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I don't think Auden liked my poetry very much, he's very Anglican.

Stevie Smith

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Stevie Smith
Age: 68 †
Born: 1902
Born: September 20
Died: 1971
Died: March 7
Illustrator
Novelist
Performing Artist
Poet
Writer
Hull
England
Florence Margaret Smith
Anglican
Auden
Liked
Poetry
Much
Think
Thinking

More quotes by Stevie Smith

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People who are always praising the past And especially the time of faith as best Ought to go and live in the Middle Ages And be burnt at the stake as witches and sages.
Stevie Smith
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As Nature is always careless and indifferent Who sees, who steps, means nothing and this is pretty.
Stevie Smith
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O happy dogs of England, Bark well at errand boys, If you lived anywhere else, You would not be allowed to make such an infernal noise.
Stevie Smith
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See the cat at love, rolling with its sweetheart, up and over, with shriek and moan. But if a person comes by, they break away, sit separate upon a fence washing their faces - and might never have met at all.
Stevie Smith
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Why does my muse only speak when she is uhnhappy? She does not, I only listen when I am unhappy.
Stevie Smith
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Nothing is more wistful than the scent of lilac, nor more robust than its woody stalk, for we must remember that it is a tree as well as a flower, we must try not to forget this.
Stevie Smith
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But one wants the idea of Death, you know, as something large and unknowable, something that allows a person to stretch himself out. Especially one wants it if one is tired. Or perhaps what one wants is simply a release from sensation, from all consciousness for ever.
Stevie Smith
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The human creature is alone in his carapace. Poetry is a strong way out.
Stevie Smith
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This Englishwoman is so refined, She has no bosom and no behind.
Stevie Smith
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There can be no good art that is international. Art to be vigorous and gesund must use the material at hand.
Stevie Smith
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Christianity in the suburb is cheerful. The church is a centre of social activity and those who go to church need never be lonely.
Stevie Smith
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I love Death because he breaks the human pattern and frees us from pleasures too prolonged as well as from the pains of this world. It is pleasant, too, to remember that Death lies in our hands he must come if we call him. ... I think if there were no death, life would be more than flesh and blood could bear.
Stevie Smith
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If a lady comes up to you and tells you that your dear mama is lying in a faint on the pavement round the corner, don't you believe her, don't have anything to do with her, do not go with her into the cab. It is the White Slave Traffic.
Stevie Smith
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It is the privilege of the rich To waste the time of the poor To water with tears in secret A tree that grows in secret That bears fruit in secret That ripened falls to the ground in secret And manures the parent tree Oh the wicked tree of hatred and the secret The sap rising and the tears falling.
Stevie Smith
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Life in the [London] suburb is richer at the lower levels. At these levels the people are not self-conscious at all, they are at liberty to be as eccentric as they please, they do not know that they are eccentric.
Stevie Smith
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I am hungry to be interrupted For ever and ever amen O Person from Porlock come quickly And bring my thoughts to an end.
Stevie Smith
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Into the dark night Resignedly I go, I am not so afraid of the dark night As the friends I do not know, I do not fear the night above As I fear the friends below.
Stevie Smith
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The sea was angry that day my friend, like an old man trying to send back soup at a deli.
Stevie Smith
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I may be smelly and I may be old, Rough in my pebbles, reedy in my pools, But where my fish float by I bless their swimming, And I like the people to bathe in me especially women.
Stevie Smith
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Oh Lion in a peculiar guise, Sharp Roman road to Paradise, Come eat me up, I'll pay thy toll With all my flesh, and keep my soul.
Stevie Smith