I'm not a drug salesman. I'm a writer.
I've written and translated my own poems from English to German. It's basically a summation of my identity as it stands now.
In the end we're all searching for our home, that one place where we belong.
If I cannot offer some relief to our world, if I cannot inspire our generation to join me, then I feel I am a complete waste of space. This constant fear of feeling irrelevant in our society has been the catalyst behind all my efforts and passions for as long as I can remember.
I would like my books to stand as a tool to unbind children from expectations of poetry because it should free the child to self-expression and exploration.
I know that there's this one Albanian myth that's always reflected on, and I think it reflects on the actual core culture. That myth is called The Besa. B-E-S-A. The Besa is a word that Albanians use to mean avow, but it's such a strong promise, that even past death, one cannot break that promise. It is unfathomable. So if you give someone your besa, life or death, heaven or hell, you have to fulfill that besa.
While some mothers sing lullabies to their children, my mother read me poetry. And to this day, I associate my strongest and most insistent feelings with words lyrically organized on a page.
The earnings of a poet could be reckoned by a metaphysician rather than a bookkeeper.
It was almost noon when the plane touched down at the Triad airport on the outskirts of Greensboro. There was a hire car waiting for me; I waved my notepad at the dashboard to transmit my profile, then waited as the seating and controls rearranged themselves slightly, piezoelectric actuators humming. As I started to reverse out of the parking bay, the stereo began a soothing improvisation, flashing up a deadpan title: Music for Leaving Airports 11 June 2008.
I've come to be pretty selective about the type of advocacy that I do, because I kind of feel like it's stronger to just do my work and let it speak for itself.
I would support whoever the people have chosen. We have to abandon the thinking that there is a bunch of politically elite people who know what is best, let the people determine for themselves who is best.