“Who you are contributes to your poetry in a number of important ways, but you shouldn't identify with your poems so closely that when they are cut, you're the one that bleeds.”

“You are not your poetry. Your self-esteem shouldn't depend on whether you publish, or whether some editor or writer you admire thinks you're any good.”

“Every poem I write falls short in some important way. But I go on trying to write the one that won’t. ”

“Writing and reading are the only ways to find your voice. It won't magically burst forth in your poems the next time you sit down to write, or the next; but little by little, as you become aware of more choices and begin to make them -- consciously and unconsciously -- your style will develop.”

“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.”

“That's how it is sometimes--God comes to your window, all bright light and black wings, and you're just too tired to open it.”

“Every good poem asks a question, and every good poet asks every question.”