I love to read poetry but I haven't written anything that I'm willing to show anybody.
What can a pencil do for all of us? Amazing things. It can write transcendent poetry, uplifting music, or life-changing equations; it can sketch the future, give life to untold beauty, and communicate the full-force of our love and aspirations.
I love all kinds of music. My dad's from London, so he loves David Bowie, the Stones, The Clash. I grew up with that influence while loving poetry and loving all kinds of current music.
Most people ignore most poetry because most poetry ignores most people.
Stadium rock and commercial rock are the opposite of what poetry needs. An audience of around 200 is ideal for poetry.
Written poetry is different. Best thing is to see it in performance first, then read it. Performance is more provocative.
I use rock and jazz and blues rhythms because I love that music. I hope my poetry has a relationship with good-time rock'n roll.
At twenty, I implicitly dissociated poetry from politics.
Poetry can't give us the laws and institutions and representatives, the antidotes we need: only public activism by massive numbers of citizens can do that.
Poetry is above all a concentration of the power of language, which is the power of our ultimate relationship to everything in the universe.
