A poem really does recreate the language, and that's what it has to do. A true poem, I think, has to give you that shiver. That, "yes, it's never been said quite that way before."

I have my faithful rhyming dictionary that sits up there on my desk, but I have to tell you, there are very few new rhymes that I didn't think of. I often just go right through the alphabet in my head when I'm looking for a rhyme.

I write a lot of children's verse and I think it delights in the language. It pleases people. It's very musical. It's very lyrical and that's certainly a very important aspect of poetry. But I think that a lot of it is verse. I write well-wrought verse.

I've always been a morning person, and what I don't get done in the morning I really don't get done at all.

When things aren't going well, I complain a lot and get depressed. I whine and I eat and I go to sleep. I do all kinds of things. And if I'm smart, I'll go and clean out a drawer or a closet or go and pay my bills. I do get myself into situations where I'm not happy with what's going on. But you just have to wait it out and have faith that that dry well will fill up again.

To me, poetry is a recreation, a renewal of language... The subtlety of what words mean and the fact that you write something and all of a sudden you'll realize that "yes, it reaches out. It meant that, too." Then all of a sudden you'll get a rhyme and the rhyme will throw up a whole new way of looking at things. It's this relationship that you never dreamed of.

I love to be read to, I love to read aloud and I love to read to children.