Poetry is at the centre of my life, too, emotionally speaking, and intellectually speaking - it's just that I'm one of those people who enjoy doing other stuff as well.

I don't want my poems to be sentimental, though I do acknowledge that sentiment is probably rather under-reported in a lot of people's feelings a lot of the time.

Each sudden gust of light explains itself as flames, but neither they, nor even bombs redoubled on the hills tonight can quite include me in their fear.

Poems are a hotline to our hearts, and we forget this emotional power at our peril

But Wordsworth is the poet I admire above all others.

I am a vigilant monarchist. I want to see things evolve. The direction the monarchy seems to be moving in - towards a more mainland-European model - is one I would feel sympathetic about.

Honor the miraculousness of the ordinary.

I write between 5.30am and 9.00. That way, I hope I carry over something from my dream time.

I like eating out. I like buying beautiful paintings and being surrounded by beautiful things. I have to finance that life. I can barely afford a pension scheme because I don't make enough money.

I'm ensuring my place in heaven.

Like a lot of people, for a long time I thought that the road to hell is paved with bad sequels.

When it comes to the past, everyone writes fiction.

Immorality, no less than morality, has at all times found support in religion.

Hurry, get on board, it's comin', listen to those rails a-thrumming all aboard. Get on the "A" train, soon you will be on Sugar Hill in Harlem.

I envy people of faith. I'm incapable of believing in anything supernatural.

Some make the world go round; others watch it turn.

Working against a restriction - for me - often produces greater things than getting rid of all boundaries.

There was a time when I could vote for economic justice, and I can't anymore.

I continued studying by myself in the field of jazz with my own technique of improvisation, walking bass lines, rhythms, all kinds of stuff, which I created for myself.

A small state increases by concord; the greatest falls gradually to ruin by dissension.

When I came out to L. A., I got a part in an episode of 'Star Trek: Voyager,' and I hired an acting coach.