Clarity, clarity, surely clarity is the most beautiful thing in the world, A limited, limiting clarity I have not and never did have any motive of poetry But to achieve clarity.

The self is no mystery, the mystery is / That there is something for us to stand on

Those who are not very concerned with art want poems or pictures to record for them something they already know - as one might want a picture of a place he loves.

The meaning of a poem is in the cadences and the shape of the lines and the pulse of the thought which is given by those lines.

Things explain each other, not themselves.

It is necessary to study these words you have written, for the words have a longer history than you have and say more than you know.

There are situations which cannot honorably be met by art.

The first question at that time in poetry was simply the question of honesty, of sincerity.

A pure mathematical series would be one in which each term is derived from the preceding term by a rule.

[It is not] the poet's business to use verse as an advanced form of rhetoric, nor to give to political statements the aura of eternal truth.

The journey not the arrival matters.

The most successful families embrace and elevate their family history, particularly their failures, setbacks and other missteps.

Most of what I listen to now is mainstream jazz from 1935 right up to and including early bebop and cool jazz.

America will tolerate the taking of a human life without giving it a second thought. But don't misuse a household pet.

Xena, I'll always love you, but I know I have to let you go.

In my day job, I worry non-stop about making wise investments for long-term gains.

Summer night-- even the stars are whispering to each other.

A man who tells nothing, or who tells all, will equally have nothing told him.

I wanted to tell stories about people who didn't have the chance to tell their own.

(Sarah Palin's) greatest hypocrisy is in her pretense that she is a woman.