Christmas is taken very seriously in this household. I believe in Father Christmas, and there's no way I'd do anything to undermine that belief.

I like to use simple words, but in a complicated way.

Poets deal in writing about feelings and trying to find the language and images for intense feelings.

For me, poetry is the music of being human. And also a time machine by which we can travel to who we are and to who we will become.

You can find poetry in your everyday life, your memory, in what people say on the bus, in the news, or just what's in your heart.

Poetry, above all is a series of intense moments ­ its power is not in narrative. I'm not dealing with facts, I'm dealing with emotion.

I write quite a lot of sonnets, and I think of them almost as prayers: short and memorable, something you can recite.

Poetry and prayer are very similar.

It is a moon wrapped in brown paper.

Like the sand and the oyster, it's a creative irritant. In each poem, I'm trying to reveal a truth, so it can't have a fictional beginning.

When you have a child, your previous life seems like someone else's. It's like living in a house and suddenly finding a room you didn't know was there, full of treasure and light.

Hate the sin, not the sinner, isn't that what good people say? Or are you asking yourself at what point does the sin overtake the sinner?

I've a regard for law, although I do not always agree with it. Without law, man becomes a beast.

By all but the pathologically romantic, it is now recognized that this is not the age of the small man.

Our combat mission is ending, but our commitment to Iraq's future is not.

My father wasn't a cruel man. And I loved him. But he was a pretty tough character. His own father was even tougher - one of those Victorians, hard as iron - but my dad was tough enough.

Since you are like no other being ever created since the beginning of time, you are incomparable.

And then there's my Grandson: He's certainly got the music together, there's just no question about it.

I'm weird about fruity desserts like lemony, acidic, zesty... I don't like lemon things and orange things, really.

Even just a normal shot I find that much more interesting because of the 3D. It's like a shot of a couple of cars and us walking and it's like, "Oh wow, this is 3D. I've never seen this before!".

You enrich people with creative resources, and over time, these Lego bricks that end up in their heads eventually build this enormous, incredible castle.