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" I am not concerned with truth, nor with conventional notions of what is beautiful. "

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" The future is always beginning now. "

" For some of us, the less said about the way we do things the better. "

" From the reader's view, a poem is more demanding than prose. "

" 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. "

" It hardly seems worthwhile to point out the shortsightedness of those practitioners who would have us believe that the form of the poem is merely its shape. "

" A great many people seem to think writing poetry is worthwhile, even though it pays next to nothing and is not as widely read as it should be. "

" But I tend to think of the expressive part of me as rather tedious - never curious or responsive, but blind and self-serving. "

" And Robert Lowell, of course - in his poems, we're not located in his actual life. We're located more in the externals, in the journalistic facts of his life. "

" I tend to like poems that engage me - that is to say, which do not bore me. "

" It's very hard to write humor. "

" Poetry is something that happens in universities, in creative writing programs or in English departments. "

" Poetry is, first and last, language - the rest is filler. "

" 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. "

" Each moment is a place you've never been. "

" 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. "

" Nothing is the destiny of everyone, it is our commonness made dumb. "

" 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. "

" I would say that American poetry has always been a poetry of personal testimony. "

" A life is not sufficiently elevated for poetry, unless, of course, the life has been made into an art. "

" Pain is filtered in a poem so that it becomes finally, in the end, pleasure. "

" Usually a life turned into a poem is misrepresented. "

" There's a certain point, when you're writing autobiographical stuff, where you don't want to misrepresent yourself. It would be dishonest. "

" I think the best American poetry is the poetry that utilizes the resources of poetry rather than exploits the defects or triumphs of the poet's personality. "