NEW POETRY BOOK
The poems in Still Possible pay homage to the invisible passage of time – the deep, private current that wends through our lives as a steadfast companion, sculpting our interior worlds as inexorably and exquisitely as its visible manifestations. Whyte turns his eye, and his pen, to the possibilities and harvests this shaping reveals: the shyness and vulnerability of love, the illusion of imperfection, and the new invitations that beckon along the way.
The poems reflect an abiding faith in time’s wisdom: a journey turned away from in youth waits patiently for later maturity; an early experience ripens in secret to reveal, decades later, a full understanding. Under Whyte’s poet-philosopher gaze, a rain-soaked day in an Irish farmouse becomes a meditation on the essence of a good day: a settled contentment, alert and open to whatever may call. Plus sheep, Seamus Heaney and a dog.
Powerful language rests on a foundation of what isn’t said, a silence underpinning the eloquence of articulation. In this way, Still Possible hovers above the numinous and the unknowable – what we pray for, what we pass on, what mystery awaits and, in the end, what it might mean to be happy.
It took you
so many years
to credit
the miracle light,
though it always
faithfully
made its difficult way
toward you.
It took you so long
to see the way
understanding rises
from the very center
of your own body
everyday and luminous,
from arriving waves
of what only seems
like the ordinary.
But you know now
the strength
of those arms
you were given,
you know now
the immensity
of the forces
coming and going
in your own tidal heart.
- David Whyte, excerpt from
PILGRIM ISLAND, from STILL POSSIBLE
ABOUT DAVID
David Whyte is an internationally renowned poet and author, and a scintillating and moving speaker. Behind these talents lies a very physical attempt to give voice to the wellsprings of human identity, human striving and, most difficult of all, the possibilities for human happiness.
His talks, to audiences of all persuasions, on everything from literature to leadership, heartbreak to healing; mindfulness to mythology, weave poetry, story and commentary into a moving, almost physical experience of the themes that run through every human life: joy and loss, vulnerability and vitality, courage and despair, beauty and necessary heartbreak. He draws from hundreds of memorized poems, his own and those of other beloved poets such as Wordsworth, Emily Dickinson, Keats, Pablo Neruda, Fleur Adcock and the sonnets of Shakespeare.
He is the author of ten books of poetry, three books of prose on the transformative nature of work; a widely-acclaimed, best-selling book of essays, and an extensive audio collection.
Learn More
NEWSLETTER
Sign up to receive notice of events, new releases and more …
New Poem Card Sets
New POEM CARDS - Sweet Darkness
$13.00
Newly designed in 2021 by artist Myrna Keliher at Expedition Press in Kingston, Washington, these elegant cards are beautifully presented in boxed sets of three, with envelopes.
Dimensions: 6.5 x 4.5 inches
Poems: The Opening of Eyes, Sweet Darkness, The Well of Grief
New Poem Cards - Faith
New POEM CARDS - Faith
$13.00
Newly designed in 2021 by artist Myrna Keliher at Expedition Press in Kingston, Washington, these elegant cards are beautifully presented in boxed sets of three, with envelopes.
Dimensions: 6.5 x 4.5 inches
Poems: Faith, Tilicho Lake, Self Portrait
JANUARY ONLINE SERIES
START CLOSE IN: Shaping Our Lives to an Inner Simplicity: and an Outer Creative Life — Equal to the Challenge of Our Times
ALSO FEATURED ON (click to listen)
