We are born to bring light / To honour the blessing of each moment / The gift of every life - Malika Ndlovu

A thousand martyrs I have made, all sacrificed to my desire. - Aphra Behn 'A Thousand Martyrs'

With walking sick, with curtseys lame, and frighted by the scolding dame, poor Mira once again is seen within the bounds of Goslin-Green. - Mary Leapor 'The Visit'

Oh! let each mental feature proclaim the labour of the mind, and leave your charms to NATURE. - Mary Robinson, 'Female Fashions For 1799'

Lord teach wings how/in the stark silence of these evenings/ in the fine chiselled rock spaces/ to fold and nest... - 'After Heartease New England', Velma Pollard

God is the perfect poet.

In these times, we should be glad of this voice. - Kate Clanchy, The Guardian

I'm interested in the power mechanisms, personal and political and sometimes a combination of the two, that prevent people from speaking. Esther Morgan

Good poetry is like effective prayer, it feeds the human spirit, it nourishes, it puts us in touch with forces far greater than ourselves. Lorna Goodison

Louise Bogan's art is compactness compacted. Emotion with her, as she has said of certain fiction, is 'itself form, the kernel which builds outward form from inward intensity.' Marianne Moore

Good writing gives energy, whatever it is about. But the fact that writers are dealing with essential issues...I think that's a necessary integration of literary writing with what's actually going on in our world. - Marilyn Hacker

I am a poet who is a woman, not a woman poet. - Ruth Fainlight