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
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.
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.
fear going-away world
...What you fear will not go away; it will take you into yourself and bless you and keep you. That's the world, and we all live there.
rivers waiting silence
You and I can turn and look at the silent river and wait. We know the current is there, hidden; and there are comings and goings from miles away that hold the stillness exactly before us. What the river says, that is what I say.
hurt mistake hate
Ask Me Some time when the river is ice ask me mistakes I have made. Ask me whether what I have done is my life. Others have come in their slow way into my thought, and some have tried to help or to hurt: ask me what difference their strongest love or hate has made. I will listen to what you say. You and I can turn and look at the silent river and wait. We know the current is there, hidden; and there are comings and goings from miles away that hold the stillness exactly before us. What the river says, that is what I say.
real caring people
Everyone is born a poet - a person discovering the way words sound and work, caring and delighting in words. I just kept on doing what everyone starts out doing. The real question is: Why did other people stop?
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.
life wisdom learning
Wisdom is having things right in your life and knowing why.
butterfly discovery experience
I embrace emerging experience, I participate in discovery. I am a butterfly. I am not a butterfly collector. I want the experience of the butterfly.
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 ~
talking needs ifs
You don't need many words if you already know what you're talking about
art teaching decision
I have a feeling that art is something you do for yourself, and that any time you turn your decisions over to someone else you're postponing at best, your own development. The atmosphere of the workshop should be that of trying out one's own work and accepting the signals from others but not accepting the dictation of others because that is a violation of the spirit of art. Art can't be done by somebody else, it has got to be done by the artist.
block enough lows
There is no such thing as writer's block for writers whose standards are low enough.