I've often said that all poetry is political. This is because real poems deal with a human response to reality and politics is part of reality, history in the making. Even if a poet writes about sitting in a glass house drinking tea, it reflects politics.
Yehuda Amichai
Related It is a lie. ARTHUR MILLER He wept because he was afraid now that he could not save Gabriel. He no longer cared about himself LOIS LOWRY It is one of the truisms of politics that a conservative is often enough a former liberal who has be... FRANK GAFFNEY Life is not a game. Still, in this life, we choose the games we live to play. J.R. RIM All the political angst and moral melodrama about getting 'the rich' to pay 'their fair ... THOMAS SOWELL Life is a re-discovery. BRIAN BLESSED If you think that life is a celebration full of party poppers and merry go rounds it's not it's a ga... GARY F EVANS... Life Is a Misconception. DEYTH BANGER Life is a desire! DEYTH BANGER To trust someone you must firstly remember that it is a two way street that will go all the way if y... GARY F EVANS... His life seemed like a deck of cards, and in the midst of all those two’s and three’s someone ha... TEKOA MANNING Is there in all the history of human folly a greater fool than a clergymen in politics? PAT ROBERTSON A man of politics writes about philosophy: it could be that his "true" philosophy should be looked f... ANTONIO GRAMSCI Art is inherently political. Even trying to make a film that has nothing to do with politics is, in ... BARRY JENKINS Raising money is a reality of modern-day politics. BARRETT KAISER I think if you say that art and politics, or religion and politics, mustn't mix, don't mix, ... MOHSIN HAMID This whole thing is a house of cards. At some point, you're going to have to sit down and talk reali... SANDER LEVIN Colour is not a human or a personal reality; it is a political reality. JAMES BALDWIN For me, my life is a journey. JAY ELECTRONICA Empathy is the new measurement of everything. It doesn't matter what religion you have, what God you... C. JOYBELL C. There's real poetry in the real world. Science is the poetry of reality RICHARD DAWKINS Love isn't the work of the tender and the gentle; Love is the work of wrestlers. The one w... JALALUDDIN MEVLANA RUMI The opportunity to decieve others is ever present and often tempting, and each instance of deception... SAM HARRIS Life is a risk. CARMELO ANTHONY The appalling reality in American politics today is that, when ideology and money mix, truth is a me... DAVID HORSEY How do you know if something is real? That’s easy. Does it change you? Does it form you? Does it g... C. JOYBELL C. Mother Superior jump the gun... -The Beatles, Happiness is a Warm Gun LAUREN MYRACLE The constant in all the businesses I've become a part of is taking what I do and making it real ... RACHEL ZOE Without music, life is a journey through a desert. PAT CONROY Life is a journey. When we stop, things don't go right. POPE FRANCIS There's a snobbery at work in architecture. The subject is too often treated as a fine art, deli... NORMAN FOSTER All art is political in the sense that it serves someone's politics. AUGUST WILSON Photography does deal with 'truth' or a kind of superficial reality better than any of the o... DUANE MICHALS Compared to politics, I think sports is funnier, because it's inconsequential. And politics can ... NORM MACDONALD I stay out of politics because if I begin thinking too much about politics, I'll probably... dro... DR. SEUSS In the end, that's what this election is about. Do we participate in a politics of cynicism or a... BARACK OBAMA One thing that education can do is it can provide us with an opportunity to understand one another b... CONDOLEEZZA RICE Daring to dream is not difficult, it's making them come true that is hard... NANETTE L. AVERY I believe that there is a Matrix and... to be more accurate I am in the Pornography Matrix. DEYTH BANGER She was scarcely a year older than I was, dark-haired, slender, with a face that would break your he... GEORGE R.R. MARTIN Politics is there the way men and women are there, the way the Atlantic Ocean is there. Sometimes I&... KENNETH KOCH I shall not often meddle with politics, because we have a political Editor who is already excellent ... MARK TWAIN Let me tell you, sisters, seeing dried egg on a plate in the morning is a lot dirtier than anything ... ANN RICHARDS From a reality perspective, I'm sure part of that is true, but this is the largest blackout in U... JENNIFER GRANHOLM Life is a school of probability. WALTER BAGEHOT This life is a process of learning. LAURYN HILL Life is a process. We are a process. The universe is a process. ANNE WILSON SCHAEF Everybody in life is a chameleon. MELANIE CHISHOLM I wanted to tell you that I just--I miss you. And maybe that sounds ridiculous--like we barely know ... TAMMARA WEBBER Life is a grand party. EZRA MILLER Oh happy day! A day to make a hay! And when it is mid-day, think about the day! And when you think a... ERNEST AGYEMANG YEBOAH Never give up on you. In order to make a difference you would have to somehow be different. JOHNNIE DENT JR. What I'm passionate about is History, and politics interest me only insofar as it is the cross-s... CHRIS MARKER Life