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I hated these visits, because I kept feeling the visitors measuring my fat and stringy hair against what I had been and what they wanted me to be, and...more

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I didn’t want my picture taken because I was going to cry. I didn’t know why I was going to cry, but I knew that if anybody spoke to me or looked at m...more

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I am helpless as the sea at the end of her string. I am restless. Restless and useless. I, too, create corpses.

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brave love, dreamnot of staunching such strict flame, but come,lean to my wound; burn on, burn on.

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I’ll never speak to God again.

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This is newness: every little tawdryObstacle glass-wrapped and peculiar,Glinting and clinking in a saint's falsetto. Only youDon't know what to make o...more

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Poppies in JulyLittle poppies, little hell flames,Do you do no harm?You flicker. I cannot touch you.I put my hands among the flames. Nothing burns.And...more

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For me poetry is an evasion of the real job of writing prose.

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I could feel the tears brimming and sloshing in me like water in a glass that is unsteady and too full.

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I am solitary as grass. What is it I miss?Shall I ever find it, whatever it is?

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The tongues of hell are dull.

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Poetry, I feel, is a tyrannical discipline. You've got to go so far so fast in such a small space; you've got to burn away all the peripherals.

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Nick and the CandlestickI am a miner. The light burns blue. Waxy stalactitesDrip and thicken, tearsThe earthen wombExudes from its dead boredom. Black...more

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The still watersWrap my lips,Eyes, nose and ears,A clearCellophane I cannot crack.

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The moon is no door. It is a face in its own right,White as a knuckle and terribly upset.It drags the sea after it like a dark crime; it is quietWith ...more