“I would like The Discovery of Poetry to be a field guide to the natural pleasures of language - a happiness we were born to have.”

“Memory is capricious. I can look back and see decadence, old bigots, the constant racial slurs, the bores, the wild cards, the bighearted, the family album of alcoholics, the saints, the old aunt p...”

“A Chinese poet many centuries ago noticed that to re-create something in words is like being alive twice. ”

“You never know, of course, when you write a book what its fate will be. Sink out of sight, soar to the sunwho knows. I love this quote from Frances Mayes. It pretty much sums up the Great Unknown o...”

“There are reasons we congregate in these hot spots- to worship beauty and to feel its effects light up the electrolytes in the bloodstream.”

“Images are the pegs holding down memory's billowing tent.”

“We are working well when we use ourselves as the fellow creatures of the plants, animals, materials, and other people we are working with. Such work is unifying, healing. It brings us home from pri...”

“My life's work is to help people step into their God-given abilities and make a positive difference in their community.”

“In a world of knowledge and expertise, fame and fortune, status and ranks....nothing has the power to affect change as much as love and compassion.”