Clergyman's

“Admitting you are a nature poet, nowadays, may make you seem something of a fool!”
— Don McKay

“The nature poet may , resort to the field guide or library but will keep coming back , figuratively speaking, to the trail - to the grain of experience.”
— Don McKay

“The medatative approach acknowledges that one moment will inevitably lead on to the next. We accept immortality instead of fighting it off.”
— Don McKay

“There's a place”
— between desire and memory, some back porchwe can neither wish nor recall- Don McKay

“Poets are supremely interested in what language can't do , in order to gesture outside, they use language in a way that flirts with its destruction.”
— Don McKay

“As I grew older the poetic surround becomes more important. I realize that the 'poetic attention' was more important to me than poetry was. The 'poetic attention' being a kind of longing without the desire to posess.”
— Don McKay

“The first indication of one's status as a nature poet is that one does not invoke language right off when talking about poetry.”
— Don McKay

“Before the wonderful, terrible wrestling with words and music there is the state of mind I'm calling 'poetic attention' ... a sort of readiness ... a form of knowing.”
— Don McKay

“Phenomenology is one name for the path back from the object to the thing, the counterbalance to the objectification or 'progress'.Poetry is another.”
— Don McKay

“We inflict our rage for immortality on things, marooning them on static islands.”
— Don McKay