155 Quotes by Theodore Roethke

I do not laugh; I do not cry;I'm sweating out the will to die.My past is sliding down the drain;I soon will be myself again.

Be sure that whatever you are is you.

Self-contemplation is a curseThat makes an old confusion worse.

I've recovered my tenderness by long looking;I'm a Socrates of small fury.The waves bends with the fish. I'm taughtAs water teaches stone. Believe me, extremest oriole,I can hear light on a dry day.The world is where we fling it; I'm leaving where I am.

A wave of Time hangs motionless on this particular shore.I notice a tree, arsenical grey in the light, or the slowWheel of the stars, the Great Bear glittering colder than snow,And remember there was something else I was hoping for.

from Open HouseMy truths are all foreknown,This anguish self-revealed.I'm naked to the bone,With nakedness my shield.Myself is what I wear:I keep the spirit spare.

I learn by going where I have to go

from The AuctionI left my home with unencumbered willAnd all the rubbish of confusion sold.

I feel her presence in the common day, In that slow dark that widens every eye.She moves as water moves, and comes to me,Stayed by what was, and pulled by what would be.