The Collected Poems of Kathleen Raine Quotes

“Let my body sweat
Let snakes torment my breast
My eyes be blind, ears deaf, hands distraught
Mouth parched, uterus cut out,
Belly slashed, back lashed,
Tongue slivered into thongs of leather
Rain stones inserted in my breasts,
Head severed,

If only the lips may speak,
If only the god will come.”
― Kathleen Raine, The Collected Poems of Kathleen Raine

“Those fields of childhood, tall
Meadow-grass and flowers small,
The elm whose dusky leaves
Patterned the sky with dreams innumerable
And labyrinthine vein and vine
And wandering tendrils green,
Have grown a seed so small
A single thought contains them all”
― Kathleen Raine, The Collected Poems of Kathleen Raine

“Not this or that
But all is amiss,
That I have done,
And I have seen
Sin and sorrow
Befoul the world -
Release me, death,
Forgive, remove
From place and time
The trace of all
That I have been.”
― Kathleen Raine, The Collected Poems of Kathleen Raine

“I do not know
Whether I spoke or heard
The word
That fills all silence.”
― Kathleen Raine, The Collected Poems of Kathleen Raine