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• We need to learn that a poem can have many meanings and that it can be enjoyed without a complete understanding of the poet's intent
• On a good day a poem might bring you great joy, on a tough day, the same poem might reveal great agony, but the poem hasn't changed—it's what you have brought to the poem that has changed
• That is how I have come to think about poetry—that a poem isn't a problem to solve, but rather it's a singular animal call that contains multiple layers of both mystery and joy.

“Stop cringing — at your future, at your failure, at yourself in the mirror — and stand up and look directly at who you are. Not who you should’ve been, but who you are now. Let that person in. Let her be as mediocre and wrong and shameful and sad and miserable and brilliant and hilarious as she wants to be, because she knows exactly what you need to feel good. She has plans for you. She wants to show you what comes next. She wants to take you into the future you’re dreading and say, “See? You never would’ve imagined this.”

“It is not enough to weep for our lost landscapes; we have to put our hands in the earth to make ourselves whole again. Even a wounded world is feeding us. Even a wounded world holds us, giving us moments of wonder and joy. I choose joy over despair. Not because I have my head in the sand, but because joy is what the earth gives me daily and I must return the gift.”

Jeanette Winterson, Lighthousekeeping