"Arte Six": Quick Hits: LIVES: Fiona Robyn, poet

"My poems are usually 'born' when I notice something unusual that strikes me for some reason. This could be anything from 'the feeling of snow compacting under my feet in shudders' to a leaf falling on my head to noticing a girl on a train.

"I'll write a rough first draft of what I've seen/heard/noticed, and then I just keep re-writing it and re-writing so it gets closer and closer to the way I want to say it. I read aloud a lot and listen to the sound of the words, and will change words or the order of the words if they don't seem 'right'.

A lot of poems seem to get born when I'm traveling for some reason -- trains are best."

Read the full "Lives" profile of poet Fiona Robyn in the March 2004 issue of "Arte Six".