"Blessings, Stevens; I stand with my back to grammar At an altar you never aspired to, celebrating the sacrament of the imagination whose high-priest notwithstanding you are."

"somewhere within sight of the tree of poetry that is eternity wearing the green leaves of time."

"What was the shell doing, on the shore? An ear endlessly drinking? What? Sound? Silence? Which came first? Listen."

"R. S. Thomas continues to articulate through his poetry questions that are inscribed on the heart of most Christian pilgrims in their search for meaning and truth. We search for God and feel Him near at hand, only then to blink and find Him gone. This poetry persuades us that we are not alone in this experience of faith — the poet has been there before us."

"I turn now not to the Bible but to Wallace Stevens"

"Art is recuperation from time. I lie back convalescing upon the prospect of a harvest already at hand."

"In the silence that is his chosen medium of communication and telling others about it in words. Is there no way not to be the sport of reason?"

"I had looked forward to old age as a time of quietness, a time to draw my horizons about me, to watch memories ripening in the sunlight of a walled garden. But there is the void over my head and the distance within that the tireless signals come from. And astronaut on impossible journeys to the far side of the self I return with messages I cannot decipher."

"Is there a place here for the spirit? Is there time on this brief platform for anything other than mind's failure to explain itself?"

"I am not notably frivolous, but whenever I read R. S. Thomas’s poetry, or his biography, I cannot help but reflect that, like the majority of mankind, I have spent most of my life chasing false gods."

"Ah, what balance is needed at the edges of such an abyss. I am left alone on the surface of a turning planet. What to do but, like Michelangelo’s Adam, put my hand out into unknown space, hoping for the reciprocating touch?"

"It was not I who lived, but life rather that lived me."

"It is alive. It is you, God. Looking out I can see no death. The earth moves, the sea moves, the wind goes on its exuberant journeys. Many creatures reflect you, the flowers your color, the tides the precision of your calculations. There is nothing too ample for you to overflow, nothing so small that your workmanship is not revealed."

"The darkness is the deepening shadow of your presence; the silence a process in the metabolism of the being of love."

"Life is not hurrying on to a receding future, nor hankering after an imagined past. It is the turning aside like Moses to the miracle of the lit bush, to a brightness that seemed as transitory as your youth once, but is the eternity that awaits you."

"Deliver me from the long drought of the mind. Let leaves from the deciduous Cross fall on us, washing us clean, turning our autumn to gold by the affluence of their fountain."

"It is too late to start For destinations not of the heart. I must stay here with my hurt."

"The deep spaces between stars, Fathomless as the cold shadow His mind cast."

"Sometimes a strange light shines, purer than the moon, casting no shadow, that is the halo upon the bones of the pioneers who died for truth."

"She is young. Have I the right Even to name her? Child, It is not love I offer Your quick limbs, your eyes; Only the barren homage Of an old man whom time Crucifies."

"There is blood in my veins That has run clear of the stain Contracted in so many loins."

"Why, then, are my hands red with the blood of so many dead? Is this where I was misled?"

"Why are my hands this way That they will not do as i say? Does no God hear when I pray?"

"I am like a tree, From my top boughs I can see The footprints that led up to me."

"Is a museum Peace? I asked. Am I the keeper Of the heart's relics, blowing the dust In my own eyes? I am a man; I never wanted the drab role Life assigned me, an actor playing To the past's audience upon a stage Of earth and stone; the absurd label Of birth, of race hanging askew About my shoulders. I was in prison Until you came; your voice was a key Turning in the enormous lock Of hopelessness. Did the door open To let me out or yourselves in?"

"There was a larger pattern we worked at: they on a big loom, I with a small needle."

"I am a man now. Pass your hand over my brow. You can feel the place where the brains grow."

"I have nowhere to go. The swift satellites show The clock of my whole being is slow."

"We live in our own world, A world that is too small For you to stoop and enter Even on hands and knees, The adult subterfuge."

"You cannot find the centre Where we dance, where we play, Where life is still asleep Under the closed flower, Under the smooth shell Of eggs in the cupped nest That mock the faded blue Of your remoter heaven."

