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" Rap is only one end of a whole spectrum of verbal play and virtuosity. Rap is geared for aural pleasure. "

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" I've always been intrigued by the way history works, the way we decide what is mentioned. "

" Libraries are where it all begins. "

" The American Dream is a phrase we'll have to wrestle with all of our lives. It means a lot of things to different people. I think we're redefining it now. "

" One definition of eternity is that we are not alone on this planet, that there are those who've gone before and those who will come, and that there is a community of spirits. "

" I carry a notebook with me everywhere. But that's only the first step. "

" I was appointed Poet Laureate. It came totally out of the blue because most Poet Laureates had been considerably older than I. It was not something that I even had begun to dream about! "

" Being Poet Laureate made me realize I was capable of a larger voice. There is a more public utterance I can make as a poet. "

" Without imagination we can go nowhere. And imagination is not restricted to the arts. Every scientist I have met who has been a success has had to imagine. "

" You have to imagine it possible before you can see something. You can have the evidence right in front of you, but if you can't imagine something that has never existed before, it's impossible. "

" Equality and self-determination should never be divided in the name of religious or ideological fervor. "

" I'm a night person. My best times are midnight to six, actually. "

" Have you ever heard a good joke? If you've ever heard someone just right, with the right pacing, then you're already on the way to poetry. It's about using words in very precise ways and using gesture. "

" The joy of working at something to find out what it means to me is what I grew up with. "

" My father is a chemist, my mother was a homemaker. My parents instilled in us the feeling that learning was the most exciting thing that could happen to you, and it never ends. "

" There are distinct duties of a poet laureate. I plan a reading series at the Library of Congress and advise the librarian. The rest is how I want to promote poetry. "

" I try to show what it is about language and music that enthralls, because I think those are the two elements of poetry. "

" I loved to write when I was a child. I wrote, but I always thought it was something that you did as a child, then you put away childish things. "

" I write short stories, and I wrote a play. "

" My favorite poets may not be your bread and butter. I have more favorite poems than favorite poets. "

" What writing does is to reveal. "

" I believe people may have a predisposition for artistic creativity. It doesn't mean they're going to make it. "

" Poetry is language at its most distilled and most powerful. "

" The poetry that sustains me is when I feel that, for a minute, the clouds have parted and I've seen ecstasy or something. "

" It makes me furious to hear haters of all skin colors - especially Christian, Jewish, and Muslim fundamentalists - deride other people because of their different beliefs and lifestyles. "

" I was apprehensive. I feared every time I talked about poetry, it would be filtered through the lens of race, sex, and age. "

" I always loved science. And in fact, I got a science award in high school. I mean, I loved science, but I think I loved literature more. "

" I grew up in Ohio, where civil-rights accomplishments had already begun to accelerate before Martin Luther King appeared. In hindsight, we know that many people, black and white, were instrumental in changing the Jim Crow status quo on all levels. "

Black And White

" I have a high guilt quotient. A poem can go through as many as 50 or 60 drafts. It can take from a day to two years-or longer. "

" In working on a poem, I love to revise. Lots of younger poets don't enjoy this, but in the process of revision I discover things. "

" It really wasn't until I was in college when I began to write more and more, and I realized I was scheduling my entire life around my writing. "