William Stafford

If you purify the pond, the lilies die

— William Stafford

Wisdom is having things right in your life and knowing why.

— William Stafford

I'll be me, but I don't like it.

— William Stafford

Language can do what it can’t say.

— William Stafford

I'll be Pavlov, you be the dog.

— William Stafford

“Evening came, a paw, to the gray hut by the river.”

— William Stafford

“Poverty plus confidence equals pioneers. We never doubted.”

— William Stafford

Anyone who breathes is in the rhythm business.

— William Stafford

You can lie at a banquet but you have to be honest in the kitchen.

— William Stafford

Kids: they dance before they learn there is anything that isn't music.

— William Stafford

“There may be losses too great to understand That rove after you and--faint and terrible-- rip unknown through your hand.”

— William Stafford

The ocean and I have many pebbles To find and wash off and roll into shape.

— William Stafford

What you have to do as a writer is . . . write day in and day out no matter what happens.

— William Stafford

When the snake decided to go straight, he didn't get anywhere.

— William Stafford

A writer is someone who has found a process that will bring about new things.

— William Stafford

You were aimed from birth: you will never be alone... The whole wide world pours down.

— William Stafford

They miss the whisper that runs any day in your mind, "Who are you really, wanderer?"-- and the answer you have to…

— William Stafford

It is this impulse to change the quality of experience that I recognize as central to creation. . . . Out of…

— William Stafford

Once we have tasted far streams, touched the gold, found some limit beyond the waterfall, a season changes and we come back…

— William Stafford

I embrace emerging experience, I participate in discovery. I am a butterfly. I am not a butterfly collector. I want the experience…

— William Stafford

A student comes to me with a piece of writing, holds it out, says, 'Is this good?' A whole sequence of emergencies…

— William Stafford

I heard a bird congratulating itself all day for being a jay. Nobody cared. But it was glad all over again, and…

— William Stafford

“This dream the world is having about itself includes a trace on the plains of the Oregon trail, a groove in the…

— William Stafford

Everyone is born a poet - a person discovering the way words sound and work, caring and delighting in words. I just…

— William Stafford

The things you do not have to say make you rich. Saying things you do not have to say weakens your talk.…

— William Stafford

I keep following this sort of hidden river of my life, you know, whatever the topic or impulse which comes, I follow…

— William Stafford

“Assurance" You will never be alone, you hear so deep a sound when autumn comes. Yellow pulls across the hills and thrums,…

— William Stafford

“If you don't know the kind of person I am and I don't know the kind of person you are a pattern…

— William Stafford

I have a feeling that art is something you do for yourself, and that any time you turn your decisions over to…

— William Stafford

The Way It Is There’s a thread you follow. It goes among things that change. But it doesn’t change. People wonder about…

— William Stafford

The things you do not have to say make you rich. Saying the things you do not have to say weakens your…

— William Stafford

I have this feeling of wending my way or plundering through a mysterious jungle of possibilities when I am writing. This jungle…

— William Stafford

Ask Me Some time when the river is ice ask me mistakes I have made. Ask me whether what I have done…

— William Stafford

“All events and experiences are local, somewhere. And all human enhancements of events and experiences -- all the arts -- are regional…

— William Stafford

“Waking At 3 a.m." Even in the cave of the night when you wake and are free and lonely, neglected by others,…

— William Stafford

“A Ritual to Read to Each Other If you don’t know the kind of person I am and I don’t know the…

— William Stafford

Writing itself is one of the great, free human activities. There is scope for individuality, and elation, and discovery. In writing, for…

— William Stafford

If you can say it, it begins to exist.

— William Stafford

There are so many things admirable people do not understand.

— William Stafford

Even the upper end of the river believes in the ocean.

— William Stafford