Be tough in the way a blade of grass is: rooted, willing to lean, and at peace with what is around it.

When you are not writing, you are a writer too. It doesn't leave you.

Nobody cares much whether you write or not. You just have to do it

I read Eve Ensler and thought it was fabulous. Not only that, but it was really the only thing I could relate to about cancer.

It's okay to embark on writing because you think it will get you love. At least it gets you going, but it doesn't last. After a while you realize that no one cares that much. Then you find another reason: money. You can dream on that one while the bills pile up. Then you think: "Well, I'm the sensitive type. I have to express myself." Do me a favor. Don't be so sensitive. Be tough. It will get you further along when you get rejected. Finally, you just do it because you happen to like it.

Our lives are at once ordinary and mythical. At the same instant we have these magnificent hearts that pump through all sorrow and all winters we are alive on the earth.

Poems are taught as though the poet has put a secret key in his words and it is the reader's job to find it. Poems are not mystery novels.