“It is impossible for a poet to characterize his own work. From other people I gather that I am a gloomy poet, if not a tragic one.”

“All poets who, when reading from their own works, experience a choked feeling, are major. For that matter, all poets who read from their own works are major, whether they choke or not.”

“I find it impossible to think of "favorite" poets. I would rather list the ones I cannot stand.”

“a poem is a naked person... some people say that I am a poet”

“You don't necessarily have to write to be a poet. Some people work in gas stations and they're poets. I don't call myself a poet, because I don't like the word. I'm a trapeze artist.”

“A modern poet has characterized the personality of art and the impersonality of science as follows: Art is I: Science is We.”

“I am a poet in deeds--not often in words.”

“Poets work upon and through each other.”

“I am a warrior, so that my son may be a merchant, so that his son may be a poet.”

“I am the poet of the Body and I am the poet of the Soul,
The pleasures of heaven are with me and the pains of hell are with me,
The first I graft and increase upon myself, the latter I translate
into a new tongue.”