Human suffering is articulated in language; communication is how we seek help, consolation, etc.

I like to move around in the landscape between poetry and prose, between the lyrical and the narrative.

Revision is a good impulse to have.

One of the things I'm constantly telling my students is that they're never going to write a poem everyone gets, or if they do, they've failed. They should leave someone behind every time.

Publishers have in-house editors, but I hire my own before I submit the work to publishers. They appreciate it and I feel more confident about the material.

I never try to force poems into a collection simply because they were written/published within a certain period of time. They will eventually find their perfect home.

Human suffering is articulated in language; communication is how we seek help, consolation, etc.