I write to be recorder, observer, participant, and sometimes, even judge. I want to engage the world as I see it with my whole self - all of those different aspects of it.

I like when a poem ends on its "receipts," meaning it gives me something tactile or tangible to dwell on as I exit the reading experience. So I strive to end my own poems that way as well.

In terms of what I write about, I consider no subject too small. Often it's the small moments, that through the amplification of poetry, reveal the larger, more profound truths that we all come to recognize and treasure.

Young poets worry that their experiences - whether urban or rural, immigrant or native, small town, suburb, or big city - aren't worthy of the written word. But for me the urge toward poetry, that seductive feeling of being swept away by words, was enough for me to overcome that fear that my experiences weren't worthy of poetry itself.

I do bring my teaching together with my writing. I make students write in class, and do the same prompts I give them. I'm always on the lookout for teaching poems - poems that inspire me and my students to write poems in response.

Each poem seems to demand its own formal approach. In both drafting and revision, I'll play around with line lengths and stanza formations, eventually letting the poem settle into what I think is its own best form.

Editing is work, and it's hard to do while working on one's own writing.