If you know what you're looking for, the illustrations might give you a tip about what is coming in that section. But it takes a lot of study and familiarity with the work for anyone to really "decode" it, and there are also images that are just thematically important, and not necessarily pointing to specific poems, so mainly it was just a fun puzzle for ourselves.

My first performance poem was about how sometimes I was teased for being manly, or a tomboy or whatever. It was saying how just because I looked a certain way and displayed myself a certain way didn't mean that I wasn't also a feminine human...a woman if you will.

I fell in love with poetry through storytelling, so my poetry tends to be fairly narrative. I like characters, I like having a beginning, middle, and ending, though not necessarily in that order.

Most days it feels as if the world is whirling around me and I am standing still. In slow motion, I watch the colors blur; people and faces all become a massive wash.

There are parts of me I only recognize from photographs.

Artistry is important. Skill, hard work, rewriting, editing, and careful, careful craft: All of these are necessary. These are what separate the beginners from experienced artists.

For some reason there's this myth that creativity - [especially] in terms of creative writing - is a gift you either have, or you don't. So when people first start writing, if they write something that's not very good, or if they try and it's difficult, they go, "Oh, I guess I don't have it." That doesn't seem very fair, you have to try and you have to work at it. If we get scared of one bad poem and quit, that's not doing anybody any good.