William Stafford
William Stafford
Prolific American poet and 1970 U.S. Poet Laureate who won the National Book Award for Traveling Through the Dark. His numerous other works include In the Clock of Reason, Brother Wind, Passwords, and Wyoming Circuit.
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth17 January 1914
CountryUnited States of America
grateful gold safe
Once we have tasted far streams, touched the gold, found some limit beyond the waterfall, a season changes and we come back changed but safe, quiet, grateful.
half wake-up whole
It's love,' they say. You touch the right one and a whole half of the universe wakes up, a new half.
rivers topics kind
I keep following this sort of hidden river of my life, you know, whatever the topic or impulse which comes, I follow it along trustingly. And I don't have any sense of its coming to a kind of crescendo, or of its petering out either. It is just going steadily along.
breathing world right-now
Will you ever bring a better gift for the world than the breathing respect that you carry wherever you go right now?
legends way world
So, the world happens twice-- once what we see it as; second it legends itself deep, the way it is.
decision life-is distraction
Once you decide to do right, life is easy, there are no distractions.
memories just-being buckets
Let the bucket of memory down into the well, bring it up. Cool, cool minutes. No one stirring, no plans. Just being there.
getting-lost madness where-you-are
The more you let yourself be distracted from where you are going, the more you are the person that you are. It's not so much like getting lost as it is like getting found.
breathe rhythm
Anyone who breathes is in the rhythm business.
enhancement literature flow
Literature is not a picture of life, but is a separate experience with its own kind of flow and enhancement.
process found new-things
A writer is not so much someone who has something to say as he is someone who has found a process that will bring about new things he would not have thought of if he had not started to say them.
letting-go hurt people
The Way It Is There’s a thread you follow. It goes among things that change. But it doesn’t change. People wonder about what you are pursuing. You have to explain about the thread. But it is hard for others to see. While you hold it you can’t get lost. Tragedies happen; people get hurt or die; and you suffer and get old. Nothing you do can stop time’s unfolding. You don’t ever let go of the thread. ~ William Stafford ~
ownership glances
The greatest ownership of all is to glance around and understand.
serious crafts jokes
A poem is a serious joke, a truth that has learned jujitsu.