Nothing is the destiny of everyone, it is our commonness made dumb.

Poems not only demand patience, they demand a kind of surrender. You must give yourself up to them. This is the real food for a poet: other poems, not meat loaf.

I haven’t met God and I haven’t been to heaven, so I’m skeptical.

From the reader's view, a poem is more demanding than prose.

I certainly can't speak for all cultures or all societies, but it's clear that in America, poetry serves a very marginal purpose. It's not part of the cultural mainstream.

In a field I am the absence of field. This is always the case. Wherever I am I am what is missing.

We all have reasons for moving. I move to keep things whole.