Honor the miraculousness of the ordinary.

Each sudden gust of light explains itself as flames, but neither they, nor even bombs redoubled on the hills tonight can quite include me in their fear.

But Wordsworth is the poet I admire above all others.

In a fragile environment, we need to be aware of ourselves as members of a uniquely powerful species living among other species who are quite as interesting as we are but vulnerable to us because we are cleverer in more destructive ways.

I am writing more than I have ever done. My life has come back to me in the most extraordinary way.

But in a lot of ways my poems are very conventional, and it's no big deal for me to write a poem in either free verse or strict form; modern poets can, and do, do both.

I get up at 5.30am, sluice myself and have two Weetabix and some mint tea, before starting to write by 6am.