I think that good writing is based on good reading. Maybe it's not about writing today, maybe it's about reading today. Maybe it's about finding the sort of book you would never read.

More people than ever are slowly but surely turning their ears toward poetry

I think we fool ourselves and really negate a great deal of history if we think that the oral history of poetry is shorter than the written history of poetry. It's not true. Poetry has a longer oral tradition than it does written

Сommercial hip-hop is not youth rebellion, not when the heroes of hip-hop like Puffy are taking pictures with Donald Trump and the heroes of capitalism - you know that's not rebellion. That's not "the street" - that's Wall Street.

You change the beat up, you might change the way people dance to the music. If you change the way they move, maybe they'll think about it differently.

Jay Z and President Bush have a lot in common, that same brash confidence

she stuck a bookmark in my heart and walked away