Whatever you think, be sure it is what you think; whatever you want, be sure that is what you want; whatever you feel, be sure that is what you feel.

Till Human voices wake us, and we drown.

Footfalls echo in the memorydown the passage we did not taketowards the door we never openedinto the rose garden. My words echothus, in your mind

But above and beyond there’s still one name left over,And that is the name that you never will guess;The name that no human research can discover–But the cat himself knows, and will never confess.When you...

The bad poet is usually unconscious where he ought to be conscious, and conscious where he ought to be unconscious.

We are not here to triumph by fighting, by strata gem, or by resistance, not to fight with beasts as men. We have fought the beast and have conquered. We have only to conquer now,...

If you desire to drain to the dregs the fullest cup of scorn and hatred that a fellow human being can pour out for you, let a young mother hear you call dear baby “it.”

Think not forever of yourselves, O Chiefs, nor of your own generation. Think of continuing generations of our families, think of our grandchildren and of those yet unborn, whose faces are coming from beneath the...

There is shadow under this red rock // (Come in under the shadow of this red rock) // And I will show you something different from either // Your shadow at morning striding behind you...

Unreal friendship may turn to real But real friendship, once ended, cannot be mended

Not the intense momentIsolated, with no before and after,But a lifetime burning in every moment.

This is the way the world ends/This is the way the world ends/This is the way the world ends/Not with a bang but a whimper.

Where is wisdom we have lost in knowledge? Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?

There are men whose presence infuses trust and reverence.

Because I do not hope to turn again / Because I do not hope / Because I do not hope to turn.

Success is relative. It is what we can make of the mess we have made of things.

Time present and time pastAre both perhaps present in time futureAnd time future contained in time past.

If time and space, as sages say,Are things which cannot be,The sun which does not feel decayNo greater is than we.So why, Love, should we ever prayTo live a century?The butterfly that lives a dayHas...

With Cats, some say, one rule is true:Don’t speak till you are spoken to.Myself, I do not hold with that —I say, you should ad-dress a Cat.But always keep in mind that heResents familiarity.I bow,...

We shall not cease from exploration and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started… and know the place for the first time.

This is the way the world ends. Not with a bang but a whimper.

I am aware of the damp souls of housemaids/Sprouting despondently at area gates.

Half of the harm that is done in this world is due to people who want to feel important. They don’t mean to do harm. But the harm does not interest them.

We had the experience but missed the meaning. And approach to the meaning restores the experience in a different form.

Honest criticism and sensible appreciation are directed not upon the poet but upon the poetry.

And what you thought you came foris only a shell, a husk of meaningfrom which the purpose breaks only when it is fulfilledif at all. Either you had no purposeor the purpose is beyond the...

What is hell? Hell is oneself. Hell is alone, the other figures in it Merely projections. There is nothing to escape from And nothing to escape to. One is always alone.

In the vain laughter of folly, wisdom hears half its applause.

Birth, copulation and death. That’s all the facts when you come to the brass tacks.

The clock has stopped in the dark.

A play should give you something to think about. When I see a play and understand it the first time, then I know it can’t be much good.

The very existence of libraries affords the best evidence that we may yet have hope for the future of man

Before a Cat will condescendTo treat you as a trusted friend,Some little token of esteemIs needed, like a dish of cream;And you might now and then supplySome caviare, or Strassburg Pie,Some potted grouse, or salmon...

Now that lilacs are in bloomShe has a bowl of lilacs in her roomAnd twists one in her fingers while she talks.”Ah, my friend, you do not know, you do not knowWhat life is, you...

The emotion of art is impersonal. And the poet cannot reach this impersonality without surrendering himself wholly to the work to be done. And he is not likely to know what is to be done...

Playwriting gets into your blood and you can’t stop it. At least not until the producers or the public tell you to.

And I will show you something different from either your shadow at morning striding behind you or your shadow at evening rising to meet you; I will show you fear in a handful of dust.

Where is the Life we have lost in living?

I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each. I do not think that they will sing to me.

And would it have been worth it, after all,Would it have been worth while,After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets, After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along...

T.S. Eliot deems dangerous the tendency “to associate tradition with the immovable; to think of it as something hostile to all change; to aim to return to some previous condition which we imagine as having...

Gus is the Cat at the Theatre Door.His name, as I ought to have told you before,Is really Asparagus. That’s such a fussTo pronounce, that we usually call him just Gus.His coat’s very shabby, he’s...

The highest form of treason: to do the right thing for the wrong reason. Murder in the Cathedral

I take as metaphysical poetry that in which what is ordinarily apprehensible only by thought is brought within the grasp of feeling, or that in which what is ordinarily only felt is transformed into thought...

When one wanted one’s interests looking after whatever the cost, it was not so well for a lawyer to be over honest, else he might not be up to other people’s tricks.

Liberty is a different kind of pain from prison.

Anxiety is the handmaiden of creativity

The Pekes and the Pollicles, everyone knows, Are proud and implacable, passionate foes;It is always the same, wherever one goes.And the Pugs and the Poms, although most people saythat they do not like fighting, will...

These fragments I have shored against my ruins

I grow old … I grow old … I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.Shall I part my hair behind? Do I dare to eat a peach?I shall wear white flannel trousers, and...