Theodore Roethke: Timing

“Snail, snail, glister me forward,
Bird, soft-sigh me home,
Worm, be with me.
This is my hard time.”

Theodore Roethke

"The Lost Son," ll. 8-11
The Lost Son and Other Poems (1948)
Context: I shook the softening chalk of my bones,
Saying,
Snail, snail, glister me forward,
Bird, soft-sigh me home,
Worm, be with me.
This is my hard time.

Home , Bird , Time

“There's time enough.
Behold, in the lout's eye, love.”

Theodore Roethke

"I Cry, Love! Love!," ll. 33-39
Praise to the End! (1951)
Context: Beginnings start without shade,
Thinner than minnows.
The live grass whirls with the sun,
Feet run over the simple stones,
There's time enough.
Behold, in the lout's eye, love.

Love , Time

“But who would count eternity in days?
These old bones live to learn her wanton ways:
(I measure time by how a body sways.)”

Theodore Roethke

"I Knew a Woman," ll. 22-28
Words for the Wind (1958)
Context: Let seed be grass, and grass turn into hay:
I'm martyr to a motion not my own;
What's freedom for? To know eternity.
I swear she cast a shadow white as stone.
But who would count eternity in days?
These old bones live to learn her wanton ways:
(I measure time by how a body sways.)

Way , Learning , Time

“In a dark time, the eye begins to see.”

Theodore Roethke

Time

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

Theodore Roethke

Source: Words for the Wind: The Collected Verse

Time , Waiting

“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.”

Theodore Roethke

Fear , Light , Learning , Water

“Let others probe the mystery if they can.
Time-harried prisoners of Shall and Will —
The right thing happens to the happy man.”