I'm not really quiet or shy. Ask any of my friends! But I always ground my poetry in life itself. Poetry is an art of language though so I am always aware of every word's meaning or multiple meanings.

I look for poetry in English because it's the only language I read.

So I suppose poetry language the shaping of it was and remains for me an effort to make sense out of essentially senseless situations.

I believe that all poetry is formal in that it exists within limits limits that are either inherited by tradition or limits that language itself imposes.

Poetry is first and last language - the rest is filler.

I think that great poetry is the most interesting and complex use of the poet's language at that point in history and so it's even more exciting when you read a poet like Yeats almost 100 years old now and you think that perhaps no one can really top that.

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

I definitely wish to distinguish American poetry from British or other English language poetry.

Deep feeling doesn't make for good poetry. A way with language would be a bit of help.

If you go into a bar in most places in America and even say the word poetry you'll probably get beaten up. But poetry is a really strong beautiful form to me and a lot of innovation in language comes from poetry.