We're all writing out of a wound, and that's where our song comes from. The wound is singing. We're singing back to those who've been wounded.

I love people and psychology. As a writer, I’m not so interested in Fred getting from the living room to the car. I want to go inside Fred’s soul and play there.

The more that accrues, the more depth, weight, and breadth we can bring to the poems, which we then need to throw overboard so we don't sink.

It's difficult to talk about [W.S.] Merwin's poems, as it's hard to talk about a feeling or a smell. It is what it is, but so much so that it overwhelms both sense and the senses. I aspire to something about his work, that imbues his poems, though I'm not sure I could say what that is. A purity, maybe, the kind of purity that comes from being beaten, like steel.

Every good poem asks a question, and every good poet asks every question.

Good writing works from a simple premise: your experience is not yours alone, but in some sense a metaphor for everyone's.

Someone spoke to me last night,/ told me the truth. Just a few words,. but I recognized it./ I knew I should make myself get up,/ Write it down, but it was late,/ and I was exhausted from working/ all day in the garden, moving rocks./ Now, I remember only the flavor--/ not like food, sweet or sharp./ More like a fine powder, like dust./ And I wasn't elated or frightened,/ but simply rapt, aware./ That's how it is sometimes--/ God comes to your window,/ all bright light and black wings,/ and you're just too tired to open it.