Young writers only take off when they find their subjects. Since almost everyone has a family and stories about family, that is often a place to start.

Pound's translation of Chinese poetry was maybe the most important thing I read. Eliot a little bit later.

Southern poets are still writing narrative poems, poems in forms, dramatic poems.

The young people have MTV and rock and roll. Why would they go to read poetry? Poetry belongs to the Stone Age. It awakens in us perceptions that go back to those times.

I write as a way of keeping myself going. You build your life around writing, and it's what gets you through. So it's partly just curiosity to see what you can do.

I considered going to film school; I took a course in film and was very interested in filmmaking as well as film writing.

Maybe the example of Southern fiction writing has been so powerful that Southern poets have sort of keyed themselves to that.