The poem
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow. I feel my fate in what I cannot fear. I learn by going where I have to go.
We think by feeling. What is there to know? I hear my being dance from ear to ear. I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
Of those so close beside me, which are you? God bless the Ground! I shall walk softly there, And learn by going where I have to go.
Light takes the Tree; but who can tell us how? The lowly worm climbs up a winding stair; I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
Great Nature has another thing to do To you and me; so take the lively air, And, lovely, learn by going where to go.
This shaking keeps me steady. I should know. What falls away is always. And is near. I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow. I learn by going where I have to go.
Poetry is not my forte. I work in the oil field driving truck so know what a worm is but have climbed the winding stair and when always falls away this poem will still express life.
Roethke has been described by Jay Parini "a latter day transcendentalist, finding spiritual correspondences in physical things". He was institutionalised on several occasions for brief periods and liked "to identify himself with 'mad' poets of the past e.g. William Blake, Christopher Smart". When Roethke writes in the last verse above, "this shaking keeps me steady", the words are in keeping with his views of his breakdown as in essence spiritual crisis. There is an echo of this poem in his other poem "words for the Wind" where he writes "What falls away will fall;/ All things bring me love.
this poem is almost like he is waiting for his death in the line " i wake to sleep, and take my waking slow." It makes you wonder what he has went through in his life. The words he uses creates a feeling or doom, or death. He may even be lost, lost in his own mind.