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'Be alive,' the land says, 'listen - this is your time, your world, your pleasure.'

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
World
Listen
Says
Land
Alive
Pleasure
Time

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Even the upper end of the river believes in the ocean.
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The ocean and I have many pebbles To find and wash off and roll into shape.
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Security of character would be like a compass, you know? Other people may say that this way is north, or this way might be north. But the compass just says -- north. That's what we count on.
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There is no such thing as writer's block for writers whose standards are low enough.
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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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Kids: they dance before they learn there is anything that isn't music.
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Anyone who breathes is in the rhythm business.
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A writer is someone who has found a process that will bring about new things.
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The greatest ownership of all is to glance around and understand.
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If you purify the pond, the lilies die
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People wander about what you are pursuing. You have to explain about the thread.
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Keep a journal, and don't assume that your work has to accomplish anything worthy: artists and peace-workers are in it for the long haul, and not to be judged by immediate results.
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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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When you allow me to live with you, every glance at the world around you will be a sort of salvation.
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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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A speech is something you say so as to distract attention from what you do not say.
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When the snake decided to go straight, he didn't get anywhere.
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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 poem is a serious joke, a truth that has learned jujitsu.
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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.
William Stafford