“Maybe it's what we don't say/that saves us.”

“A poem is like a child; at some point we have to let it go and trust that it will make its own way in the world.”

“Poetry is an intimate act. It's about bringing forth something that's inside you--whether it is a memory, a philosophical idea, a deep love for another person or for the world, or an apprehension of the spiritual. It's about making something, in language, which can be transmitted to others--not as information, or polemic, but as irreducible art.”

“We aren't suggesting that mental instability or unhappiness makes one a better poet, or a poet at all; and contrary to the romantic notion of the artist suffering for his or her work, we think these writers achieved brilliance in spite of their suffering, not because of it.”

“Moon In the WindowI wish I could say I was the kind of childwho watched the moon from her window,would turn toward it and wonder.I never wondered. I read. Dark signsthat crawled toward the edge of the page.It took me years to grow a heartfrom paper and glue. All I had was a flashlight, bright as the moon,a white hole blazing beneath the sheets.”

“Death comes to me again, a girlin a cotton slip, barefoot, giggling.It’s not so terrible she tells me,not like you think, all darknessand silence. There are windchimesand the smell of lemons, some daysit rains, but more often the air is dryand sweet. I sit beneath the staircasebuilt from hair and bone and listento the voices of the living. I like it,she says, shaking the dust from her hair,especially when they fight, and when they sing.”

“You've walked those streets a thousand times and stillyou end up here. Regret none of it, not oneof the wasted days you wanted to know nothing,when the lights from the carnival rideswere the only stars you believed in, loving themfor their uselessness, not wanting to be saved.You've traveled this far on the back of every mistake,ridden in dark-eyed and morose but calm as a houseafter the TV set has been pitched out the upstairswindow. Harmless as a broken ax. Emptiedof expectation. Relax. Don't bother rememberingany of it. Let's stop here, under the lit signon the corner, and watch all the people walk by.”