"All right, I was Welsh. Does it matter? I spoke a tongue that was passed on To me in the place I happened to be, A place huddled between grey walls Of cloud for at least half the year. My word for heaven was not yours. The word for hell had a sharp edge Put on it by the hand of the wind Honing, honing with a shrill sound Day and night. Nothing that Glyn Dwr Knew was armour against the rain's Missiles. What was descent from him?"

"I have known exile and a wild passion Of longing changing to a cold ache. King, beggar and fool, I have been all by turns, Knowing the body’s sweetness, the mind’s treason; Taliesin still, I show you a new world, risen, Stubborn with beauty, out of the heart’s need."

"Was he balked by silence? He kneeled long, And saw love in a dark crown Of thorns blazing, and a winter tree Golden with fruit of a man's body."

"I have been all men known to history, Wondering at the world and at time passing; I have seen evil, and the light blessing Innocent love under a spring sky."

"Even God had a Welsh name: He spoke to him in the old language; He was to have a peculiar care For the Welsh people. History showed us He was too big to be nailed to the wall Of a stone chapel, yet still we crammed him Between the boards of a black book."

"I have been Merlin wandering in the woods Of a far country, where the winds waken Unnatural voices, my mind broken By a sudden acquaintance with man’s rage."

"A slow singer, but loading each phrase With history’s overtones, love, joy And grief learned by his dark tribe In other orchards and passed on Instinctively as they are now, But fresh always with new tears."

"He arose, pacing the floor Strewn with books, his mind big with the poem Soon to be born, his nerves tense to endure The long torture of delayed birth."

"A power guided my hand. If an invisible company waited to see what I would do, I in my own way asked for direction, so we should journey together a little nearer the accomplishment of the design."

"Yet men sought us despite this. My high cheek-bones, my length of skull Drew them as to a rare portrait By a dead master. I saw them stare From their long cars, as I passed knee-deep In ewes and wethers. I saw them stand By the thorn hedges, watching me string The far flocks on a shrill whistle. And always there was their eyes; strong Pressure on me: You are Welsh, they said; Speak to us so; keep your fields free Of the smell of petrol, the loud roar Of hot tractors; we must have peace And quietness."

"[From paragraph 193] Because they have showed no willingness to change, I feel that I need to make sure that this unlawful behaviour is exposed, because obviously I don't want anybody else going through the same thing that I've been going through on a personal level. But also, on a national level as, at the moment, our country is judged globally by the state of our press and our government – both of which I believe are at rock bottom. Democracy fails when your press fails to scrutinise and hold the government accountable, and instead choose to get into bed with them so they can ensure the status quo."

"[From paragraph 191] They claim to hold public figures to account, but refuse to hold themselves accountable. If they're supposedly policing society, who on earth is policing them, when even the government Is scared of alienating them because position is power. It is incredibly worrying for the entire UK."

"[From paragraph 194] Unfortunately, as a consequence of me bringing my Mirror Group claim, both myself and my wife have been subjected to a barrage of horrific personal attacks and intimidation from Piers Morgan, who was the Editor of the Daily Mirror between 1995 and 2004, presumably in retaliation and in the hope that I will back down, before being able to hold him properly accountable for his unlawful activity towards both me and my mother during his editorship."

"My penis was oscillating between extremely sensitive and borderline traumatized. The last place I wanted to be was Frostnipistan. I’d been trying some home remedies, including one recommended by a friend. She’d urged me to apply Elizabeth Arden cream. 'My mum used that on her lips. You want me to put that on my todger?' "It works, Harry. Trust me." I found a tube, and the minute I opened it the smell transported me through time. I felt as if my mother was right there in the room. Then I took a smidge and applied it...down there."

"[From paragraph 191] I fully accept and agree with the fact that journalists and the media own the public square, in as much as, if you are in a position of responsibility and or are funded by the taxpayer, the media should have the power to be able to investigate anyone, anytime, for pretty much anything. The problem is that, over the last 15 to 20 years, there are now incredibly powerful media companies who masquerade as journalists and who have, quite literally, hijacked journalistic privileges for their own personal gain and agenda, It’s an unbelievably dangerous place."

"I'm not the important one. It doesn't matter what I do."

"I'm not going to be some person in the Royal Family who just finds a lame excuse to go abroad and do all sorts of sunny holidays and whatever."

"Where I can see myself is doing as much as I can in the position that I've got."

"I mean, I'll do the best I can."