A sudden fear that I will "lose it," or have already "lost it," the ability to have something of relevance or interest to anyone else. This fear fighting against the contrary feeling that actually I have more to say now than I ever did, that past versions of myself were vastly inadequate, that I've only really figured anything out in the last three or four years.

That idea that you have to be of a certain age to really understand an art form, whether poetry or any other. In conflict with my feeling that I was already fairly well-on-the-way to understanding something about poetry when I was 19 or 20. I am rarely in awe of a mere literary critic. I hardly ever feel, that is, that there is anyone substantially superior to me in the ability to read poetry and understand what it is about. There are definitely more erudite people, or people with a surer command of the theoretical discourse.