I'm reading a manuscript by Rodney Jones, "Village Prodigies",it's one of the best contemporary poetry books I've ever read ever.

Love doesn't need a reason. Hate needs a reason.

One writes a poem when one is so taken up by an emotional concept that one is unable to remain silent.

A poem is a window that hangs between two or more human beings who otherwise live in darkened rooms.

Actions have consequences. Ignorance about the nature of those actions does not free a person from responsibility for the consequences. (28)

I write poems to find out why I write them

It was as if pain were a room he had entered and the door had been locked behind him.

Each thing I do, I rush through, so I can do something else.

Baudelaire's L'Héautontimorouménos was long seen to be a sexual sadomasochistic poem, it is now generally accepted that the poem is about writing poetry.

I can't believe there is a poet who hasn't eagerly put down a word one day, only to erase it the next day deciding it was sheer lunacy. It's part of the process of selection.

Many of my poems try to use a comic element to reach a place that isn't comic at all. The comic element works as a surprise. It is unexpected and energizing.

You say ‘cure.’ I hear ‘you’re not human enough.

The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts ... take care that you entertain no notions unsuitable to virtue and reasonable nature.

I have two extraordinary daughters, who, I can say proudly, are doing very well in school and in piano. Daughters are a father's joy.

Perfection is often the enemy of greatness.

God created the world out of nothing, and so long as we are nothing, He can make something out of us.

There's nothing so much like a god on earth as a General on a battlefield.

Writing is a crummy profession, but a good hobby.

I am but too conscious of the fact that we are born in an age when only the dull are treated seriously, and I live in terror of not being misunderstood.

Making films has got to be one of the hardest endeavors known to humankind.

Language is by its very nature a communal thing; that is, it expresses never the exact thing but a compromise - that which is common to you, me, and everybody.