What inspires you to write? they ask

This is such a difficult question! There is no definitive answer. 

All that I can say is that both of my books, all of my (as yet unpublished) short stories and all of my poems would never have come into being without some hook to hang them on. Some germ of an idea. That may sound obvious, but I mean to say that I cannot manufacture an idea and work it up, it has to slip into my mind unasked!

I find it impossible to start with the idea that today I will write a poem. Or a short story. Inst...