I have thought for many years that the audience any creative writer imagines has a great effect on what gets written.

I think my prose - mine and that of others - sometimes slips into a cadence or rhythm that can replicate or come close to the music in a wonderful poem, and then it returns to the sound of prose.

I do love writing prose interspersed with the poetry of other people. Their rhythms break into my prose and create a connection.

I love the language. I'm just totally fascinated by the sound and the look of words and the kinds of cadences you can create with them, the various kinds of music.

My object when writing prose is to write as clearly as possible. I think I know what I'm saying in prose, and I want others to understand it and to be able to restate it.

Ordering is very important with essays, even if a reader doesn't read the essays or the poems in order through the book...

I'm all in favor of poets telling about the process as much as they can. And many do.