I walked out to brood on this life of ours, which seems from birth to death to be a steady loss, disguised by sudden gains and happiness, which persuade us of good fortune, when all the while the glass is emptying.

…I noticed a woman whose face was a sea voyage I had not the courage to attempt.

Writing has to have a great deal of certainty and self-assurance, but it's not arrogant.

I am good at walking away. Rejection teaches you how to reject.

Poets will never be the highest-paid writers in the world. Instead, poetry will go on cutting a hand-made path through the mass-market insanity. For me, anyway, that path is the one that leads to the Chapel of the Grail.

There are only three possible endings -aren't there? - to any story: revenge, tragedy or forgiveness. That's it. All stories end like that.

Each book is a different staging post on the writer's journey, and each book stands by itself, regardless of the writer's relationship to it.