One of the principle qualities of pain is that it demands an explanation.

You remember too much," my mother said to me recently. "Why hold onto all that?" And I said, "where can I put it down?

Men know almost nothing about desire, they think it has to do with sexual activity or can be discharged that way. But sex is a substitute, like money or language. Sometimes I just want to stop seeing.

Everything depends on liking the people and trusting the people. You have to assume that whatever they do will be as good as you want the thing to be and just go ahead with that.

Those nights lying alone are not discontinuous with this cold hectic dawn. It is who I am.

[Short Talk on Sylvia Plath] Did you see her mother on television? She said plain, burned things. She said I thought it an excellent poem but it hurt me. She did not say jungle fear. She did not say jungle hatred wild jungle weeping chop it back chop it. She said self-government she said end of the road. She did not say humming in the middle of the air what you came for chop.

Poetry - poiesis means a thing made.