Stadium rock and commercial rock are the opposite of what poetry needs. An audience of around 200 is ideal for poetry.

Most people ignore most poetry because most poetry ignores most people.

Poetry is an extra hand. It can caress or tickle. It can clench and fight.

When I am sad and wearyWhen I think all hope has goneWhen I walk along High HolbornI think of you with nothing on

I want to speak, to sing to total strangers. It's my way of talking to the world.

There have always been poets who performed. Blake sang his Songs of Innocence and Experience to parties of friends.

I was run over by the truth one day.Ever since the accident I've walked this way

I don't like writing essays or theory.

The man who believes in giraffes would swallow anything.

I would have walked on the waterBut I wasn't fully insured.And the BMA sent a writ my wayWith the very first leper I cured.

Written poetry is different. Best thing is to see it in performance first, then read it. Performance is more provocative.

Time can be a greedy thing-sometimes it steals the details for itself.

An artist is nothing without his or her obsessions, and I have mine.

If you suffer thank God! It is a sure sign that you are alive.

Purchasing power is a license to purchase power.

Sometimes people need to be told to sit down and shut up.

I considered that the homes that people live in exactly describe their lives.

I think Julia is defining a new feminism. It's the power of the open heart. And its ok to be sexual.

It's not that easy to find someone I can relate too. I'm tough to crack because I'm shy.

What we have been living for three decades is frontier capitalism, with the frontier constantly shifting location from crisis to crisis, moving on as soon as the law catches up.

We are all writers and readers as well as communicators with the need at times to please and satisfy ourselves with the clear and almost perfect thought.