Libraries Are Where It All Begins.

We Tend To Be So Bombarded With Information, And We Move So Quickly, That There's A Tendency To Treat Everything On The Surface Level And Process Things Quickly. This Is Antithetical To The Kind Of Openness And Perception You Have To Have To Be Receptive To Poetry.poetry Seems To Exist In A Parallel Universe Outside Daily Life In America.

The Poetry That Sustains Me Is When I Feel That, For A Minute, The Clouds Have Parted And I've Seen Ecstasy Or Something

I Believe People May Have A Predisposition For Artistic Creativity. It Doesn't Mean They're Going To Make It.

It's The Combination Of The Intimate And The Public That I Find So Exciting About Being Poet Laureate.

I Was Apprehensive. I Feared Every Time I Talked About Poetry, It Would Be Filtered Through The Lens Of Race, Sex, And Age.