Here you will find the Poem After Arguing Against The Contention That Art Must Come From Discontent of poet William Stafford
Whispering to each handhold, ?I'll be back,? I go up the cliff in the dark. One place I loosen a rock and listen a long time till it hits, faint in the gulf, but the rush of the torrent almost drowns it out, and the wind? I almost forgot the wind: it tears at your side or it waits and then buffets; you sag outward. . . . I remember they said it would be hard. I scramble by luck into a little pocket out of the wind and begin to beat on the stones with my scratched numb hands, rocking back and forth in silent laughter there in the dark? ?Made it again!? Oh how I love this climb! ?the whispering to stones, the drag, the weight as your muscles crack and ease on, working right. They are back there, discontent, waiting to be driven forth. I pound on the earth, riding the earth past the stars: ?Made it again! Made it again!?
