I deliberately did not read anything about the Vietnam War because I felt the politics of the war eclipsed what happened to the veterans. The politics were irrelevant to what this memorial was.

In religion as in politics it so happens that we have less charity for those who believe half our creed than for those who deny the whole of it.

In politics nothing happens by accident. If it happens you can bet it was planned that way.

Politics is the ability to foretell what is going to happen tomorrow next week next month and next year. And to have the ability afterwards to explain why it didn't happen.

Tradition means giving votes to the most obscure of all classes our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead. Tradition refuses to submit to that arrogant oligarchy who merely happen to be walking around.

Meet some people who care about poetry the way you do. You'll have that readership. Keep going until you know you're doing work that's worthy. And then see what happens. That's my advice.

Journalism wishes to tell what it is that has happened everywhere as though the same things had happened for every man. Poetry wishes to say what it is like for any man to be himself in the presence of a particular occurrence as though only he were alone there.

Poetry is something that happens in universities in creative writing programs or in English departments.

How does one happen to write a poem: where does it come from? That is the question asked by the psychologists or the geneticists of poetry.

America was based on a poetic vision. What will happen when it loses its poetry?

Auden said poetry makes nothing happen. But I wonder if the opposite could be true. It could make something happen.

My obsession with time informs my poetry so completely it is hard for me to summarize it. We want time to pass for new things to happen to us we want to hold on to certain moments we don't want our lives to end.

I've never read a political poem that's accomplished anything. Poetry makes things happen but rarely what the poet wants.

A lot happens by accident in poetry.

I think there are things in my story that have helped my creativity. Your father being killed for instance is one of the best things that could happen to a kid if he's going to write poetry or songs.

Kittens can happen to anyone.

There is something at work that's bigger than us. It's about having a trust in life and being at peace that things are happening the way they should. You do what you do as well as you can do it and then you don't worry or agonize about the outcome.

Peace in Palestine is inevitable. The question is how do we make it happen today.

Everyone is interested in war in that people don't want it to happen. I'm much more interested in peace than in war but it's important to understand why we fight.

I happen to dig being able to use whatever mystique I have to further the idea of peace.

My biggest weakness is patience wanting to see things happen too quickly or get changes in place right away. Not having the patience to let things develop.

The fans know what's happened to me over the past couple of years. I lost my family. I pretty much got devastated financially and the fans know that I've had some hard times - and that's the nature of loyal fans. They want to see the people that they love and believe in get back on their feet.

It often happens that when a person possesses a particular ability to an extraordinary degree nature makes up for it by leaving him or her incompetent in every other department.

Every corny thing that's said about living with nature - being in harmony with the earth feeling the cycle of the seasons - happens to be true.