The Poet With His Face In His HandsYou want to cry aloud for your mistakes. But to tell the truth the world doesn’t need anymore of that sound.So if you’re going to do it and...

…eventually tides will be the only calendar you believe in…And someone’s face, whom you love, will be as a starBoth intimate and ultimate, And you will be heart-shaken and respectful. And you will hear the...

Love, love, love, says Percy.And hurry as fast as you canalong the shining beach, or the rubble, or the dust.Then, go to sleep.Give up your body heat, your beating heart.Then, trust.

Sometimes I dreamthat everything in the world is here, in my room, in a great closet, named and orderly,and I am here too, in front of it, hardly able to see for the flash and...

It’s not the weight you carrybut how you carry it -books, bricks, grief -it’s all in the wayyou embrace it, balance it, carry itwhen you cannot, and would not,put it down.”So I went practicing.Have you...

The man who has many answersis often foundin the theaters of informationwhere he offers, graciously,his deep findings.While the man who has only questions,to comfort himself, makes music.

Percy wakes me (fourteen)Percy wakes me and I am not ready.He has slept all night under the covers.Now he’s eager for action: a walk, then breakfast.So I hasten up. He is sitting on the kitchen...

In your handsThe dog, the donkey, surely they knowThey are alive.Who would argue otherwise?But now, after years of consideration,I am getting beyond that.What about the sunflowers? What aboutThe tulips, and the pines?Listen, all you have...

EVERY DOG’S STORYI have a bed, my very own.It’s just my size.And sometimes I like to sleep alonewith dreams inside my eyes.But sometimes dreams are dark and wild and creepyand I wake and am afraid,...

I simply do not distinguish between work and play.

Poetry is a life-cherishing force. For poems are not words, after all, but fires for the cold, ropes let down to the lost, something as necessary as bread in the pockets of the hungry.

But I want to extol not the sweetness nor the placidity of the dog, but the wilderness out of which he cannot step entirely, and from which we benefit. For wilderness is our first home...

LITTLE DOGS RHAPSODY IN THE NIGHT(PERCY THREE)He puts his cheek against mineand makes small, expressive sounds.And when I’m awake, or awake enoughhe turns upside down, his four pawsin the airand his eyes dark and fervent.Tell...

The woods that I loved as a child are entirely gone. The woods that I loved as a young adult are gone. The woods that most recently I walked in are not gone, but they’re...

So come to the pond, or the river of your imagination, or the harbor of your longing,and put your lips to the world.And live your life.

As for the body, it is solid and strong and curiousand full of detail: it wants to polish itself; it wants to love another body; it is the only vessel in the world that can...

Tell me, what is it you plan to dowith your one wild and precious life?

I feel the terror of idleness,like a red thirst.Death isn’t just an idea.

How heron comesIt is a negligence of the mindnot to notice how at duskheron comes to the pond andstands there in his death robes, perfectservant of the system, hungry, his eyesfull of attention, his wingspure...

Be prepared. A dog is adorable and noble.A dog is a true and loving friend. A dogis also a hedonist.

I was very careful never to take an interesting job. If you have an interesting job, you get interested in it.

How I go to the woodsOrdinarily, I go to the woods alone, with not a singlefriend, for they are all smilers and talkers and therefore unsuitable.I don’t really want to be witnessed talking to the...

Of course I am thinking the Lord was once young and will never in fact be old.And who else could this be, who goes off down the green path,Carrying his sandals, and singing?

I have a little dog who likes to nap with me.He climbs on my body and puts his face in my neck.He is sweeter than soap.He is more wonderful than a diamond necklace,which can’t even...

Someone I loved once gave me a box full of darkness. It took me years to understand that this too, was a gift.

Poetry is a life-cherishing force.

Oh Lord of melons, of mercy, though I am not ready, nor worthy, I am climbing towards you.

What can we dobut keep on breathing in and out,modest and willing, and in our places?

oxygen Everything needs it: bone, muscles, and even, while it calls the earth its home, the soul. So the merciful, noisy machine stands in our house working away in its lung-like voice. I hear it...

The sweetness of dogs (fifteen) What do you say, Percy? I am thinkingof sitting out on the sand to watchthe moon rise. Full tonight.So we goand the moon rises, so beautiful it makes me shudder,...

It’s not a competition, it’s a doorway.

I worked probably 25 years by myself, just writing and working, not trying to publish much, not giving readings.

The Uses Of Sorrow(In my sleep I dreamed this poem)Someone I loved once gave mea box full of darkness.It took me years to understandthat this, too, was a gift.

Every springI hear the thrush singingin the glowing woodshe is only passing through.His voice is deep,then he lifts it until it seemsto fall from the sky.I am thrilled.I am grateful.Then, by the end of morning,he’s...

Because of the dog’s joyfulness, our own is increased. It is no small gift. It is not the least reason why we should honor as well as love the dog of our own life, and...

Why I Wake Early Hello, sun in my face.Hello, you who made the morningand spread it over the fieldsand into the faces of the tulipsand the nodding morning glories,and into the windows of, even, themiserable...

Sleeping In The ForestI thought the earth remembered me,she took me back so tenderly,arranging her dark skirts, her pocketsfull of lichens and seeds.I slept as never before, a stone on the river bed,nothing between me...

You are young. So you know everything. You leap into the boat and begin rowing. But, listen to me. Without fanfare, without embarrassment, without doubt,I talk directly to your soul. Listen to me.

To live in this world, you must be able to do three things: to love what is mortal; to hold it against your bones knowing your own life depends on it; and, when the time...

I read the way a person might swim, to save his or her life. I wrote that way too.

The poet dreams of the mountainSometimes I grow weary of the days, with all their fits and starts.I want to climb some old gray mountains, slowly, takingThe rest of my lifetime to do it, resting...

It’s very important to write things down instantly, or you can lose the way you were thinking out a line. I have a rule that if I wake up at 3 in the morning and...

If I’ve done my work well, I vanish completely from the scene. I believe it is invasive of the work when you know too much about the writer.

In Blackwater WoodsLook, the treesare turningtheir own bodiesinto pillarsof light,are giving off the richfragrance of cinnamonand fulfillment,the long tapersof cattailsare bursting and floating away overthe blue shouldersof the ponds,and every pond,no matter what itsname is,...

Do Stones Feel?Do stones feel?Do they love their life?Or does their patience drown out everything else?When I walk on the beach I gather a fewwhite ones, dark ones, the multiple colors.Don’t worry, I say, I’ll...

And it is exceedingly short, his galloping life. Dogs die so soon. I have my stories of that grief, no doubt many of you do also. It is almost a failure of will, a failure...

If you suddenly and unexpectedly feel joy, don’t hesitate. Give in to it. There are plenty of lives and whole towns destroyed or about to be. We are not wise, and not very often kind....

At Blackwater Pond At Blackwater Pond the tossed waters have settledafter a night of rain.I dip my cupped hands. I drinka long time. It tasteslike stone, leaves, fire. It falls coldinto my body, waking the...

I believe you did not have a happy life.I believe you were cheated.I believe your best friends were loneliness and misery.I believe your busiest enemies were anger and depression.I believe joy was a game you...

When it’s over, I want to say: all my life I was a bride married to amazement. I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms.