Praise from William Stafford

looking at an old notebook
I was bored last night so I started looking through some old notebooks I had kept. I came across page after page of drafts for a poem. It was interesting to me to see the process of getting the words down to what I was actually trying to say. The early drafts became the poem "Circuits" that is in my book, The Wilderness Within.

Years ago, William Stafford, Poet Laureate, looked at the poem "Circuits" in a workshop and said it reminded him of the work of Gerard Manley Hopkins. And then he asked me, "How easy is this for you?" I did not mention the pages of drafts, but I did say that I like to play with words. I do. Writing poetry is playing with words until I get it right.

Here is the poem:  


                                                                             Circuits

Light from a star that died

shines out

from jade green eyes.

A salmon tail fans streambed stones

and dark silt swirls.

Millennia ago a star spurt fire and

now a constellation of eggs

and white milt spiral down

in black water.

Fishbone lattices litter the stream

that speaks of glaciers

and purls.

Frost flowers bloom on the cut bank

while embryos curl in sweet cold sleep below.

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