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For better or worse, poetry is my life.

I have not the slightest pretension to call my verses poetry; I write now and then for no other purpose than to relieve depression or to improve my English.

Poetry at its best can do you a lot of harm.

Poetry is what I've done my whole life. And every important thing in my life had found itself into poems.

As things get worse, poetry gets better because it becomes more necessary.

Anybody serious about poetry knows how hard it is to achieve anything worthwhile in it.

Poetry gives us courage and sets us straight with the world. Poems are great companions and friends.

I don't live for poetry. I live far more than anybody else does.

I think that I have less conviction than ever that poetry matters - that poetry changes or saves anything or anyone. But, in fact, that's tremendously freeing. If it doesn't matter much, the stakes are lower and you can't really fail. It's insurrection. It's a tiny alphabet revolution. A secret. A psalm.

You don't help people in your poems. I've been trying to help people all my life - that's my trouble.