Found looking for something entirely different, in a Mary Oliver collection

In a story I shall tell later, I bought a stunning etching of "my favorite corner in all the world", as I call Chicago's Michigan and Wacker, from a talented artisan yesterday. I had spotted a Mary Oliver quote on his work-table, and I came home to page through Oliver after Oliver to identify the poem.

While I was frantically searching for the printmaker's quote, this found me. I don't remember having met it, previously, but, oh, it's recognizable now.

Walden, by Mary Oliver

It isn't very far as highways lie.

I might be back by nightfall, having seen

The rough pines, and the stones, and the clear water.

Friends argue that I might be wiser for it.

They do not hear that far-off Yankee whisper:

How dull we grow from hurrying here and there!

Many have gone, and think me half a fool

To miss a day away in the cool country.

Maybe. But in a book I read and cherish,

Going to Walden is not so easy a thing

As a green visit. It is the slow and difficult

Trick of living, and finding it where you are.

Fifteen Rounds, Old School

"Don't be afraid if your dreams change. It can be great. Life's not a three-round amateur fight. It's 15 rounds, old school."

Found this morning, in the Chicago Tribune's interview with the week's "Remarkable Person", Bill Hillman, former boxing champ and founder of the Windy City Story Slam here in Chicago.