My ideal reader is somebody who reads my poems out loud.

Poetry isn't an efficient tool for preserving experience, any more than it's an efficient mode of communication, but who says that it should be efficient?

If poems very different from my own bring pleasure to a group of readers, who am I to say that the poems should have been written differently?

Start listening to what you say. Are your comments and ideas negative? You aren't going become positive if you always say negative things. Do you hear yourself say"I could never do that","I never have any luck","I never get things right". Wow - that's negative self-talk! Try saying"I am going to do that","I am so lucky""I always try to get things right". Can you hear how much better that sounds?

I'm a mix; I'm sure some of my Canadian friends find me very American, both in person and on the page.

Whenever I visit my family in Canada, I remind myself that what many Americans would consider forthright, many Canadians would consider overbearing.

William Shakespeare tried hard to see every facet of every question, probably because he was more interested in questions than in answers. That's a big part of what makes him great, in my opinion.