The reason why we do maths is because it's like poetry. It's about patterns, and that really turned me on. It made me feel that maths was in tune with the other things I liked doing.
Poetry is, first and last, language - the rest is filler.
Poetry is something that happens in universities, in creative writing programs or in English departments.
Pain is filtered in a poem so that it becomes finally, in the end, pleasure.
I would say that American poetry has always been a poetry of personal testimony.
I certainly can't speak for all cultures or all societies, but it's clear that in America, poetry serves a very marginal purpose. It's not part of the cultural mainstream.
I believe that all poetry is formal in that it exists within limits, limits that are either inherited by tradition or limits that language itself imposes.
And yet, in a culture like ours, which is given to material comforts, and addicted to forms of entertainment that offer immediate gratification, it is surprising that so much poetry is written.
And at least in poetry you should feel free to lie. That is, not to lie, but to imagine what you want, to follow the direction of the poem.
I've got a book of poetry by the bed, one of these big collections that goes back to the Greeks and Romans.
Poetry is fascinating. As soon as it begins the poetry has changed the thing into something extra, and somehow prose can go over into poetry.
The poetry of a people comes from the deep recesses of the unconscious, the irrational and the collective body of our ancestral memories.
I don't like poetry that doesn't give me a sense of ritual, but I don't like poetry that doesn't sound like people talking to each other. I try to do both at once.
I'm quite sure that most writers would sustain real poetry if they could, but it takes devotion and talent.
I'm as much influenced by Joseph Smith and the Mormons as I am, more so, than by Eliot. Actually, I'm much more influenced by the poetry of the Mormons.
I'm not an academic, but I've always loved poetry since I've been small.
So I really began as a failed poet - although when I first wanted to be a writer, I learned to write prose by reading poetry.
When I really want to be soothed and reminded of why people bother to fiddle with sentences, I often read poetry.
When it comes to atoms, language can be used only as in poetry. The poet, too, is not nearly so concerned with describing facts as with creating images.
I like it when someone gives me a new book of poetry by a poet I haven't read.
I believe poetry has very little to do with memory.
