A poem is a hand, a hook, a prayer. It is a soul in action.

But, that was the beginning, though I didn't start writing until I was in high school and when I was in high school I really began to write poetry with great energy and enthusiasm.

Now, that can be a traditional form or it can be something you're inventing. It can be the development of a metaphor, the working through of a metaphor.

And what I've found over time is that for me to write a poem that I think is worthy that I can live with, two things have to happen.

Often you've read another poem that you think is so beautiful that you'd like to make something like that. And so you try to make a sonnet that works in a certain kind of way, or you try to make something that's songlike, or you create a refrain, or you love the way a poem works in two line stanzas and you try to do that.

Works of art imitate and provoke other works of art, the process is the source of art itself.

The very good thing about MFA programs is their democratizing. They bring a lot of different people to the table.