A Poem for a Thursday #304

William Stafford was 48 years old when his first successful volume of poetry was published. That volume, Traveling Through the Dark, won the 1963 Book Award for Poetry. Stafford typically wrote short poems that concentrated on the ordinary bits of life. He wrote in a gentle, conversational style that pulls the reader into the inner circle of his life.

Now has come, an easy time. I let it
roll. There is a lake somewhere
so blue and far nobody owns it.
A wind comes by and a willow listens 
gracefully.

I hear all this, every summer. I laugh
and cry for every turn of the world,
its terribly cold, innocent spin.
That lake stays blue and free; it goes
on and on.

And I know where it is.

Why I Am Happy
William Stafford