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"The reader's challenge is to replicate the experiment by reading the poem and to draw their own conclusions."
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"We are the mountains we must cross."

"The greater your destiny the greater your troubles."

"The more difficult a problem is, the more discoveries you make in the process of resolving it."

"The greater the difficulty the more glory in surmounting it. Skillful pilots gain their reputation from storms and tempests."

"If it doesn't challenge you, it won't change you!"

"It's a challenge between me and the hurdle, and the hurdle has always won."

"There was a special challenge in describing the awful childhood of a person who happens to be my own husband. It was very painful at times, for both of us."

"I challenge myself everywhere, onstage, on the golf course. Hey, isn't that the point of it all? To keep getting better? Otherwise why do it?"
Explore more quotes by John Barton

"I consider a poem to be a kind of experiment where a number of elements are brought together under test conditions to see how they will interact to create meaning or relevance."

"Some readers allow their prejudices to blind them. A good reader knows how to disregard inappropriate responses."

"The experiment of the poem is mostly intuitive. I write the first draft, pulling in the various elements that interest me, in the hope that their being combined will lead to some kind of insight."

"The community of poets I belong to is not as close as it used to be, if only for the fact that our lives have become busier: jobs, children, and the like."

"Most victims of my autobiographical verse are either far too polite, remarkably understanding unaware that I have written poems about them."

"I became intrigued with colour theory. The absurd pronouncements of the Colour Institute, a group that decides what colours are hot each year or season, amused me."

"A literary journal is intended to connect writer with reader; the role of the editor is to mediate."
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