My muse is very often, in my mind, a nagger. She nags me.

I was nine when I first knew I wanted to be a writer, in particular, a poet.

I don't like crows. In the poem "C," crows are predatory, killing other birds and so forth. But in my morning walks, there were always crows, particularly at certain times of the year. And they're very aggressive, very visible and loud. They're not at all likable, but they have to be dealt with. They are part of the picture, the art in the morning. You cannot deny their reality.

In the poem "C," the crows are associated with cancer, because I had suffered a cancer scare.

The poem is not a physical body. It's a textual body that has life only insofar as it can act symbolically. It cannot physically act.

Sometimes the taproot and the vines are far apart. Like English and the Asian poem.

When you're a female poet, would you, therefore, invoke a male muse? When nuns get consecrated into their vocations, they become brides of Christ. Christ is the bridegroom. In these symbolic actions, rather than in physical actions, where a male reaches sexuality or participates in intimate exchanges, if one uses a different term - there's often a heterosexual figuring that takes place. The male poet invokes a beautiful female muse. The virginal nun consecrated invokes the male bridegroom, Christ.