I Wanted To Write Poetry Almost A

The Sharpest Memory Of Our Old-fashioned Christmas Eve Is My Mother's Hand Making Sure I Was Settled In Bed.

All Families Had Their Special Christmas Food. Ours Was Called Dutch Bread, Made From A Dough Halfway Between Bread And Cake, Stuffed With Citron And Every Sort Of Nut From The Farm - Hazel, Black Walnut, Hickory, Butternut.

Verse Is Not Written, It Is Bled; Out Of The Poet's Abstract Head. Words Drip The Poem On The Page; Out Of His Grief, Delight And Rage.

When Your First Marriage Goes Into Tragedy, You Become Very Battle-scarred... I Even Thought Of Suicide. Luckily, I Had Known Some Happy Marriages.

For My Oxford Degree, I Had To Translate French And German Philosophy (as It Turned Out, Descartes And Kant) At Sight Without A Dictionary. That Meant Germany For My First Summer Vacation, To Learn The Thorny Language On My Own.