“We begin to say something that cannot be said. When you see on the front page a woman in Iraq who's just seen her husband blown up, you see her there, her mouth wide open, you know the sound coming out of her, a howl of grief and pain -- that's the beginning of language.Trying to express that, it's inexpressible, and poetry is really to say what can't be said. And that's why people turn to it in these moments. They don't know how to say this, [but] part of them feels that maybe a poem will say it. It won't say it, but it'll come closer to saying it than anything else will.I think there are always two sides, and one of them is the unsayable. The utterly singular. Who you are; who you can never tell anybody. And on the other hand, there is what you can express. How do we know about this thing we talk about? Because we talk about it. We're using words. And the words never say it, but the words are all we have to say it.”

“with the night falling we are saying thank youwe are stopping on the bridge to bow from the railingswe are running out of the glass roomswith our mouths full of food to look at the skyand say thank youwe are standing by the water looking outin different directionsback from a series of hospitals back from a muggingafter funerals we are saying thank youafter the news of the deadwhether or not we knew them we are saying thank youin a culture up to its chin in shameliving in the stench it has chosen we are saying thank youover telephones we are saying thank youin doorways and in the backs of cars and in elevatorsremembering wars and the police at the back doorand the beatings on stairs we are saying thank youin the banks that use us we are saying thank youwith the crooks in office with the rich and fashionableunchanged we go on saying thank you thank youwith the animals dying around usour lost feelings we are saying thank youwith the forests falling faster than the minutesof our lives we are saying thank youwith the words going out like cells of a brainwith the cities growing over us like the earthwe are saying thank you faster and fasterwith nobody listening we are saying thank youwe are saying thank you and wavingdark though it is”

“For a Coming ExtinctionGray whaleNow that we are sending you to The EndThat great godTell himThat we who follow you invented forgivenessAnd forgive nothingI write as though you could understandAnd I could say itOne must always pretend somethingAmong the dyingWhen you have left the seas nodding on their stalksEmpty of youTell him that we were madeOn another dayThe bewilderment will diminish like an echoWinding along your inner mountainsUnheard by usAnd find its way outLeaving behind it the futureDeadAnd oursWhen you will not see againThe whale calves trying the lightConsider what you will find in the black gardenAnd its courtThe sea cows the Great Auks the gorillasThe irreplaceable hosts ranged countlessAnd fore-ordaining as starsOur sacrificesJoin your word to theirsTell himThat it is we who are important”

“We can't define anything precisely. If we attempt to, we get into the paralysis of thought that comes to philosophers... one saying to the other: you don't know what you are talking about! The second one says: what do you mean by talking? What do you mean by you? What do you mean by know?”

“The idea tells you everything. Lots of times I get ideas, I fall in love with them. Those ones you fall in love with are really special ideas. And, in some ways, I always say, when something's abstract, the abstractions are hard to put into words unless you're a poet. These ideas you somehow know. And cinema is a language that can say abstractions. I love stories, but I love stories that hold abstractions--that can hold abstractions. And cinema can say these difficult-to-say-in-words things. A lot of times, I don't know the meaning of the idea, and it drives me crazy. I think we should know the meaning of the idea. I think about them, and I tell this story about my first feature Eraserhead. I did not know what these things meant to me--really meant. And on that particular film, I started reading the Bible. And I'm reading the Bible, going along, and suddenly--there was a sentence. And I said, forget it! That's it. That's this thing. And so, I should know the meaning for me, but when things get abstract, it does me no good to say what it is. All viewers on the surface are all different. And we see something, and that's another place where intuition kicks in: an inner-knowingness. And so, you see a thing, you think about it, and you feel it, and you go and you sort of know something inside. And you can rely on that. Another thing I say is, if you go--after a film, withholding abstractions--to a coffee place--having coffee with your friends, someone will say something, and immediately you'll say “No, no, no, no, that's not what that was about.” You know? “This is what it was about.” And so many things come out, it's surprising. So you do know. For yourself. And what you know is valid.”

“I had hardly begun to readI asked how can you ever be surethat what you write is reallyany good at all and he said you can'tyou can't you can never be sureyou die without knowingwhether anything you wrote was any goodif you have to be sure don't write”

“You did really great up there,” I tell her, because I don’t know how to say what I really want to: that the people you love can surprise you every day. That maybe who we are isn’t so much about what we do, but rather what we’re capable of when we least expect it.”