Unicorn Poetry and Quotes

"I have forgotten that men cannot see Unicorns.
If men no longer know what they're looking at,
there may be other unicorns in the world yet, unknown.
I'm glad of it."

~Peter S. Beagle; The Last Unicorn

The Unicorn with the long white horn
     Is beautiful and wild.
He gallops across the forest green
So quickly that he's seldom seen
Where Peacocks their blue feathers preen
     And strawberries grow wild.
He flees the hunter and the hounds,
Upon black earth his white hoof pounds,
Over cold mountain streams he bounds
     And comes to a meadow mild;
There, when he kneels to take his nap,
He lays his head in a lady's lap
     As gently as a child.

~William Jay Smith

Jim: What kind of thing is this one supposed to be?
Laura: Haven't you noticed the single horn on its
forehead?
Jim: A unicorn, huh?
Laura: Mmmm-hmmm.
Jim: Unicorns, aren't they extinct in the modern
world?
Laura: I know!
Jim: Poor little fellow, he must feel sorta lonesome.

~Tennessee Williams, The Glass Menagerie

While yet the Morning Star
Flamed in the sky
A unicorn went mincing by,
Whiter by far than blossom of the thorn:
His silver horn
Glittered as he danced and pranced
Silver-pale in the silver-pale morn.
The folk that saw him, ran away.
Where he went, so gay, so fleet,
Star-like lilies at his feet
Flowered all day,
Lilies, lilies in a throng,
And the wind made for him a song:
But he dared not stay
Over-long!

~Ella Young

The unicorns were the most recognizable magic the fairies possessed,and they sent them to those worlds where belief in the magic was in danger of failing altogether. After all, there has to be some belief in the magic, however small, for any world to survive.

~Terry Brooks, The Black Unicorn

"The unicorn, she said, was a marvelous beast, shining with honor, wisdom and strength. Just to see him strengthens the soul."

~Mega Lindolm; The Unicorn in the Maze

This is the creature there has never been.
They never knew it, and yet, none the less,
They loved the way it moved, its suppleness,
its neck, its very gaze, mild and serene.
Not there, because they loved it, it behaved as though it were.
They always left some space.
And in that clear unpeopled space they saved it lightly reared its head,
with scarce a trace of not being there.

They fed it, not with corn, but only with the possibility of being.
And that was able to confer such strength, its brow put forth a horn.
One horn.
Whitely it stole up to a maid -- to be within the silver mirror and in her.

~Ranier Maria Rilke, Possibility of Being © New Directions Publishing Corp

"The question of historicity and actuality with regard to gods and unicorns is a relatively trifling matter which may be left to antiquarians and biologists, for both god and the unicorn had a business to perform greater than any mere existence in the flesh could explain or provide a basis for."

~Odell Shepard; The Lore of the Unicorn

"To this day, it is said, malicious animals poison this water after sundown, so that none can thereupon drink it. But early in the morning, as soon as the sun rises, a unicorn comes out of the ocean, dips his horn into the water to expel the venom from it so that the other animals may drink thereof during the day. This as I describe it. I saw it with my own eyes."

~Johannes van Hesse of Utrecht; 1389

Some things you have to believe to see

~ Author Unknown

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fantasy courtesy of Fantasy Midis

Poetry and quotations copyrighted by their respective authors.

The graphics are my own.