All Quotes

Sometimes I write quickly, sometimes I spend several weeks on a single poem. I would really love for readers not to be able to guess which of the poems took so much work! ”

I usually write for the individual reader -though I would like to have many such readers. There are some poets who write for people assembled in big rooms, so they can live through something collectively. I prefer my reader to take my poem and have a one-on-one relationship with it. ”

Nothing can ever happen twice. In consequence, the sorry fact is that we arrive here improvised and leave without the chance to practice. ”

Any knowledge that doesn't lead to new questions quickly dies out: it fails to maintain the temperature required for sustaining life. ”

Life lasts but a few scratches of the claw in the sand. ”

I cannot speak for more than an hour exclusively about poetry. At that point, life itself takes over again. ”

I started earning a living as a poet rather early on. ”

In the language of poetry, where every word is weighed, nothing is usual or normal. Not a single stone and not a single cloud above it. Not a single day and not a single night after it. And above all, not a single existence, not anyone's existence in this world. ”

In every tragedy, an element of comedy is preserved. Comedy is just tragedy reversed. ”

Everyone needs solitude, especially a person who is used to thinking about what she experiences. Solitude is very important in my work as a mode of inspiration, but isolation is not good in this respect. I am not writing poetry about isolation. ”