"The pleasure that I take in writing gets me interested in writing a poem. It's not a statement about what I think anybody else should be doing. For me, it's an interesting tension between interior and exterior."

"My mother was told she couldn't go to medical school because she was a woman and a Jew. So she became a teacher in the New York City public school system."

"Clearly, once the student is no longer a student the possibilities of relationship are enlarged."

"There is a way in which all writing is connected. In a second language, for example, a workshop can liberate the students' use of the vocabulary they're acquiring."

"A person must have a certain amount of intelligent ignorance to get anywhere."

"No one thinks of how much blood it costs."

"Russians can give you arms but only the United States can give you a solution."

"Whatever satisfies the soul is truth."