“The forest—pure, wild—doesn’t disappoint, whatever the time of year.”

The Great North, Living, Spalding, Rhiannon, Alice.

“When my son and I graduated to books like Charlotte's Web or Harry Potter (so called "chapter books") my long imprisoned inner ham actor was given a nightly furlough.”

Kid’s Books, Falls’ Chekhov, God of Carnage, Dawn Upshaw,

“Pick up a volume ("Ci-Cz") open it at random and read about the life cycle of cicadas, the poems of Samuel Taylor Coleridge or the military hubris of General George Custer.”

The Joy of Reference, Baraton’s Beethoven, Cleo’s Spring, Rushdie’s world, Fonda and Stanwyck.

“A dog’s will is the purest kind of free will.”

Oliver, Stephen Shore, Cecilia McLorin Salvant, Ikiru, Orwell’s nature.

Jane Hirshfield, Ada Limón, Tony Hoagland, Joni Mitchell, Fred Hersch, Bertolt Brecht.

“Poems, despite the ways they are sometimes taught, are not crossword-puzzle constructions; first drafts, and many stages of revision, take place at a level closer to daydream.”