Young writers find their first audience in little magazines, and experimental writers find their only audience there.

The great watershed of modern poetry is French, more than English.

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.

Some people want to call me an Appalachian writer, even though I know some people use regional labels to belittle.

I tell students they will know they are getting somewhere when a scene is so painful they can just barely bring themselves to write about it. A writer has to draw blood.

Neither of my parents has been very sensitive about my writing.

You have to really dive deep back into yourself and get rid of so much modern analytical categorization. It's one of the great things poetry does.