“Poetry is the rhythmical creation of beauty in words.”

“I would define, in brief, the poetry of words as the rhythmical creation of beauty.”

“The Christian gospel is rooted in langauge: God spoke a creation into being; our Savrior was the Word made flesh. The poet is the person who uses words not primarily to convey information but to make a relationship, shape beauty, form truth…Isn’t it odd that pastors, who are responsible for interpreting the Scriptures, so much of which come in the form of poetry, have so little interest in poetry? … Words create. God’s word creates; our words can participate in creation.” ”

“A good sentence in prose should be like a good line in poetry, unchangeable, as rhythmic, as sonorous.”

“I would say poetry is language charged with emotion. It's words, rhythmically organized . . . A poem is a complete little universe. It exists separately. Any poem that has any worth expresses the whole life of the poet. It gives a view of what the poet is.”

“. . . poetry, like all imaginative creations, divines the human enterprise. This is poetry's social value.”