some william stafford notes to self, 1956-1957

8/12/2019 Some William Stafford Notes to Self, 1956-1957

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Some William Stafford Notes to Self

1956-1957

by Kim Stafford

Its July, a week of rainy weather here in Oregon, and Im teaching a class in the Library

at Lewis & Clark College. Now and then, I remember how odd this undertaking is: Imteaching a class called Stafford Studies about the writing and life of my late father, the

poet William Stafford. A Stafford teaching a Stafford. We delve into the Archives,

looking closely at his daily writing pages (22,000 of them to consider), his photographs

(some 16,000 images), his correspondence (around 50,000 pages there)while in exhibit

cases we can study his beat up Stella guitar, his rusty double-bitted ax, his camera and

battered felt hat.


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Its all a bit spooky for me. Its the centennial of my dads birth, a fact that I and others

have magnified into something were calling The William Stafford Centennial 2014: 100

Years of Poetry & Peace. There are seven new books out, by him or about him, and

events in his honor in libraries and schools all over. Here at the college, where he taught

from 1948-1978 (and where I have taught from 1979 until now), hes a big deal this year,

and as I try to make my innocent way down the hall on my way to class, the old man

suddenly looms up before me on the screen for campus events:

There he is with his camera, in a stern self-portrait that, under the circumstances, seems

to be interrogating me: What are you up to, my boy?Big brother gazes from the wall.

I must say, those eyebrows are amazing, still. And the hungry gaze of his camera

startling. Staring into his glare, I recall what a kind person he wasmost of the time. But

he was always also, as he described himself, Friendly, but not tame.


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When I walk into the library, the old man is everywhere:

At such a moment, I experience the arresting, surreal nature of my endeavor: teaching my

father. My students are studying the work of a writer, teacher, and witness for peace, an

enigmatic artist at a safe distance but I am blundering into the inner life of my father,

and now and then Im brought up short.

Today this happens when one among us, Stevemy old friend, and the son of my

fathers close colleague Kenny Johnsonhands me something that turned up at his house

this morning: its my father calendar and diary from 1956-57, when I was seven years

old.

I thought this was my dads, Steve says, but its your dads. I wonder why it was with

my dads stuff. Here, you take it.


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In my hands, the book feels like the fifties, stationary store, cheap tool for simple order.

But as I leaf through the brittle pages turning sepia at the edges, I think I know why my

father exported it to Kennys. This book could be upsetting, even incendiary, if left at

home and found by one of us, for it is filled, along with notes about errands and actions

and tiny financial decisions, with private counsel about the struggles of life.

August 1:

I heard my boy crying in the mountains. I had crossed a river, climbed a slope

found a cave. He stood far below.

September 1:

I said today, Are you tired of living with me? Can you like the way I am?

October 22:

Almost trapped at school for faculty meeting.

October 30:

I distrust the good things I say.

November 2:

Biked thru clear, sharp afternoon, like living in a diamond.

November 5:

Letter from Lulu in Alabama, about her experience being hit by a star.

December 18:

Men at school gloomy about Christmas. I told Dorothy & she blew up,

feeling that the spirit is gone, that the feeling of Christmas is missed(be men?).

December 21:

7thDay Adventist at door with carol & asking for help for the poor;

by time I got to kitchen Kim was emptying his purse for the man.


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There is my father, brooding about his relations with my mother (Can you like the way I

am?), with his college (trapped at school), with relatives and friends (Letter from

Lulu), and with his writing (I distrust the good things I say). And there is me, an

impulsive child in my fathers gaze (Kim was emptying his purse).

First I think of his poem What in My Journal, which came back to me this summer

when we were emptying the house, my parents both gone. I opened my fathers

miscellaneous drawer, and the poem leaped to mind:

Whats in My Journal

Odd things, like a button drawer. Mean

things, fishhooks, barbs in your hand.

But marbles too. A genius for being agreeable.

Junkyard crucifixes, voluptuousdiscards. Space for knickknacks, and for

Alaska. Evidence to hang me, or to beatify.

Clues that lead nowhere, that never connected

anyway. Deliberate obfuscation, the kind

that takes genius. Chasms in character.

Loud omissions. Mornings that yawn above

a new grave. Pages you know exist

but you can't find them. Someone's terribly

inevitable life story, maybe mine.

The stuff in the drawer the stuff in the journal the stuff in his mind he never shared

it all begins to mix richly in my head. Its like there is this telescope I am looking


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throughlooking the wrong way, gazing back down the tunnel of time to find my

fathers fountain pen scribbling his daily assessments in private for then, but also for this

moment, for his inquisitive child Kim.

I almost speak aloud:Daddy, Im trespassing on your privacy, yes but Im caretaking

your legacy, too and Im your fellow seeker delving into the mysteries of daily life and

creation.

Im seeing through time by this telescope, but I have the prickly feeling Im also looking

in a mirror. Ill be gone, someday, like him. My pages, my images, my half-completed

schemes will be layered in boxes, a kind of delayed-action life for someone, or no one, to

sift.

What fishhooks may be there?

I remember when my father and I would give a poetry reading together, now over twenty

years ago, he would read two or three of his concise acts of witness, and I would follow

with a song, a passage of rapturous prose, or a poem like some incantation. After my

performance, my father would shake his head, and the audience would laugh. Was he

disapproving? I think not. He was indicating to me, if not to others: You are different

from me, my boy. And thats good.

At this point, I have to close the diary, and step outside. The rain has stopped. On a stone

bench, water has gathered in a tiny pool reflecting the tops of trees. In the long struggle

of a layered life, I have managed, yet again, to return to the primary world of grit and

water and air. Bowing low, I savor the rim of light around the periphery of the sky.

some william stafford notes to self, 1956-1957

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