The whole red state/blue state thing is very interesting. Watching that shift over the years.

I don't demonize the downside. As we've seen in Egypt and Tahrir square and other recent event, the adhesiveness through [technology] kinds of communication is extraordinary. Interesting times we live in.

As a younger person you can come in through many, many gateways. It's like some huge Mandela. You can enter into this and get refreshed.

We can think for ourselves and we can awaken the world to a greater consciousness.

I took my vow to poetry; this is where I'm going to be. These are my people; this is my tribe. This is where I'm going to put my energy.

For me poems are acts re-done, and that can vibrate well into the future.

When students are first at the Kerouac School we harp on Gertrude Stein's very basic poetic insistence that words are things . Not to invalidate your experience or all the great feelings you have, I tell them. Although poetry may be good for you, it's not therapy. You're making something with words which are visceral, muscular, active, not just markers of how you feel. And we have classes studying William Blake, Ezra Pound, Charles Olson, Robert Duncan, Stein.