Paul Muldoon

"One will never again look at a birch tree, after the Robert Frost poem, in exactly the same way."

"For whatever reason, people, including very well-educated people or people otherwise interested in reading, do not read poetry."

"That's one of the great things about poetry one realises that one does one's little turn - that you're just part of the great crop, as it were."

"The other side of it is that, despite all that, people reach out to poetry at the key moments in their lives."

"We simply have not kept in touch with poetry."