Often when I write I am trying to make words do the work of line and color. I have the painter's sensitivity to light. Much of my writing is verbal painting.

[A writer] should try not to be too far, personally, below the level of his work.

Every love has a poetic relevance of its own; each love brings to light only what to it is relevant. Outside lies the junk-yard of what does not matter.

But to be quite oneself one must first waste a little time.

What's the matter with this country is the matter with the lot of us individually - our sense of personality is a sense of outrage.

I can't see or feel the conflict between love and religion. To me, they're the same thing.

The silence of a shut park does not sound like country silence: it is tense and confined.