When I began to dare to be clear, because I think clarity is the real risk in poetry because you are exposed. You're out in the open field. You're actually saying things that are comprehensible, and it's easy to criticize something you can understand.

You will always be the bread and the knife, not to mention the crystal goblet and—somehow—the wine.

While the novelist is banging on his typewriter, the poet is watching a fly in the windowpane.

I think what gets a poem going is an initiating line. Sometimes a first line will occur, and it goes nowhere; but other times - and this, I think, is a sense you develop - I can tell that the line wants to continue. If it does, I can feel a sense of momentum - the poem finds a reason for continuing.

Radio is such a perfect medium for the transmission of poetry, primarily because there just is the voice, there's no visual distraction.

The trouble with poetry is that it encourages the writing of more poetry.

And I should mention the light which falls through the big windows this time of day italicizing everything it touches.