Quote

To be a poet is a condition, not a profession.

Poetry isn't a profession, it's a way of life. It's an empty basket; you put your life into it and make something out of that.

Poetry is a vocation. It is not a career but a calling.

To be a poet is as serious, long-term and natural as the effort to be the best human you can be. To express something well is not a question of having a top-class education and understanding poetic forms: rather, it's a question of paying attention.

I don't think that I ever believed that poetry would be a career. I have always thought of poems as something more private than professional... I would never introduce myself as a poet. I will always have some other thing that I am.

To be a poet, it's a challenge to do it in poverty, to do it in wealth. To do it in the academy, to do it in a relationship where you're happy. Everything changes the game. To do it in the awkward state of love, despair, dying. You just have to work it.

A poet is a professional maker of verbal objects.

The reason a poet is a poet is to write poems, not to advertise himself as a poet.

I think a poet, like a painter, should be a craftsperson.

You don't become a poet if you want to make any money.