There are two kinds of writers: hustlers and sanctimonious hustlers.

Animals are stylized characters in a kind of old saga - stylized because even the most acute of them have little leeway as they play out their parts.

We New Yorkers see more death and violence than most soldiers do, grow a thick chitin on our backs, grimace like a rat and learn to do a disappearing act. Long ago we outgrew the need to be blowhards about our masculinity; we leave that to the Alaskans and Texans, who have more time for it.

True solitude is a din of birdsong, seething leaves, whirling colors, or a clamor of tracks in the snow.

Poetry is engendered in solitude, so what better meter for it than the clip of a buckskin horse?

Men greet each other with a sock on the arm, women with a hug, and the hug wears better in the long run.

It's incongruous that the older we get, the more likely we are to turn in the direction of religion. Less vivid and intense ourselves, closer to the grave, we begin to conceive of ourselves as immortal.