Revision is a good impulse to have.

One of the things I'm constantly telling my students is that they're never going to write a poem everyone gets, or if they do, they've failed. They should leave someone behind every time.

Human suffering is articulated in language; communication is how we seek help, consolation, etc.

I figure I write for people who are intelligent enough to do some labor. Lazy readers are not my ideal readers.

I turned to human suffering because - this may sound odd - animal suffering is more difficult for me to deal with.

I like to move around in the landscape between poetry and prose, between the lyrical and the narrative.

I never try to force poems into a collection simply because they were written/published within a certain period of time. They will eventually find their perfect home.

I enjoy working on a number of projects - books - at once.

I tend to overuse the word "project" only because "book" is terrifying while I'm still in the middle of something. A project can fail. I don't want a book to fail.

I always revise when I publish in a book. So versions in magazines are sometimes slightly different.

I pay editors. I never ask friends or colleagues to work for free.

Children can be disgusting, and often they can develop extraordinary talents, but I’m yet to meet any child who can stimulate his carotid arteries inside his ribcage.

If you look at all aspects of all sports, everything comes down to basics and fundamentals.

You have to think there's a reason for everything. When a door closes another door opens.

Having no other recourse, Roran resorted to the unexpected: he stuck his head and neck out and shouted, "BAH!" just as he would if he were trying to scare someone in a dark hallway.

It is when people are told their own thoughts that they think they are being insulted.

Everyone is alone and yet nobody can do without other people, not just because they are useful... but also when it comes to happiness.

[Librarians] are subversive. You think they're just sitting there at the desk, all quiet and everything. They're like plotting the revolution, man. I wouldn't mess with them.

More and more people now have jobs that require them to confront the risk of appearing stupid on a regular basis.

My ma says You can't unspill a stew." "She also says Undoing a wrong is greater than doing a right." "You know, Ma is very good at saying two things at once.

Allah manages everything in the heavens and earth—the sun, the moon, the stars—with perfection, and yet we don’t trust Him to manage our lives!