One could say the higher the spirit goes, the more deeply the soul sinks down into the waters of melancholy and tragedy. Drowning in that water is as sweet as rising.

Be careful how quickly you give away your fire.

The distance between the adolescent and the true adult is about five thousand miles, but the distance between the adult and the elder is almost as large.

What I am trying to do is bring people into grief in relation to the society we have.

Hierarchy, as in the Catholic Church, has to do with power, and vertical attention has to do with longing.

I think that poetry is important when you are shipwrecked, when the ordinary structures that hold you up are gone.

It’s all right if you grow your wings on the way down.