Cliches are lovely things, I think they say much that a rarer phrase cannot express, and in the common mind, the role they play, is one much filled with beauty and largess. When used discerningly within a verse their nuances of meaning are quite sweet, though writ unthinkingly they are a curse that seldom helps a poet find his feet. The poet who would make their light his own must keep such phrases constantly at hand and close his ears to critics as they moan, then with girded loins pick up his pen and rebel. Finding within a phrase that’s old some image, that while used, is good as gold.