You can always give something, even if it is only kindness.
I think that's what poetry does. It allows people to come together and identify with a common thing that is outside of themselves, but which they identify with from the interior.
I don't like political poetry, and I don't write it. If this question was pointing towards that, I think it is missing the point of the American tradition, which is always apolitical, even when the poetry comes out of politically active writers.
Innocence is suffering and the loss of that innocence is something to fear.
I'm perfectly happy when I look out at an audience and it's all women. I always think it's kind of odd, but then, more women than men, I think, read and write poetry.
What line breaks add to prose prosody is a connection between eye and ear which emphasizes the nature of the language by. . . creating units of intent and emphasis, and by contouring the meloding pitch changes in the narrative-line.
My poems are almost all written as Diane. I don't have any problems with that, and if other women choose to identify with this, I think that's terrific.
Death and resurrection are what the story is about and had we but eyes to see it, this has been hinted on every page, met us, in some disguise, at every turn, and even been muttered in conversations between such minor characters (if they are minor characters) as the vegetables.
I think for folks of color the key to combatting racism period is a) trusting their instincts and b) solidarity with one another.
There was a subtlety about Peggy Lee. It was powerful. There was a valuable use of space. Everything was not cluttered. Her voice was out front and was the key instrument.
Every word, every character in a picture book must count.