It's very important to write things down instantly, or you can lose the way you were thinking out a line. I have a rule that if I wake up at 3 in the morning and think of something, I write it down. I can't wait until morning - it'll be gone.

When will you have a little pity for every soft thing that walks through the world, yourself included.

I have a notion that if you are going to be spiritually curious, you better not get cluttered up with too many material things.

Poetry is a life-cherishing force.

I think one thing is that prayer has become more useful, interesting, fruitful, and... almost involuntary in my life.

I got saved by poetry. And I got saved by the beauty of the world.

And it is exceedingly short, his galloping life. Dogs die so soon. I have my stories of that grief, no doubt many of you do also. It is almost a failure of will, a failure of love, to let them grow old-or so it feels. We would do anything to keep them with us, and to keep them young. The one gift we cannot give.