"snip off a length"

John Ashbery:

In a 1976 interview ..., Ashbery describes his creative process: “I have a feeling that in my mind is an underground stream, if you will, that I can have access to when I want it. I want the poetry to come out as freshly and unplanned as possible.” In another interview from 1984, he directly addresses the issue of resolution: “I don’t look on poems as closed works. I feel they’re going on all the time in my head, and I occasionally snip off a length.”