My father read poetry to me, encouraged me to memorize poems. But the writing of it was quite a different thing.

Poems have a different music from ordinary language, and every poem has a different kind of music of necessity, and that's, in a way, the hardest thing about writing poetry is waiting for that music, and sometimes you never know if it's going to come.

A dark poem is meant to redeem the dark part.

When you begin to write poems because you love language, because you love poetry. Something happens that makes you write poems. And the writing of poems is incredibly pleasurable and addictive.

You're confident, you're going to the ring to fight, but there's always that little thing where you're thinking, 'God.' You're nervous. But you have to embrace it and enjoy it.

I live by faith and not sight.

Faith is not belief. Belief is passive. Faith is active.

So many have come to me that I might serve them, leaving me no time to think of myself. However, I assure you that I do feel deep down within me, God be praised.