Poetry is one of the essential structures of civilization - carrying myth, ritual, 'tales of the tribe' and the essence of language.

Poetry is the art of saying what you mean but disguising it.

I do not read newspapers. I do not watch television. I am not interested in current events, although I will occasionally discuss them if other people want to discuss them.

But I am not political in the current events sense, and I have never wanted anyone to read my poetry that way.

But I don't think that poetry is a good, to use a contemporary word, venue, for current events.

High and low culture come together in all Post Modern art, and American poetry is not excluded from this.

Learning to live what you're born with is the process, the involvement, the making of a life.

American poets celebrate their bodies, very specifically, as Whitman did.

American poetry, like American painting, is always personal with an emphasis on the individuality of the poet.

Still, language is resilient, and poetry when it is pressured simply goes underground.

I write in the first person because I have always wanted to make my life more interesting than it was.

Moonlight drowns out all but the brightest stars.

I am not discouraged because every wrong attempt discarded is another step forward.

Fantasy love is much better than reality love. Never doing it is very exciting. The most exciting attractions are between two opposites that never meet.

Nothing is more paralyzing than the idea of limitless possibilities.

I'm going to do as much as I can for the animal world, and I'll never stop.

A continual atmosphere of hectic passion is very trying if you haven't got any of your own.

I'm for tax reform, not tax increases.

The only way not to worry about the race problem is to be doing something about it yourself. When you are, natural human vanity makes you feel that now the thing is in good hands.

No athletic director holds office longer than two losing football coaches.

Marriage is a state that is attended with so much care and trouble, that it is a kind of faulty indulgence and selfishness to livesingle, in order to avoid the difficulties it is attended with.