Quote

But when I breath with the birds, The spirit of wrath becomes the spirit of blessings, And the dead begin from their dark to sing in my sleep.

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
Begin
Wrath
Dead
Blessings
Becomes
Birds
Sleep
Breath
Dark
Breaths
Spirit
Sing
Blessing
Bird

More quotes by Theodore Roethke

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And soon a branch, part of a hidden scene,The leafy mind, that long was tightly furled,Will turn its private substance into green,And young shoots spread upon our inner world.
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The fields stretch out in long unbroken rows. We walk aware of what is far and close. Here distance is familiar as a friend. The feud we kept with space comes to an end.
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How body from spirit slowly does unwind, until we are pure spirit at the end.
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Let others probe the mystery if they can.Time-harried prisoners of Shall and Will -The right thing happens to the happy man.
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Being, not doing, is my first joy.
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The stones were sharp, The wind came at my back Walking along the highway, Mincing like a cat.
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I wish I could find an event that meant as much as simple seeing.
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What's important? That which is dug out of books, or out of the guts?
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The living all assemble! What's the cue?-- Do what the clumsy partner wants to do!
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The indignity of it!- With everything blooming above me, Lilies, pale-pink cyclamen, roses, Whole fields lovely and inviolate,- Me down in the fetor of weeds, Crawling on all fours, Alive, in a slippery grave.
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I always felt mean, jogging back over the logging road,As if I had broken the natural order of things in that swamplandDisturbed some rhythm, old and of vast importance,By pulling off flesh from the living planetAs if I had committed, against the whole scheme of life, a desecration.
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Pain wanders through my bones like a lost fire
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I came to love, I came into my own.
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So much of adolescence is an ill-defined dying, An intolerable waiting, A longing for another place and time, Another condition.
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What have I done, dear God, to deserve this perpetual feeling that I'm almost ready to begin something really new?
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A too explicit elucidation in education destroys much of the pleasure of learning. There should be room for sly hinters, masters of suggestion.
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Time marks us while we are marking time.
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I came where the river Ran over stones My ears knew An early joy. And all the waters Of all the streams Sang in my veins That summer day.
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By daily dying, I have come to be.
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Art is our defense against hysteria and death.
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