Go to thy little senseless play; thou dost not heed my lay. - Joanna Baillie 'A Mother To Her Waking Infant'

Deep in heart-wrung tears I'll pledge thee, warring sighs and groans I'll wage thee. - Robert Burns 'Song: ae fond kiss and then we sever'

The owl from the steeple sing, 'Welcome, proud lady.' - Walter Scott 'Proud Maisie'

Herbert takes on the major forms of ode and elegy, adding satire, comedy and the ancient Scottish tradition of extended insult, as well as modes still undefined. - Sean O'Brien

What we cannot speak about we must

Birthcries repeatedly / new, self pull out self, self / issuing that self home - Vahni Capildeo, 'On Not Writing as a West Indian Woman'

Technical mastery and fresh, unrehearsed sensibility - The Times

Who wants to know / a story's end, or where a road will go? - Sheenagh Pugh, 'What If This Road'

As activities, writing poetry and climbing have few connections, apart from a heightened sense of being and awareness, of being fully engaged. Andrew Greig

A poet of striking originality and cunning, a genuinely distinctive voice in the murmur and babble of the contemporary - Neil Corcoran

I travelled, however, mainly to find places to come to rest in, places to write in, oases.

Among the finest of our poets. - Melvyn Bragg