That's a wonderful change that's taken place and so most poetry today is published if not directly by the person certainly by the enterprise of the poet himself working with his friends.

I've always written. When I was in school the only teacher who ever liked me was my creative writing teacher. I used to enter poetry competitions and I don't think I ever lost one. So I had the idea for a while of being some kind of poet.

I've often entertained paranoid suspicions about my fridge and what it's been doing to my poetry when I'm not looking but I never even considered that my fan was thinking about me.

And yet in a culture like ours which is given to material comforts and addicted to forms of entertainment that offer immediate gratification it is surprising that so much poetry is written.

A group of us started a community center in Santa Monica. We've tried different programs and three have worked really well. A poetry group. Once a week we visit Venice High and talk to girls at risk.

Those who have never entered upon scientific pursuits know not a tithe of the poetry by which they are surrounded.

Poetry should be great and unobtrusive a thing which enters into one's soul and does not startle it or amaze it with itself but with its subject.

Sometimes poetry is inspired by the conversation entered into by reading other poems.

I've teamed up with PetSmart Charities to celebrate the five million homeless pets who've found homes through their in-store adoption centers and to spread the word about how we can work together to save millions more pets' lives and ultimately end pet homelessness.

War should never be entered upon until every agency of peace has failed.