Traversing a slow page, to come upon a lode of the pure shining metal is to exult inwardly for greedy hours.

I wonder if children don't begin to reject both poetry and religion for similar reasons, because the way both are taught takes the life out of them.

In middle age we are apt to reach the horrifying conclusion that all sorrow, all pain, all passionate regret and loss and bitter disillusionment are self-made

This is a God who is not identified with the help of a dictionary but through a relationship.

Not money, or success, or position or travel or love makes happiness,--service is the secret.

Just the knowledge that a good book is waiting one at the end of a long day makes that day happier.

Poets are immersed in process, and I mean process not as an amorphous blur but as a discipline. The hard work of writing has taught me that in matters of the heart, such as writing, or faith, there is no right or wrong way to do it, but only the way of your life. Just paying attention will teach you what bears fruit and what doesn't. But it will be necessary to revise--to doodle, scratch out, erase, even make a mess of things--in order to make it come out right.