We Americans are trained to think big, talk big, act big, love big, admire bigness but then the essential mystery is in the small.

I have closely noted that people who watch a great deal of TV never again seem able to adjust to the actual pace of life. The speed of the passing images becomes the speed the aspire to and they seem to develop an impatience and boredom with anything else.

We set this house on fire forgetting that we live within.

The answer is always in the entire story, not a piece of it.

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

I was on the verge of jumping into one of those holes in life out of which we emerge a bit tattered and bloody, though we remain sure nonetheless that we had to make the jump.

I can maintain my sense of the sacredness of existence only by understanding my own limitations and losing my self-importance.