Nobody Stays Special When They're Old, Anna.

I Live Alone, Perhaps For No Good Reason, For The Reason That I Am An Impossible Creature, Set Apart By A Temperament I Have Never Learned To Use As It Could Be Used, Thrown Off By A Word, A Glance, A Rainy Day, Or One Drink Too Many. My Need To Be Alone Is Balanced Against My Fear Of What Will Happen When Suddenly I Enter The Huge Empty Silence If I Cannot Find Support There. I Go Up To Heaven And Down To Hell In An Hour, And Keep Alive Only By Imposing Upon Myself Inexorable Routines. I Write Too Many Letters And Too Few Poems.

Human Relations Just Are Not Fixed In Their Orbits Like The Planets -- They're More Like Galaxies, Changing All The Time, Exploding Into Light For Years, Then Dying Away.

Nobody Stays Special When They're Old, Anna. That's What We Have To Learn.

We Are Able To Laugh When We Achieve Detachment, If Only For A Moment.

The Beginner Hugs His Infant Poem To Him And Does Not Want It To Grow Up. But You May Have To Break Your Poem To Remake It.