“I seem to be convinced that the point of poetry is to clarify language through a process of ongoing exploration, so that I can more and more find out how to live within language as a joy and a liberation, rather than as a prison, which it can be and usually is when I am definingmyself and the world in language….”

“Almost every day I listen to or read or watch the news, some days all three of these, because I want to stay tuned to what is seemingly going on in the world outside my house. These days this is an unpleasant experience. … But when I switch the news off and read a poem or listen to music I begin to thaw out. ”