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And the things you know before you hear them these are you and the reason you are in the world.

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
Things
World
Hear
Reason

More quotes by William Stafford

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An owl sound wandered along the road with me. I didn't hear it--I breathed it into my ears.
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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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The greatest ownership of all is to glance around and understand.
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'Be alive,' the land says, 'listen - this is your time, your world, your pleasure.'
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If you can say it, it begins to exist.
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Others may be able to accept standards from another, but an artist is a person who decides.
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You don't need many words if you already know what you're talking about
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You can lie at a banquet but you have to be honest in the kitchen.
William Stafford
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I don't see writing as a communication of something already discovered, as truths already known. Rather, I see writing as a job of experiment. It's like any discovery job you don't know what's going to happen until you try it.
William Stafford
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The root and the flower have to trust each other. If the root does not trust, the plant won't blossom.
William Stafford
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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.
William Stafford
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The ocean and I have many pebbles To find and wash off and roll into shape.
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Wisdom is having things right in your life and knowing why.
William Stafford
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Kids: they dance before they learn there is anything that isn't music.
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You were aimed from birth: you will never be alone... The whole wide world pours down.
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Anyone who breathes is in the rhythm business.
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I have woven a parachute out of everything broken.
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...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.
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It is as if the ordinary language we use every day has a hidden set of signals, a kind of secret code.
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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.
William Stafford