These hands have Moulded monuments, created crafts, healed hearts. Khosi Xaba, from 'These Hands'

'here I am, on the edge of animation, / a dream, a dance, a fantastic construction'. Moniza Alvi

Here lies, whom hound did ne'er pursue, nor swifter greyhound follow, whose foot ne'er tainted morning dew, nor ear heard huntsman's halloo'. - William Cowper 'Epitaph on a hare'

Strands of autobiography, a deeply sensuous ecology of place, historical narratives; the inner world of imagination and the often difficult realities of the postcolonial nation are interwoven in McWatt's bold but carefully worked out architecture. Peepal Tree

My subject is War and the pity of War. The Poetry is in the pity. Wilfred Owen

The imagination is not a State: it is the Human existence itself. William Blake

Sitting around an old table/they drew lines across the map/dividing the place/I would call my country. Choman Hardi 'Lausanne, 1923'

The kind of poetry that imbues the everyday, the tarnished and burnished, with the possibilities of the transcendent - The Times

It was a world that I wanted to record because it was such a miracle visitation to me. - Laurie Lee

My father could only sign/His name, but he'd look at blueprints/& say how many bricks/ Formed each wall - My Father's Letters, Yusef Komunyakaa

Properly, we should read for power. Man reading should be man intensely alive. The book should be a ball of light in one's hand. - Ezra Pound

I believe even 5-year-olds can get something from a Shakespearean sonnet...as long as you DON'T tell them, 'This is really hard.' - Rita Dove