"The art of losing isn't hard to master;
so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster.

Lose something every day. Accept the fluster
of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

Then practice losing farther, losing faster:
places, and names, and where it was you meant
to travel. None of these will bring disaster.

I lost my mother's watch. And look! my last, or
next-to-last, of three loved houses went.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,
some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.
I miss them, but it wasn't a disaster.

---Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture
I love) I shan't have lied. It's evident
the art of losing's not too hard to master
though it may look like (Write it!) like disaster."
— Elizabeth Bishop (One Art: Letters)

"Open the book. (The gilt rubs off the edges of the pages and pollinates the fingertips.)"
— Elizabeth Bishop

"But he sleeps on the top of his mast
with his eyes closed tight.
The gull inquired into his dream,
which was, "I must not fall.
The spangled sea below wants me to fall.
It is hard as diamonds; it wants to destroy us all."
"
— Elizabeth Bishop

"If after I read a poem the world looks like that poem for 24 hours or so I'm sure it's a good one—and the same goes for paintings. "
— Elizabeth Bishop

"I knew that nothing stranger
had ever happened, that nothing
stranger could ever happen."
— Elizabeth Bishop

"I was made at right angles to the world
and I see it so. I can only see it so."
— Elizabeth Bishop (Poems, Prose and Letters)

"Icebergs behoove the soul (both being self-made from elements least visible) to see themselves: fleshed, fair, erected, indivisible."
— Elizabeth Bishop

" Each night he must
be carried through artificial tunnels and dream recurrent dreams.
Just as the ties recur beneath his train, these underlie
his rushing brain. He does not dare look out the window,
for the third rail, the unbroken draught of poison,
runs there beside him. He regards it as a disease
he has inherited the susceptibility to. He has to keep
his hands in his pockets, as others must wear mufflers.
"
— Elizabeth Bishop (The Complete Poems, 1927-1979)

"Dreams were the worst. Of course I dreamed of food
and love, but they were pleasant rather
than otherwise. But then I'd dream of things
like slitting a baby's throat, mistaking it
for a baby goat. I'd have
nightmares of other islands
stretching away from mine, infinities
of islands, islands spawning islands,
like frogs' eggs turning into polliwogs
of islands, knowing that I had to live
on each and every one, eventually,
for ages, registering their flora,
their fauna, their geography."
— Elizabeth Bishop (Geography III: Poems)

"--Even losing you (a joking voice, a gesture/ I love) I shan't have lied. It's evident/ the art of losing's not too hard to master/ though it may look like (Write it!) like disaster."
— Elizabeth Bishop

"The art of losing isn't hard to master;
so many things seemed filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster"
— Elizabeth Bishop (The Complete Poems, 1927-1979)

"Is it right to be watching strangers in a play / in this strangest of theatres? / What childishness is it that while there's a breath of life / in our bodies, we are determined to rush / to see the sun the other way around? "
— Elizabeth Bishop

"Oh, must we dream our dreams
and have them, too?"
— Elizabeth Bishop (Questions of Travel)

"The art of losing isn't hard to master."
— Elizabeth Bishop