I take seriously what Ezra Pound said, "make poetry new." I do not want to write like anyone else, if that's possible. I want to create new forms of poetry. Sure, I have been influenced by many writers who write differently than I do, whether it is in style, theme, or topics, but I respect all forms and styles of poetry. I am experimenting all the time. Each time I write, it is as if it is my first time, like I have not done it before. The poem, and the way it is put together, becomes the object I am writing about as well as the subject. The way the poem is written is part of its meaning. All of it, I feel, comes from a deep and original, and yet common, place. I write to try to understand myself and the world and to question the things we just assume to be true, but mostly I write to remember the brightness of being alive.