When you liked somebody, you wanted to trade the best things you knew about. You liked them not only for themselves, but for the parts of you that th… - Naomi Shihab Nye

I do think that all of us think in poems. I think of a poem as being deeper than headline news. You know how they talk about breaking news all the time, that — if too much breaking news, trying to absorb all the breaking news, you start feeling really broken. And you need something that takes you to a place that's a little more timeless, that kind of gives you a place to stand to look out at all these things. Otherwise, you just feel assaulted by all of the tragedy in the world. (2012)

The things that cause you friction are the things from which you might make art. Surely losing is one of the most endemic frictions of our journey.

All our roots go deep down, even if they’re tangled (p199)