If I am going to be a writer, earning a living in the era of digital text, I need to understand where the opportunities are. They won't ...

"Ladybird, ladybird, fly away home. Your house is on fire, your children will burn!" Do you know how that curious couplet came int...

Every time I read Pride and Prejudice , I want to dig her up and beat her over the skull with her own shin-bone. ~ Mark Twain ~ Answer to th...

Life seems but a quick succession of busy nothings. ~ Jane Austen ~ Photo by Hil

Among ashcans. He leaps and lightly Walks upon sleep, his mind on the moon. Nightly over the round world of men, Over the roofs go his eyes ...

There are some woods that are like stately sonnets and others of which the truth would best be told in tender lyrics. ~ Helen Hunt Jackson ~...

This time         we tap with joy                 on mystery's door ~ Jakushitsu ~ Image courtesy the Library of Congress .

though my rice sack is empty... cherry blossoms! ~ Issa translated by David G. Lanoue ~ Image courtesy the Library of Congress .

The truth is more important than the facts. ~ Frank Lloyd Wright ~

Solar power is clean, renewable and cost effective, but it also needs time to develop. ~ J. D. Hayworth ~ Image courtesty Open Clip Art Libr...

Any man who does not like dogs and want them about does not deserve to be in the White House. ~ Calvin Coolidge ~

Cats Cats sleep Anywhere, Any table, Any chair, Top of piano, Window-ledge, In the middle, On the edge, Open drawer, Empty shoe, Anybody...

Every spring is the only spring, a perpetual astonishment. ~ Ellis Peters ~

That children love to scrutinize things at close range--anthills and animals, grasshoppers and gyroscopes--persuades us that, with a little ...

A painting in a museum hears more ridiculous opinions than anything else in the world. ~ Edmond de Goncourt ~

The printing press is either the greatest blessing or the greatest curse of modern times, one sometimes forgets which. ~ J. M. Barrie ~

I'm so pleased that my caterpillar can help to promote healthy eating in the fight against childhood obesity, and I hope The Very Hungry...

Today’s events remind us of just how fragile life can be. Our hearts go out to our friends in Japan and across the region and we’re going to...

one by one even the cats come home... cold nights ~ Issa, translated by David G. Lanoue ~ With prayers for the people, and cats, of Japan. ...

The smug rich have overplayed their hand. They couldn't have just been content with the money they raided from the treasury. They couldn...

And how exciting it is to find that a poetic language will liberate and not constrain. ~ Eavan Boland ~

I have now one ambition: to retire before it becomes essential to tweet. ~ Barney Frank ~ Image courtesy twitter.com

Art is the signature of civilizations. ~ Beverly Sills ~

Like their personal lives, women's history is fragmented, interrupted; a shadow history of human beings whose existence has been shaped ...

Labor is prior to, and independent of, capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first exi...

How nice to be the gardener's cat, She troubles not for mouse or rat, But when it's coming down in streams, She sits among the flowe...

The trouble with the world is that the stupid are cocksure and the intelligent are full of doubt. ~ Bertrand Russell ~ Photo by Gnal

It is the responsibility of society to let the poet be a poet. ~ Grace Paley ~ Image courtesy Steve Rhodes

With a stout heart, a mouse can lift an elephant. ~ Tibetan proverb ~ Photo by revdode

For over seventy years, Babar has been the most famous elephant in the world—and the most controversial. He has been praised as a benevolent...

One morning I shot an elephant in my pajamas. How he got into my pajamas I'll never know. ~ Groucho Marx ~ Photo courtesy Squidoo

If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse...

Then fill up the glasses as quick as you can, And sprinkle the table with buttons and bran: Put cats in the coffee, and mice in the tea-- An...

If you can walk, you can dance. If you can talk, you can sing. ~ African proverb ~

What the imagination seizes as beauty must be truth. ~ John Keats ~

Hair is the first thing. And teeth the second. Hair and teeth. A man got those two things he's got it all. ~ James Brown ~

I have long thought that anyone who does not regularly--or ever--gaze up and see the wonder and glory of a dark night sky filled with countl...

The greatness of a craft consists firstly in how it brings comradeship to men. ~ Antoine de Saint-Exupery ~

Associate with men of good quality if you esteem your own reputation; for it is better to be alone than in bad company. ~ George Washington ...

Mistress, there are portents abroad of magic and         might, And things that are yet to be done. Open the door! ~ Elizabeth Coatsworth f...

It is one of the characteristics of a free and democratic nation that it have free and independent labor unions. ~ Franklin D. Roosevelt ~ H...

One should lie empty, open, choiceless as a beach--waiting for a gift from the sea. ~ Anne Morrow Lindbergh ~ Photo by Adam Glasgow

Make sure your blanket covers your feet. ~ Azerbaijani proverb ~ Photo by amanky

Smelling books is really nostalgic for me--I am often reminded of my grandparents’ homes, or libraries where I used to go when I was a child...

There are no extra pieces in the universe. Everyone is here because he or she has a place to fill, and every piece must fit itself into the ...

Postcard image courtesy riptheskull

For he is an instrument for the children to learn benevolence upon. ~ Christopher Smart ~ Photo by Jimee, Jackie, Tom & Asha

God grant that not only the love of liberty but a thorough knowledge of the rights of man may pervade all the nations of the earth, so that ...

She is mine own, And I as rich in having such a jewel As twenty seas, if all their sand were pearl, The water nectar, and the rocks pure gol...

Even a good love song can sort of awaken people. The way we travel and meet one another at the crossroads is important. ~ Dar Williams ~ Pho...

It's difficult to get films made, especially films about poets. ~ Dougray Scott ~ Image courtesy Open Clip Art Library

A beautiful thing is never perfect. ~ Egyptian proverb ~

Kittens in the garden Looking in her face, Learning how to spit and swear-- Oh, what a disgrace! ~ Elizabeth Anna Hart from "Mother Tab...

Be grateful for luck. Pay the thunder no mind--listen to the birds. And don't hate nobody. ~ Eubie Blake ~ Image by Elizabeth Abernath...

A poem is true if it hangs together. Information points to something else. A poem points to nothing but itself. ~ E. M. Forster ~ Photo by J...

Tradition wears a snowy beard, romance is always young. ~ John Greenleaf Whittier ~

Water is the driving force of all nature. ~ Leonardo da Vinci ~

A fat stomach never breeds fine thoughts. ~ St. Jerome ~ Image courtesy Visipix