I'm Uncomfortable With The Focus

My Great-grandfather Melvin Had Been A Carpenter - So Was My Father - And They Taught Me The Value Of Tools: Saws, Hammers, Chisels, Files And Rulers. It All Dealt With Conciseness And Precision. It Eliminated Guesswork. One Has To Know His Tools, So He Doesn't Work Against Himself.

I Think Of My Poems As Personal And Public At The Same Time. You Could Say They Serve As Psychological Overlays. One Fits On Top Of The Other, And Hopefully There's An Ongoing Evolution Of Clarity.

Vietnam Helped Me To Look At The Horror And Terror In The Hearts Of People And Realize How We Can't Aim Guns And Set Booby Traps For People We Have Never Spoken A Word To. That Kind Of Impersonal Violence Mystifies Me.

There's A Sameness About American Poetry That I Don't Think Represents The Whole People. It Represents A Poetry Of The Moment, A Poetry Of Evasion, And I Have Problems With This. I Believe Poetry Has Always Been Political, Long Before Poets Had To Deal With The Page And White Space . . . It's Natural.

I Originally Wanted To Embrace The Imagery And Forthrightness Of Rap Music. There Are Some Interesting, Dynamic Voices In Rap. But I Find Most Of It Irresponsible In Its Overt Violence And Commercialization Of Anger. As Artists, We Believe We Can Will Action Through Language. If That's The Case, We Have To Take Responsibility For What We Say.