[To write poems] I think it's important to do research, and research mostly is going to come from books, so all of your reading is potentially helpful to your poetry.

and sometimes I sit down at my typewriter and I think not of someone cause there isn't anyone to think about and i wonder is it worth it

It's not a ladder we're climbing, it's literature we're producing. . . . We cannot possibly leave it to history as a discipline nor to sociology nor science nor economics to tell the story of our people.

And you will understand all too soon That you, my children of battle, are your heroes

Poetry is the most informative of all of the arts because everything comes down to poetry. No matter what it is we are describing, ultimately we use either a metaphor; or we say "that's poetry in motion." You drink a glass of wine and say, "that's poetry in a bottle." Everything is poetry, so I think we come down to emotional information. And that's what poetry conveys.

I have not tried to tell the people anything. I have shared my views with the people but I have not tried to lead or correct them, assuming they need correction.

Violence is like money in the bank; it's only helpful if you don't have to use it.