Ellen Bass

So much inspires me. People living their lives with courage, beauty of all kinds, nature in all its aspects, people I love and people I hardly know, and, of course, other poets.

Garrison Keillor read several of my poems on 'The Writer's Almanac' and I've heard from listeners nationally and internationally. That's one of the great gifts of email.

I wanted to be a writer since I was in high school, but I never thought it was possible.

The thing about great poetry is we have no defenses against it.

This is the most intimate relationship between literature and its readers: they treat the text as a part of themselves, as a possession.

Realistically speaking, I don't know how many more years I will want to be acting or will be invited to be.