I always say that I'll have a go and see whether the poem works and if it does, then fine.

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.

Some things belong to the past.

I had to stop myself from laughing. Who needs help taking a pill?

Knowledge comes but wisdom lingers.

Indiscriminate tolerance and indiscriminate condemnation are not two opposites: they are two variants of the same evasion.

My dad was the biggest influence on my life because he was never boring.

And one of the frustrating parts, but it's an inherent part of our democracy, is we have separation of powers.

I have made a short excursion into the new world which the Indian dwells in, or is. He begins where we leave off.

This ain't fun. But you watch me, I'll get it done.

A rolling loan gathers no loss.

My father, who grew up picking olives on the Greek island of Lesbos, was a doctor. So my family expected me to become a physician.