When I look at my life there are these streams, these things that have continuity from the fifties to now.

I think the idea of the lone tormented artist - which we can apply to others - I think that it needs to be revisited. Jack Kerouac needs to be seen in the context of a lot of other artistic activity.

I'm drawn to the magical efficacies of language as a political act.

I hope I'm not implying role of contemporary poet for myself, although there's a kind of resonant paradigm. It's traditionally a difficult role.

The music is notated first, the text follows. I might have to wait until the right kind of text or form arises. I often see the poems as “scores.”

I was raised with a sense of democratic vistas and egalitarianism.

There is a pretty interesting document called 'action writing.' Which is not all about spontaneity and first thought, best thought,' but a certain kind of attention to the smallest increments of the phonemes of language, The kind of power of connection, what he is able to do with language.