is a journey and it's about growing and changing and coming to terms with who and what you ... KELLY MCGILLIS When I go about my own politics, I meet Tea Party supporters who I can work with in Congress, that I... CORY BOOKER Life is political, not because the world cares about how you feel, but because the world reacts to w... TIMOTHY SNYDER I'm looking forward to the day when America will mature to the point that we are a color-blind s... J. C. WATTS Reality is how we interpret it. Imagination and volition play a part in that interpretation. Which m... YANN MARTEL In our age there is no such thing as 'keeping out of politics.' All issues are political iss... GEORGE ORWELL The poet exposes himself to the risk. All that has been said about poetry, all that he has learned a... A. R. AMMONS Politics has come to resemble a cynical team game played by politicians, while the public has been p... EDI RAMA Don’t let the enemy try to keep you bound with fear. The devil is a liar. Stay in faith and trust ... GERMANY KENT I rather still be love blind, then to see the reality of him loving someone else DEICY ZULEICA GONZALEZ No matter what you may think about her politics or her record, Hillary Clinton understands that this... MICHAEL BLOOMBERG There is a great deal of poetry and fine sentiment in a chest of tea RALPH WALDO EMERSON Political parties have to convince people that there is a real reason to vote and that will re-engag... NICOLA STURGEON Being present is being connected to All Things. S. KELLEY HARRELL, M. DIV. The political vision of the religious right is for the most part an individualistic politics of righ... MARCUS J. BORG To stand on the brink of what is coming, feeling eager, optimistic anticipation—with no feeli... ASK AND IT IS GIVEN I believe that life is a journey towards God, and that no one has the right to insist that you go a ... PAT BUCKLEY If everybody in this town connected with politics had to leave town because of chasing women and dri... BARRY GOLDWATER What is politics? Political system is equal to development politics plus political politics. A. P. J. ABDUL KALAM Poetry itself is music. I'm just lucky that I can convert it into music. William Blake is my fav... BENJAMIN CLEMENTINE I'm a girl, but that doesn't mean I don't appreciate greatness and the struggle of sport... DIANE LANE Poetry is about the grief. Politics is about the grievance. ROBERT FROST The idea of how to read a poem is based on the idea that poetry needs you as a reader. That the expe... EDWARD HIRSCH If I seem to take part in politics, it is only because politics encircles us today like the coil of ... MAHATMA GANDHI Reality television has borrowed so much from the world of politics, whether it's alliances or vo... R. J. CUTLER 'The Means' is about power. I have access to political insiders who helped me write a portra... DOUGLAS BRUNT When we say, even in a global village, that all politics is local, we mean that national sovereignti... MICHAEL IGNATIEFF Politics is not a career. Politics is a service, a mission. If I am to choose between a decision tha... FRANCO DEBONO We must restore faith in politics. Reform of the House of Lords is only one part of the answer, but ... CHARLES KENNEDY Be grateful for every moment and every breath. TERESA COLLINS I've often thought that the gauntlet of American politics is more individualistic, more expensiv... HILLARY CLINTON If you distance yourself from reality and just cling to cliches about democracy find yourself a diff... HANY GHORABA To err is human. To blame someone else is politics. HUBERT H. HUMPHREY I've always championed women in politics. We just get stuck in; politics isn't a game. The d... THERESA MAY Catalan politics emancipated from the Spanish politics on September 27, 2015. Since then, we've ... CARLES PUIGDEMONT International politics is never about democracy and human rights. It's about the interests of states... EGON BAHR You can't write about history without writing about politics at some point. History is about mov... DAVID MAMET In politics, as in poetry, it is sometimes true that it is darkest before dawn. LARRY SUMMERS There is a long history in country music of songs celebrating drinking and lamenting drinking. Count... CHET ATKINS Life is a mountain of solvable problems, and I enjoy that. JAMES DYSON My life is a struggle. VOLTAIRE Life is a lot like skateboarding. LIL WAYNE All life is a manifestation of the spirit, the manifestation of love. MORIHEI UESHIBA For me, life is a bowl of cherries. SISSY SPACEK Life is a right, not collateral or casual. SUHEIR HAMMAD Don't be more serious than God. God invented dog farts. God designed your body's plumbing system. Go... PETER KREEFT As a movement (rather than a preference), the goal of antinatalism is that no humans should have chi... QUENTIN S. CRISP
More Yehuda Amichai
