Now I think poetry will save nothing from oblivion but I keep writing about the ordinary because for me it's the home of the extraordinary the only home.

Meet some people who care about poetry the way you do. You'll have that readership. Keep going until you know you're doing work that's worthy. And then see what happens. That's my advice.

The irony is going to work every day became the subject of probably my best poetry.

I realized poetry's the thing that I can do 'cause I can stick at it and work with tremendous intensity.

Besides the actual reading in class of many poems I would suggest you do two things: first while teaching everything you can and keeping free of it teach that poetry is a mode of discourse that differs from logical exposition.

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.

The poet exposes himself to the risk. All that has been said about poetry all that he has learned about poetry is only a partial assurance.

Poetry leads us to the unstructured sources of our beings to the unknown and returns us to our rational structured selves refreshed.

Once every five hundred years or so a summary statement about poetry comes along that we can't imagine ourselves living without.

I am grateful for - though I can't keep up with - the flood of articles theses and textbooks that mean to share insight concerning the nature of poetry.