here no draped despairs, no saddening clouds, Where the soul rests, proclaims eternity. But let the wrong cry out as raw as wounds, This Time forgets and never heals, far less transcends.

Stephen Spender

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Stephen Spender
Age: 86 †
Born: 1909
Born: February 28
Died: 1995
Died: July 16
Essayist
Journalist
Literary Critic
Poet
Translator
University Teacher
Writer
London
England
Stephen Harold Spender
Paint
Forgets
Wrong
Rests
Forget
Wounds
Saddening
Less
Heal
Despairs
Soul
Clouds
Draped
Never
Despair
Proclaims
Time
Cry
Heals
Eternity
Transcends

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My words like eyes that flinch from light, refuse And shut upon obscurity my acts Cast to their opposites by impatient violence Break up the sequent path they fly On a circumference to avoid the centre.
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The only true hope for civilization-the conviction of the individual that his inner life can affect outward events and that, whether or not he does so he is responsible for them.
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I'm struggling at the end to get out of the valley of hectoring youth, journalistic middle age, imposture, moneymaking, public relations, bad writing, mental confusion.
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My brothers and sister and I were brought up in an atmosphere which I would describe as 'Puritan decadence'. Puritanism names the behaviour which is condemned Puritan decadence regards the name itself as indecent, and pretends that the object behind that name does not exist until it is named.
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The greatest of all human delusions is that there is a tangible goal, and not just direction towards an ideal aim. The idea that a goal can be attained perpetually frustrates human beings, who are disappointed at never getting there, never being able to stop.
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What we call the freedom of the individual is not just the luxury of one intellectual to write what he likes to write but his being a voice which can speak for those who are silent.
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Religion stands, the Church blocking the sun.
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When you read and understand a poem, comprehending its rich and formal meanings, then you master chaos a little.
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My single pair of eyes Contain the universe they see Their mirrored multiplicity Is packed into a hollow body Where I reflect the many, in my one.
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I think continually of those who were truly great...Born of the sun they traveled a short while towards the sun, and left the vivid air signed with their honor.
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History is the ship carrying living memories to the future.
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What the eye delights in, no longer dictates My greed to enjoy: boys, grass, the fenced-off deer. It leaves those figures that distantly play On the horizon's rim: they sign their peace, in games.
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Never allow gradually the traffic to smother with noise and fog the flowering of the spirit.
Stephen Spender
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What is precious is never to forget, The delight of the blood drawn from ancient springs, Breaking through rocks in worlds before our earth Never to deny its pleasure in the simple morning light, Nor its grave evening demand for love Never to allow gradually the traffic to smother, With noise and fog the flowering of the spirit.
Stephen Spender
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Under the olive trees, from the ground Grows this flower, which is a wound. It is easier to ignore Than the heroes' sunset fire Of death plunged in their willed desire Raging with flags on the world's shore.
Stephen Spender
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If you get to a certain age, all people want to know about you is people you knew. ...An American student once said to me, you know, isn't it extraordinary that I am alive and you're not dead.
Stephen Spender
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One type of concentration is immediate and complete, as it was with Mozart. The other is plodding and only completed in stages, as with Beethoven. Thus genius works in different ways to achieve its ends.
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No one Shall hunger: Man shall spend equally. Our goal which we compel: Man shall be man.
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All the posters on the walls All the leaflets in the streets Are mutilated, destroyed or run in rain, Their words blotted out with tears, Skins peeling from their bodies In the victorious hurricane.
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For I had expected always Some brightness to hold in trust, Some final innocence To save from dust
Stephen Spender