My brother and I were both teenage writers, and he was, I have to say, better than I was, but he went into science, and I went into writing.

Come away with me, he said, we will live on a desert island. I said, I am a desert island. It was not what he had in mind.

What a lost person needs is a map of the territory, with his own position marked on it so he can see where he is in relation to everything else.

More powerful than God, more evil than the Devil; the poor have it, the rich lack it, and if you eat it you die?

The only way you can write the truth is to assume that what you set down will never be read.

Write down the thoughts and even more, write down a specific line. If you don't, it'll fly away forever.

When I was sixteen, it was simple. Poetry existed; therefore it could be written; and nobody had told me — yet — the many, many reasons why it could not be written by me.