Works of art imitate and provoke other works of art, the process is the source of art itself.

Reading poetry is an adventure in renewal, a creative act, a perpetual beginning, a rebirth of wonder.

Language is an impure medium. Speech is public property and words are the soiled products, not of nature, but of society, which circulates and uses them for a thousand different ends.

There has never been a great poet who wasn't also a great reader of poetry.

The way to become a poet is to read poetry and to imitate what you read and to read passionately and widely and in as involved a way as you can.

I put down these memorandums of my affections in honor of tenderness, in honor of all of those who have been conscripted into the brotherhood of loss.

The spiritual desire for poetry can be overwhelming, so much do I need it to experience and name my own perilous depths and vast spaces, my own well-being.

But, something has to be worked through formally as well as emotionally. Now, when those two things come together I've got something, I think, that I can be proud of.

A poem is a hand, a hook, a prayer. It is a soul in action.

I was surprised recently to find a book called "Poetry in Persons" that's coming out about visit to poets to a class that Pearl London gave.

But, the best times I have found, in my life, are late at night or early in the morning and I think it's because you're outside the social realm.

The joy is the journey of Life.

People should not confuse opinions and rules with egocentric interests.

I live wherever you are cos honestly there's no better place to call home.

The proper, wise balancing of one's whole life may depend upon the feasibility of a cup of tea at an unusual hour.

All men are a disappointment. No matter what anyone says.

I listen to old songs and remember exactly where I was living and where I recorded it and how I wrote it, the girl I was dating at the time or whatever.

It is not permitted that we should know everything.

Life means that I can live to see tomorrow.

My movies are, more or less, very short. I'm terrified of boring an audience.

Here is my best advice on the matter of deductibles: just count off on your fingers all the items that you suspect might be deductible - and then forget them, because they aren't.