I was apprehensive. I feared every time I talked about poetry, it would be filtered through the lens of race, sex, and age.

I loved to read, but I always thought that the dream was too far away. The person who had written the book was a god, it wasn't a person.

In fact, sometimes traveling the world is a way of not writing a poem, but it's the quality of experience. It's being able to experience something and when you begin to write about it be able to apply the tools that you need for writing.

I carry a notebook with me everywhere. But that's only the first step.

It really wasn't until I was in college when I began to write more and more, and I realized I was scheduling my entire life around my writing

Instead of trying to come up and pontificate on what literature is, you need to talk with children, to teachers, and make sure they get poetry in the curriculum early.

There are times in life when, instead of complaining, you do something about your complaints.