But I think it's quite clear in my work that my orientation isn't political or doesn't come out of modern politics.

I'm an independent. I'm a centrist. A new generation is arriving that has grown up with a multiplicity of choice in every aspect of their lives and yet politics is the last place that they are told that they should be satisfied with a choice between brand A and brand B. It doesn't fit the way they think. It doesn't fit the way they live.

I never got into politics for it to be a career. It doesn't take a lot of strength to hang on. It takes a lot of strength to let go.

By nominating Chuck Hagel to be his Defense secretary President Obama is putting forward an aloof contrarian who doesn't suffer fools - a striving politician who considers himself above politics.

You have to take away some of tax breaks for the wealthy and you have to cut back on some entitlements. Because unless we do all of these things it just doesn't work. And what's good theater and what's good politics isn't necessarily good economic policy.

Just because you do not take an interest in politics doesn't mean politics won't take an interest in you.

I have a fantasy where Ted Turner is elected President but refuses because he doesn't want to give up power.

Of course a poem is a two-way street. No poem is any good if it doesn't suggest to the reader things from his own mind and recollection that he will read into it and will add to what the poet has suggested. But I do think poetry readings are very important.

I think that concrete poetry seems to have as far as I can see come to a kind of a dead end. It doesn't seem to be going any further than it went in its high period of about five or six years ago.

When you're looking that far out you're giving people their place in the universe it touches people. Science is often visual so it doesn't need translation. It's like poetry it touches you.