I grew up in an anti-intellectual climate. I realized as a late teen that it was my ability to think that saved me from self-destructiveness. That is what I am often pursuing in my work—not just in my poetry, but in in everything from my journals to my aphorisms and stories—an analysis of the way things were and are and may be, from the details of my family life, my self, to society in general. Because only by thinking through these things can we save ourselves, save each other, and save what we can of our environment.