"In life, the number of beginnings is exactly equal to the number of endings: no one has yet to begin a life who will not end it.
In poetry, the number of beginnings so far exceeds the number of endings that we cannot even concieve it. Not every poem is finished - one poem is abandoned, another catches fire and is carried away by the wind, which may be an ending, but it is the ending of a poem without and end."
Mary Ruefle
"Madness, Rack and Honey"
Wave Books 2012