My poems are political in the deeper sense of the word. Political means to live in your time, to be ... YEHUDA AMICHAI The world of religion isn't a logical world; that's why children like it. It's a world o... YEHUDA AMICHAI I try to stay a civilian, to live as a human, not as a poet. YEHUDA AMICHAI There are two languages: one as things seem to us and the other of knowledge. YEHUDA AMICHAI The reason a poet is a poet is to write poems, not to advertise himself as a poet. YEHUDA AMICHAI I was a very religious child - I went to synagogue at least once, sometimes twice, a day. And I reme... YEHUDA AMICHAI Every intelligent person, whether he's an artist or not - a mathematician, a doctor, a scientist... YEHUDA AMICHAI I think the end is endless. It's either a big black hole or a big white light or both together. ... YEHUDA AMICHAI Like a butcher sharpening knife on knife I sharpen heart on heart inside me. YEHUDA AMICHAI Every little action creates an effect: We are all interconnected. YEHUDA BERG Unfortunately, it is human nature for us to only learn and grow from a place of emptiness. It's ... YEHUDA BERG 'Faith' and 'trust' are words that put the power in the hands of an outside force th... YEHUDA BERG If we were handling a bomb which could go off at any minute as a result of our actions, we would min... YEHUDA BERG We are increasingly open to understanding how we are all connected and that if we sink the ship that... YEHUDA BERG I do believe that the original sources of all religions should be taught, because with that we will ... YEHUDA BERG To me, spirituality means 'no matter what.' One stays on the path, one commits to love, one ... YEHUDA BERG If falling into desperation worked to make things better, then I would say, 'Let's all jump ... YEHUDA BERG The truth is that we were born to have it all. And part of our handicap as adults is that we no long... YEHUDA BERG Personal responsibility is not only recognizing the errors of our ways. Personal responsibility lies... YEHUDA BERG Unfortunately, we can never truly know if we're making the right decision. What we do know is th... YEHUDA BERG We need to realize that our path to transformation is through our mistakes. We're meant to make ... YEHUDA BERG A true community is not just about being geographically close to someone or part of the same social ... YEHUDA BERG The biggest breakthroughs in consciousness occur when things are difficult; when we have a choice to... YEHUDA BERG It is not our sexual preferences, the color of our skin, the language we speak, nor the religion we ... YEHUDA BERG Our contribution purely depends on our consciousness and our willingness to support those in need, t... YEHUDA BERG With so much evidence of depleting natural resources, toxic waste, climate change, irreparable harm ... YEHUDA BERG Our dependence on the pollutants of this Earth have always, and will continue to have, far-reaching ... YEHUDA BERG On one hand, we know that everything happens for a reason, and there are no mistakes or coincidences... YEHUDA BERG It's our own small voice within that is our oppressor; it says we are not worthy and not powerfu... YEHUDA BERG If we each take responsibility in shifting our own behavior, we can trigger the type of change that ... YEHUDA BERG Darkness is the only path to light. It is not our wonderful gifts that make us closer to God: it'... YEHUDA BERG I imagine God to be like my father. My father was always the voice of certainty in my life. Certaint... YEHUDA BERG If we can soften our hearts, and if we can access the pure and simple aspect of our nature, then we ... YEHUDA BERG Words are singularly the most powerful force available to humanity. We can choose to use this force ... YEHUDA BERG The bottom line is: We must be working on arriving at the destination for which we were put on this ... YEHUDA BERG As children, our imaginations are vibrant, and our hearts are open. We believe that the bad guy alwa... YEHUDA BERG At any given moment, it's not about where we are supposed to be. It's about what work, which... YEHUDA BERG Kabbalah is all about change. It isn't about being proud of our good qualities: the wisdom is ab... YEHUDA BERG In the not so distant past, we were close enough to our community to physically see how our actions ... YEHUDA BERG We need to have complete certainty that things will work out, not because we are righteous or wise, ... YEHUDA BERG God never answers prayers. It is people who answer their own prayers by knowing how to connect and u... YEHUDA BERG Change is inevitable. Things absolutely cannot stay the same. The type of change we invoke is up to ... YEHUDA BERG If you are messing around all day and then scream for certainty, you're not going to get it. If ... YEHUDA BERG Thou shalt not be a victim, thou shalt not be a perpetrator, but, above all, thou shalt not be a bys... YEHUDA BAUER The problem with certainty is that sometimes it can sound cold and heartless, although it is the mos... YEHUDA BERG Love is a weapon of Light, and it has the power to eradicate all forms of darkness. That is the key.... YEHUDA BERG Ego is one of the biggest weapons that is used to take us down. It's self-destructive. It's ... YEHUDA BERG In truth, we are all part of the team of humanity. And as such, we are all obligated to share oursel... YEHUDA BERG My heart in the East But the rest of me far in the West— How can I savor this life, ev... YEHUDA HALEVI Men who hit do so because they can...someplace they enjoy or need to humiliate another. There is no ... NA'AMA YEHUDA The only things that last are love and hate. The only one that matters is love: Choose love. Hate er... NA'AMA YEHUDA