Theodore Roethke

And what a congress of stinks!- Roots ripe as old bait, Pulpy stems, rank, silo-rich, Leaf mold, manure, lime, piled against slippery planks, Nothing would give up life: Even the dirt kept breathing a small breath.

My Papa's Waltz: The whiskey on your breath Could make a small boy dizzy; But I hung on like death: Such waltzing was not easy. We romped until the pans Slid from the kitchen shelf; My mother's countenance Could not unfrown itself. The hand that held my wrist Was battered on one knuckle; At every step you missed My right ear scraped a buckle. You beat time on my head With a palm caked hard by dirt, Then waltzed me off to bed Still clinging to your shirt.

Art is our defense against hysteria and death.

The indignity of it!-_x000D_ _x000D_ With everything blooming above me,_x000D_ _x000D_ Lilies, pale-pink cyclamen, roses,_x000D_ _x000D_ Whole fields lovely and inviolate,-_x000D_ _x000D_ Me down in the fetor of weeds,_x000D_ _x000D_ Crawling on all fours,_x000D_ _x000D_ Alive, in a slippery grave.

By daily dying, I have come to be.

The stones were sharp, The wind came at my back; Walking along the highway, Mincing like a cat.

The self says, I am; The heart says, I am less; The spirit says, you are Nothing.

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.

Being, not doing, is my first joy.

Pain wanders through my bones like a lost fire

Over every mountain there is a path, although it may not be seen from the valley.

A lively understandable spirit Once entertained you. It will come again. Be still. Wait.

Nothing would give up life: Even the dirt keeps breathing a small breath.

To follow the drops sliding from a lifting oar, Head up, while the rower breathes, and the small boat drifts quietly shoreward.

Should we say the self, once perceived, becomes the soul?

What is madness but nobility of soul at odds with circumstance?

So much of adolescence is an ill-defined dying, An intolerable waiting, A longing for another place and time, Another condition.

All lovers live by longing, and endure: Summon a vision and declare it pure.

Long live the weeds that overwhelm_x000D_ _x000D_ My narrow vegetable realm!_x000D_ _x000D_ The bitter rock, the barren soil_x000D_ _x000D_ That force the son of man to toil;_x000D_ _x000D_ All things unholy, marred by curse,_x000D_ _x000D_ The ugly of the universe.

I learned not to fear infinity, The far field, the windy cliffs of forever, The dying of time in the white light of tomorrow, The wheel turning away from itself, The sprawl of the wave, The on-coming water.

I teach my sighs to lengthen into songs.