71 Quotes by Kevin Powers

I wasn't a good student in high school. I wanted to go to college, but they weren't exactly beating down my door to offer me admission, and it's so expensive in the U.S. If you join up for a period, the army will pay your school and provide a stipend.

It's not just: you get off the plane, you're back home, everything's fine. Maybe the physical danger ends, but soldiers are still deeply at risk of being injured in a different way.

Poetry and prose are of equal importance to me as a reader, and there doesn't seem to be much difference in my own writing.

I guess I find the boundaries between poetry and prose to be somewhat permeable.

I understand that it's incredibly difficult to watch what's happening on the news every day and not become inured to it. I've fallen victim to that myself, wanting to look away.

Joining the military is not to be taken lightly. You're putting every part of yourself at risk, not just your body but your moral and spiritual centre.

I understood that 'The Yellow Birds' would be a peculiar representation of the experience of being at war. I intended it to be so.

I've been writing poems and stories since I was about 13.

Writing was always an aspiration, but I'd kept it a secret even from myself.