My poems were just kind of all over the place. They had no focus, no location, nothing. Kind of a series of images that could have been set anywhere. A lot of the poems were just exercises for myself.

I think ethnic and regional labels are insulting to writers and really put restrictions on them. People don't think your work is quite as universal.

Nobody would take checks from Indians, nobody would give them any credit, and nobody would let them drink in the bars. There was a rudeness, a brusqueness, with which the Indians were treated constantly. At a very young age, that had entered my consciousness.

The title of the poems was The Only Bar in Dixon. We sent it out to The New Yorker on a fluke, and they took them and printed all three in the same issue.

Before, Indian people had been so defeated, they were always looking for outsiders, for the government, to somehow come in and fix things. But now, they seem to realize that they're the only ones who can save themselves.

The townspeople outside the reservations had a very superior attitude toward Indians, which was kind of funny, because they weren't very wealthy; they were on the fringes of society themselves.

I wrote a lot in study hall to while away the hours.

I am definitely a storyteller, but probably not a traditional Storyteller.

I used to object to being called an Indian writer, and would always say I was a writer who happened to be an Indian, and who happened to write about Indians.

Our literature is in great shape.

In a lot of Indian societies, spirituality has been lost, I think it's still the best way of looking at the world for Indians - better than any organized religion in this country.

Richard Hugo taught me that anyone with a desire to write, an ear for language and a bit of imagination could become a writer. He also, in a way, gave me permission to write about northern Montana.

My poems were just kind of all over the place. They had no focus, no location, nothing. Kind of a series of images that could have been set anywhere. A lot of the poems were just exercises for myself.

The economic piece is still missing, since it's so hard to attract industry to reservations, but spiritually and educationally, they're doing just fine. Each tribe has a community college now, and they teach the language, they teach the traditions.

To receive this award from an organization I admire so much makes me totally happy and grateful.

I wander around, get the lay of the land and try to imagine what kind of people would have lived there in that historical period. What would they eat? What kind of clothing would they wear? How did they shelter themselves? How did they get around?

I do believe in the viability of Indian spiritualism.

Concentrate all your thoughts upon the work at hand. The sun's rays do not burn until brought to a focus.

My focus is that firearms are handled safely and that we can continue to enjoy them here in North America.

When you focus on being a blessing, God makes sure that you are always blessed in abundance.

One reason so few of us achieve what we truly want is that we never direct our focus; we never concentrate our power. Most people dabble their way through life, never deciding to master anything in particular.

Be dramatically willing to focus on the customer at all costs, even at the cost of obsoleting your own stuff.

While I recognize the great value and importance of prescription drugs and strongly support a continued U.S. focus on pharmaceutical research and development, our nation's seniors cannot be asked to subsidize the drug costs of other wealthy industrialized nations any longer.

In examining the potential of individuals, we must focus on their strengths and not just their mistakes. We cannot be limited by what they may have spilled in the kitchen.

There are two things that I put my focus on. One is the fight against AIDS and finding a cure. The other is human rights.

It was by design that we mostly used pictures that you could not necessarily see what was going on, and that didn't really focus in on the band, but instead focused in on a theme.

But the real focus should be on people who are buying today because the base is so big it will take a long time for any change materialize on an overall basis.

We don't focus as much in schools on educational knowledge which requires thinking and application, as we do on acquiring facts.

I enjoyed high school and college, and I think I learned a lot, but that was not really my focus. My focus was on trying to figure out what businesses to start.

Common sense tells us that we should focus our resources to benefit children, teachers and taxpayers by keeping dollars in the classroom.

I am what you might call abstractly anti-capitalist. For instance, I am suspicious of the old leftists who focus all their hatred on the United States. What about Chinese neo-colonialism? Why are the left silent about that? When I say this, it annoys them, of course. Good!

What I thought we ought to try to do in a book like this is to focus closely on Lincoln, himself, to see what he knew, how he knew it, how he came to make the decisions that he did, and how he implemented them.

And there are so many people in the third world suffering so horribly right now, and we are so focused on ourselves and our culture that a lot of things are showing up in our culture that are making it impossible for us to focus on others. We're so self-focused.

When words become unclear, I shall focus with photographs. When images become inadequate, I shall be content with silence.

My focus is to forget the pain of life. Forget the pain, mock the pain, reduce it. And laugh.

It is really hard to do comedy; it takes a lot of energy and focus. It's rather like music: It's a lot of hitting notes precisely.

My colleagues have expressed confidence in my ability to articulate our conservative message and to provide new focus to our efforts in the General Assembly.

I was raised a Christian, but I wouldn't call myself a Christian now. I think when I was younger it was easier to focus on the negative, nihilist vision... this is sort of picking up on the other half of the body, which is God and white light.

Our focus is on outputs rather than inputs.

Instead of focusing on that circumstances that you cannot change - focus strongly and powerfully on the circumstances that you can.

Advocates of unrestricted abortion do not want the public to focus on these undeniable facts of fetal development, but the facts cannot be ignored.

For a good chunk of Israelis, it doesn't matter who is in power when it comes to dealing with the Palestinians. Their focus was more on economic issues.

You have got to have discipline and focus - on the customer and how you run the business.

The orgasm has replaced the cross as the focus of longing and fulfillment.

The major championships have always been a special focus in my career, and as a professional, I think Augusta is where I need to be.

Each of us seems to have a main focus, a particular idea of practicality - a concept of 'what we want out of life' against which we judge our experiences.

We also had good software in the key categories and more focus on the gameplaying capability, so more of the marketing effort was targeted at game customers.

My idea of a good picture is one that's in focus and of a famous person.

Singing was the big focus and outlet for me.