A poem begins in delight and ends in wisdom.

I have never started a poem yet whose end I knew. Writing a poem is discovering.

Like a piece of ice on a hot stove the poem must ride on its own melting.

A poem begins with a lump in the throat; a homesickness or a love sickness. It is a reaching-out toward expression; an effort to find fulfillment. A complete poem is one where an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words.

There are three things, after all, that a poem must reach: the eye, the ear, and what we may call the heart or the mind. It is the most important of all to reach the heart of the reader.

A poem may be worked over once it is in being, but may not be worried into being.