Poetry, above all, is a series of intense moments - its power is not in narrative. I'm not dealing with facts, I'm dealing with emotion. Carol Ann Duffy

Have I not been trying to use the obstacle/Of language well? - 'Malcolm Mooney's Land', W. S. Graham

We are drawn to edges, to our own/parapets and sea-walls: - 'Apart', Robin Robertson

I would say that the poem exists in a space somewhere between the reader and the author, and in a sense belongs to neither, and both. - Don Paterson

A poem is a little moment of belief. - Jackie Kay

the most dynamic, brilliant, free-wheeling poet around, endlessly accessible and inventive - The Scotsman

Our response to the world is essentially one of wonder, of confronting the mysterious with a sense, not of being small, or insignificant, but of being part of a rich and complex narrative. From 'Strong Words', John Burnside

The essence of Orkney's magic is silence, loneliness and the deep marvellous rhythms of sea and land, darkness and light. - George Mackay Brown

I'll hae nae hauf-way hoose, but aye be whaur/Extremes meet. - Hugh MacDiarmid

...if poetry is a method of approaching truths, and each of us with a human soul and 'a tongue in oor heids' can make an approach toward a truth, poetry is inherently democratic. - Kathleen Jamie

All my poems are intended to be heard out loud. They are an attempt to manifest something: not to 'describe' or 'invoke' it, but actually to bring it before the listener.