Quote

In a dark time, the eye begins to see / I meet my shadow in the deepening shade...Dark, dark my light, and darker my desire.

Theodore Roethke

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Theodore Roethke
Age: 55 †
Born: 1908
Born: May 25
Died: 1963
Died: August 1
Poet
Teacher
Writer
Saginaw
Michigan
Meet
Dark
Eye
Desire
Deepening
Light
Darker
Time
Shade
Begins
Shadow

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The visible exhausts me. I am dissolved in shadow.
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You must believe: a poem is a holy thing - a good poem, that is. The poem, even a short time after being written, seems no miracle unwritten, it seems something beyond the capacity of the gods.
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Fear was my father, Father Fear. His look drained the stones.
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I came to love, I came into my own.
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When I go mad, I call my friends by phone: I am afraid they might think they're alone.
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The living all assemble! What's the cue?-- Do what the clumsy partner wants to do!
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Death was not. I lived in a simple drowse:Hands and hair moved through a dream of wakening blossoms.Rain sweetened the cave and the dove still calledThe flowers leaned on themselves, the flowers in hollowsAnd love, love sang toward.
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Pain wanders through my bones like a lost fire
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Art is our defense against hysteria and death.
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The self says, I am The heart says, I am less The spirit says, you are Nothing.
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I lose and find myself in the long water. I am gathered together once more.
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