I Don't Miss Teaching. I'm

I've Always Associated The Moment Of Writing With A Moment Of Lift, Of Joy, Of Unexpected Reward.

I Don't Miss Teaching. I'm Learning To Take My Time For Myself.

I Have Always Thought Of Poems As Stepping Stones In One's Own Sense Of Oneself. Every Now And Again, You Write A Poem That Gives You Self-respect And Steadies Your Going A Little Bit Farther Out In The Stream. At The Same Time, You Have To Conjure The Next Stepping Stone Because The Stream, We Hope, Keeps Flowing.

The Aim Of Poetry And The Poet Is Finally To Be Of Service, To Ply The Effort Of The Individual Into The Larger Work Of The Community As A Whole.

It Has As Much To Do With The Energy Released By Linguistic Fission And Fusion, With The Buoyancy Generated By Cadence And Tone And Rhyme And Stanza, As It Has To Do With The Poem's Concerns Or The Poet's Truthfulness.