I got $30 from Nation magazine for a poem and $500 for my first book of poems.

It is easy to forget that in the main we die only seven times more slowly than our dogs.

Being a writer requires an intoxication with language.

When we die we are only stories in the minds of others, I thought

Michigan is two radically different places - the North and the South which makes for good drama and contrast.

As an English major I was familiar with the stories of dozens of writers trying to get their work done among the multifarious diversions of the world and the hurdles of their own vices. A professor had said that what saved writers is that they, like politicians, had the illusion of destiny that allowed them to overcome obstacles no matter how nominal their work.

I can write anywhere.