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The signals we give-yes or no, or maybe-/should be clear/the darkness around us is deep.

William Stafford

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William Stafford
Age: 79 †
Born: 1914
Born: January 17
Died: 1993
Died: August 28
Author
Poet
Writer
Hutchinson
Kansas
Maybe
Clear
Around
Give
Giving
Signals
Darkness
Deep

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Literature is not a picture of life, but is a separate experience with its own kind of flow and enhancement.
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You were aimed from birth: you will never be alone... The whole wide world pours down.
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Let the bucket of memory down into the well, bring it up. Cool, cool minutes. No one stirring, no plans. Just being there.
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The ocean and I have many pebbles To find and wash off and roll into shape.
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A student comes to me with a piece of writing, holds it out, says, 'Is this good?' A whole sequence of emergencies goes off in my mind. That's not a question to ask anyone but yourself.
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Wisdom is having things right in your life and knowing why.
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People wander about what you are pursuing. You have to explain about the thread.
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So, the world happens twice-- once what we see it as second it legends itself deep, the way it is.
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And the things you know before you hear them these are you and the reason you are in the world.
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I heard a bird congratulating itself all day for being a jay. Nobody cared. But it was glad all over again, and said so, again.
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One way to find your place is like the rain, a million requests for lodging, one that wins, finds your cheek: you find your home.
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You can treat experience as a set of surprises on which to exercise your quirky self.
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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.
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A speech is something you say so as to distract attention from what you do not say.
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You don't need many words if you already know what you're talking about
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Will you ever bring a better gift for the world than the breathing respect that you carry wherever you go right now?
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When the snake decided to go straight, he didn't get anywhere.
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All still when summer is over stand shocks in the field, nothing left to whisper, not even good-bye, to the wind. After summer was over we knew winter would come: we knew silence would wait, tall, patient calm.
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Even the upper end of the river believes in the ocean.
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Language can do what it can’t say.
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