The Cantos Quotes

“The temple is holy because it is not for sale.”
― Ezra Pound, The Cantos

“M'amour, m'amour
what do I love and
where are you?
That I lost my center
fighting the world
The Dreams clash
and are shattered-
and that I tried to make a paradiso
terrestre.

I have tried to write Paradise
Do not move
Let the wind speak
that is paradise
Let the Gods forgive what I
have made
Let those I love try to forgive
what I have made.”
― Ezra Pound, The Cantos

“where the dead walked
and the living were made of cardboard.”
― Ezra Pound, The Cantos

“Hate is not born in the trenches
nor among 2nd. lieutenants.”
― Ezra Pound, The Cantos

“O woman shapely as a swan,
Your gunmen tread on my dreams”
― Ezra Pound, The Cantos

“She is submarine, she is an octopus, she is
A biological process,
So Arnaut turned there
Above him the wave pattern cut in the stone
Spire-top alevel the well-curb
And the tower with cut stone above that, saying,
"I am afraid of the life after death."
and after a pause:
"Now, at least, I have shocked him.”
― Ezra Pound, The Cantos

“Time, space,
neither life nor death is the answer.
And of man seeking good, doing evil.
In meiner Heimat where the dead walked
and the living were made of cardboard.

Ezra Pound, from "Canto CXV" (The Cantos of Ezra Pound)”
― Ezra Pound, The Cantos

“Under white clouds, cielo di Pisa. Out of all this beauty something must come.”
― Ezra Pound, The Cantos

“that the body of light come forth
from the body of fire
And that your eyes come to the surface
from the deep wherein they were sunken,
Reina -- for 300 years,
and now sunken
That your eyes come forth from their caves”
― Ezra Pound, The Cantos

“The hells move in cycles,
No man can see his own end.
The Gods have not returned. "They have never left us."
They have not returned.”
― Ezra Pound, The Cantos

“2 young ladies to sing us the new liberty song
readiness to be shot / versus / taxes”
― Ezra Pound, The Cantos

“Never ", said Winston to his cousin
" waste time making munitions.
Be a GUN, and shoot other's munitions.
Don't waste time having ideas."
(cousin deeply impressed..but
did not achieve lasting preeminence)”
― Ezra Pound, The Cantos

“And if I see her not,
no sight is worth the beauty of my thought.”
― Ezra Pound, The Cantos

“Out of dark, thou, Father Helios, leadest,
but the mind as Ixion, unstill, ever turning.”
― Ezra Pound, The Cantos

“To communicate and then stop, that is the
law of discourse
To go far and come to an end”
― Ezra Pound, The Cantos

“no, your body-guard is not the
town executioner
the executioner is not here for the moment
the fellow who rides beside your coachman
is just a cossak who executes...”
― Ezra Pound, The Cantos

“The shadow of the tent's peak treads on its corner peg
marking the hour. The moon split, no cloud nearer than Lucca.
In the spring and autumn
In "The Spring and Autumn"
there
are
no
righteous
wars”
― Ezra Pound, The Cantos

“you sit tiller " said Kokka
" if whenever you move something jangles.”
― Ezra Pound, The Cantos

“Moon shone in an haze of colours
Water boiled in the wells, and died Tchao-ouang
to joy of the people.”
― Ezra Pound, The Cantos

“I would like to accept C. H.'s book
But it would make my own seem so out of date.
Heaven will protect
The lay reader.”
― Ezra Pound, The Cantos

“Could you", wrote Mr. Jefferson,
"Find me a gardener
Who can play the french horn?”
― Ezra Pound, The Cantos

“Fac deum!" "Est factus.”
― Ezra Pound, The Cantos

“to the end:
four fat oxen
having their arses wiped
and in general being tidied up to serve god under my window
with stoles of Imperial purple
with tassels, and grooms before the carroccio
on which carroch six lion heads
to receive the wax offering
Thus arrive the gold eagles, the banners of the contrade,
and boxes of candles
‘Mn-YAWWH!!!’
Said the left front ox, suddenly,
‘pnAWH!’ as they tied on his red front band,
St George, two hokey-pokey stands and the unicorn
‘Nicchio! Nicch-iO-né!!’
The kallipygous Sienese females
get that way from the salite
that is from continual plugging up hill
One box marked ‘200 LIRE’
‘laudate pueri’
alias serve God with candles
with the Palio and 17 banners
and when six men had hoisted up the big candle
a bit askew in the carroch and the fore ox had
been finally arse-wiped
they set off toward the Duomo, time
consumed 1 hour and 17 minutes.”
― Ezra Pound, The Cantos