"All young men are unhappy. That’s why they identify so strongly with Hamlet. They’re unhappy in a formless kind of way, partly because they don’t have an identity, they don’t know where they’re going, they don’t know who they are. You’re a pretty unusual person—something slightly sinister—if at the age of twenty or twenty-two you really know exactly who you are and what you’re going to do. More likely you’re undefined, and being undefined is rather painful."
This poem of his is a particular favourite of mine, its visceral drive makes a relatively uninteresting subject matter impulsive:
Considering the Snail
The snail pushes through the green
night, for the grass is heavy
with water and meets over
the bright path he makes, where rain
has darkened the earth's dark. He
moves in a wood of desire,
pale antlers barely stirring
as he hunts. I cannot tell
what power is at work, drenched there
with purpose, knowing nothing.
What is snail's fury? All
I think is that if later
I parted the blades above
the tunnel and saw the thin
trail of broken white across
litter, I would never have
imagined the slow passion
to that deliberate progress.