I think what I would really most like to write about is palm trees and bougainvillea and hummingbirds. I would like to go into the desert and write about salamanders and the Grand Canyon, but history keeps rupturing my experience because politics are everywhere.

Robin Coste Lewis

Categorized in : History Politics Experience Desert

Long before we created libraries, or even books, poetry was the way we humans remembered who we were, a primary means of documenting and contemplating our lives.

Robin Coste Lewis

books poetry long way

I thought that if one wanted to be a writer, one had to write novels because I didn't know that one could be a poet.

Robin Coste Lewis

write thought know poet

I think that if someone told me I could have been a visual artist, I might have been a visual artist instead. And if I'd known I could have done art history, I would have done that. But I just didn't know.

Robin Coste Lewis

think me history art

I am an artist through to my marrow, which might be a curse and not necessarily a good thing.

Robin Coste Lewis

i-am good curse artist

Poetry, first and foremost, is the lyric. It's the music.

Robin Coste Lewis

lyric first music poetry

We all know what it means to be sung to. And poetry is very close to that.

Robin Coste Lewis

close very know poetry

I don't want to waste my readers' time ever. My readers are very important to me.

Robin Coste Lewis

me important want time

Toni Morrison was a big influence on my work since I was a teenager, what she did with English. I joke that I think she speaks 20 Englishes simultaneously, that she knows how to do that.

Robin Coste Lewis

joke think influence work

Poetry is this gorgeous, complex history rendered in verse and song, a blueprint that can lead you back into the world after you've walked into air.

Robin Coste Lewis

you poetry song history