Alchemy is the art of far and near, and I think poetry is alchemy in that way. It's delightful to distort size, to see something that's tiny as though it were vast.

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.

It was less a literary thing than a linguistic, philosophical preoccupation... discovering how far you can go with language to create immediate, elementary experience.

I have taught students from the New York City area so long I have a special affinity and rapport with them. It surprises me sometimes that there are students from anywhere else.

Distance not only gives nostalgia, but perspective, and maybe objectivity.

A lot of my students are Asian-American, and it has been thrilling to watch them break through the stereotypes into something alive and surprising.

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

I seem to keep returning to my father in poems because his personality was so extreme, so driven. He did everything to excess.

Fiction is about intimacy with characters, events, places.

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

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.

The more a species is rare the more we like and protect it... So what about humans?

When I get lemon juice in a cut..it hurts..but then I remember all who would die for that lemon I am quiet and take the pain for what it is... because that is what it is to live.

We need a new definition of malnutrition. Malnutrition means under- and over-nutrition. Malnutrition means emaciated and obese.

Every day I pray. I yield myself to God and the tensions and anxieties go out of me and peace and power come in.

What makes Will the best father in the world to me is that he's there, not just there in a way that's traditional. The emotional support he offers his children is immeasurable.

Oh, to be a center fielder, a center fielder- and nothing more

Intelligence is useful. Energy is valuable. Integrity is essential.

Grief even in a child hates the light and shrinks from human eyes.

Those who have suffered much become very bitter or very gentle.

History repeats itself in the large because human nature changes with geological leisureliness.