Within that moment was trust, compassion, and our mutual sense of irony. He was carrying death within him and I was carrying life. We were both aware of that, I know.

My mother answers all my fan mail.

If I have any regrets, I could say that I'm sorry I wasn't a better writer or a better singer.

People have the power to redeem the work of fools.

I wanted to go to Portland because it's a really good book town.

When I was home, traditionally since I was young, I'd write in cafés. That was the romantic notion in 1963. Café atmospheres back then were different. The café life really stemmed from the Parisians' idea of it, with poets struggling over their poems and drinking coffee. No music, no sounds, maybe a little jazz, or soul, but mostly nothing. Now you go into a café and the music is really loud, people are having business meetings, they are on their cellphones. It changes from generation to generation.

I knew if I lived long enough I would be poet laureate of something.