September twenty-second, Sir, the bough cracks with unpicked apples, and at dawn the small-mouth bass breaks water, gorged with spawn.

We feel the machine slipping from our hands As if someone else were steering; If we see light at the end of the tunnel, It's the light of the oncoming train.

Pity the planet, all joy gone from this sweet volcanic cone; peace to our children when they fall in small war on the heel of small war--until the end of time to police the earth, a ghost orbiting forever lost in our monotonous sublime

I saw the spiders marching through the air, Swimming from tree to tree that mildewed day In latter August when the hay Came creaking to the barn. But where The wind is westerly, Where gnarled November makes the spiders fly Into the apparitions of the sky, They purpose nothing but their ease and die Urgently beating east to sunrise and the sea.

Middle Age At forty-five, What next, what next? At every corner, I meet my Father, My age, still alive.

I'm sure that writing isn't a craft, that is, something for which you learn the skills and go on turning out. It must come from some deep impulse, deep inspiration. That can't be taught, it can't be what you use in teaching.

It's the light of the oncoming train.