Mostly the thought and the verse come inseparably. In my poem Poetics, it's as close as I come to telling how I do it.

Once in awhile you have a thought, and you rhyme it.

[T]eaching has been for me an education (Lord knows what it has been for my students).

When modern writers gave up telling stories, they gave up the greatest thing we had.

I am not at all clear what free verse is anymore. That's one of the things you learn not to know.

Obvious enough that generalities work to protect the mind from the great outdoors; is it possible that this was in fact their first purpose?

I like all my children, even the squat and ugly ones.