And who has greater sense, but greater sorrow shares? - Anne Finch, 'The hog, the sheep and the goat, carrying to a fair'

For I will consider my Cat Jeoffry. For he is the servant of the Living God, duly and daily serving him. - Christopher Smart 'My cat Jeoffrey'

What on Earth deserves our trust? Youth and Beauty both are dust. - Katherine Philips 'Epitaph'

Adventurous, compelling and utterly original - The Times

His poetry is what all poetry should be, the surprising and beautiful organisation of things that life has disorganised. John Fuller

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

Woman! too long degraded, scorned, opprest; / O born to rule in partial Law's despite, / Resume thy native empire o'er the breast! Anna Laetitia Barbauld, 'The Rights of Women'

'No entertainment is so cheap as reading, nor any pleasure so lasting.' Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

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

I don't want to be one of those ivory tower writers; I want to affect people's lives.

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

Master of Music / Let my voice be / Clear as he dreamed it / Who fashioned me - 'The Violin Speaks', Ruth Gilbert