The ones who have nothing have the enormous power of nothing to lose and everything to gain. ~ Sign at L.A. Occupy Wall Street ~

I am a jack-o'-lantern With terrible teeth And the children know I am fooling. ~ Carl Sandburg from "Theme in Yellow" ~ Photo ...

...our nation's children spend more time with media and digital activities than they do with their families or in school, which profound...

Advertising reflects the mores of society, but it does not influence them. ~ David Ogilvy ~

There are very few monsters who warrant the fear we have of them. ~ Andre Gide ~ Photo by AlexiUeltzen .

Murder is commoner among cooks than among members of any other profession. ~ W. H. Auden ~

And why do we go on caring, sometimes at great expense or with heartburn involved, for creatures who are sometimes superaffectionate, but at...

I hope we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our monied corporations which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of s...

I've always believed that poetry is the grace of little things. That the right details make a poem. ~ Paul B. Janeczko ~ This is taken f...

If my lips teach the public that men are made mad by bad treatment, and if the police are taught that they may exasperate to madness men the...

I hate television. I hate it as much as peanuts. But I can't stop eating peanuts. ~ Orson Welles ~ Photo by EuroMagic

Satire is a lesson, parody is a game. ~ Vladimir Nabokov ~ Photo courtesy Ygrek .

Good friends, good books and a sleepy conscience: this is the ideal life. ~ Mark Twain ~ Photo by litlnemo .

the stray cat makes Buddha's lap her pillow ~ Kobayashi Issa, translated by David Lanoue ~ Photo by sadaton .

It is not the job of the protesters to draft legislation. That’s the job of the nation’s leaders, and if they had been doing it all along th...

There simply isn't one right way to write a poem. Doesn't exist....Ultimately, you write your own poetry. Your poem is your idea i...

The end of reading is not more books but more life. ~ Holbrook Jackson ~

All the ills of mankind, all the tragic misfortunes that fill the history books, all the political blunders, all the failures of the great l...

Coming out to gays is a way of affirming sanity and self-worth. ~ George Weinberg ~ Photo by Urban Sea Star .

The Columbian Exchange has shaped everything about the modern world. It brought us the plants we tend in our gardens and the pests that eat ...

When everyone else is just ready to go out, The cat is just ready to come in. He's not where he's been. ~ Rosalie Moore from "C...

Occupy Wall Street photo by waywuwei .

I think an aptitude for physics and astronomy is probably a plus for a poet. As is an aptitude for anything that involves the real, physical...

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No ...

Causes of Civil War are also, that the Wealth of the Nation is in too few mens hands, and that no certain means are provided to keep all men...

Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the propositio...

It is well that war is so terrible, or we should grow too fond of it. ~ Robert E. Lee ~ Image courtesy Library of Congress .

Did St. Francis preach to the birds? Whatever for? If he really liked birds he would have done better to preach to the cats. ~ Rebecca West ...

Little progress can be made by merely attempting to repress what is evil. Our great hope lies in developing what is good. ~ Calvin Coolidge...

Real poetry can use any material. The important thing is that it be judiciously, infallibly, inevitably selected and arranged so that the p...

What sculpture is to a block of marble, education is to the soul. ~ Joseph Addison ~

We're all pilgrims on the same journey--but some pilgrims have better road maps. ~ Nelson DeMille ~

I hope you love birds too. It is economical. It saves going to heaven. ~ Emily Dickinson ~ Print courtesy Library of Congress .

Intellectual freedom can exist only where two essential conditions are met: first, that all individuals have the right to hold any belief on...

Intelligence is the only unlimited natural resource. ~ Robert Theobald ~

The Sixth Night: Waking That first green night of their dreaming, asleep beneath the Tree, God said, "Let meanings move," and ther...

This trusty sandwich is almost more dessert than meal, which is why kids like it, and it is so simple to slap together, it hardly requires d...

Photo courtesy ChuckJones.com .

I see no reason to spend your life writing poems unless your goal is to write great poems. ~ Donald Hall from "Poetry and Ambition...

Life's pretty good, and why wouldn't it be? I'm a pirate, after all. ~ Johnny Depp ~

Politeness pleases even a cat. ~ Czech proverb ~ Drawing by Alice Barber Stephens courtesy Library of Congress .

Art is not a treasure in the past or an importation from another land, but part of the present life of all living and creating peoples. ~ Fr...

Art is the elimination of the unnecessary. ~ Pablo Picasso ~ This is especially true of poetry, don't you think? --KK Image courtesy th...

Books are standing counselors and preachers, always at hand, and always disinterested... ~ Louis Nizer ~ Photo by Ellen Forsyth .

All kids, when they go to school, are pretty good artists and dancers and singers and poets. All that gets buried, basically through being e...

A person is a fool to become a writer. His only compensation is absolute freedom. ~ Roald Dahl ~

12.2 percent of women born in the United States today will develop breast cancer at some time in their lives. This estimate is based on brea...

the cat waits hour upon hour ...September 11 ~ Diane Mayr ~ Photo by bonnyweb .

In a post-9/11 world, diversity has become even more important. ~ Jane Harman ~ Photo courtesy Oregon DOT .

The mythic nature of this attack, this disaster--echoing everything from the tower of Babel to the fall of Icarus--is undeniable, and the ac...

A film is--or should be--more like music than like fiction. It should be a progression of moods and feelings. ~ Stanley Kubrick ~ Image cour...

We hate those who will not take our advice, and despise them who do. ~ David Sarnoff ~

Improvement begins with I. ~ Arnold H. Glasow ~

Dignify and glorify common labor. It is at the bottom of life that we must begin, not at the top. ~ Booker T. Washington ~ Photo ...

The real measure of a day's heat is the length of a sleeping cat. ~ Charles J. Brady ~ Photo by Stephen and Claire Farnsworth .

I'm not against e-books in principle – I'm tempted by the Kindle – but the more they become interactive and linked, the more they mu...

Poetry-- but what is poetry anyway? More than one rickety answer has tumbled since that question first was raised. But I just keep on ...

The librarian must be the librarian militant before he can be the librarian triumphant. ~ Melvil Dewey ~ Image courtesy Instant Att...

I'm not going to buy my kids an encyclopedia. Let them walk to school like I did. ~ Yogi Berra ~

Home is the place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in. ~ Robert Frost ~ Photo courtesy Robert Frost Farm .

You know, the Beatles seem to find a new audience each time another generation comes along. ~ George Martin ~

For by stroaking of him I have found out electricity. ~ Christopher Smart from Jubilate Agno ~ Photo by Hybernaut .

My friends, love is better than anger. Hope is better than fear. Optimism is better than despair. So let us be loving, hopeful and optimisti...

The poet doesn't invent. He listens. ~ Jean Cocteau ~ Photo courtesy David Reverchon .